Adding Body To Mead.

[DUANNE]

hey guys, im just making my first mead now and its tasting good. but i drank a bottle of mead tonight i brought back from tassie and while i prefer the flavour of mine the mead i brought back with me had a much nicer mouthfeel. mine is extremely thin were the bought one has a thcker mouthfeel and a smoothness i would love to get in my next attempt. i couldnt say it tatsed much sweeter than mine butim not discounting this as being so.the one ive got down now is orrange blossom that started at 1090 and finished at around 998 using d 47 yeast. it fermented out in 2 and a half weeks and after a month its really starting to clear well. any help from the experianced mead makers on the forum would be well appreciated as id love to nail this stuff.

thanks dwayne

 

[pdilley]

Have to run out the door to work, but really quickly a lot of the body in mead comes from residual sugars in the liquid. Finishing at .998 is dry and means you only have any remaining compounds in your original honey to give an impression of body.

Cheers,
Brewer Pete

 

[raven19]

A lower alcohol tolerant yeast would result in limited fermentation - leaving residual sugars to improve body.

Or you could try a braggot with a high mash temp with the grain component.

 

[Airgead]

There are a few things that will increase body & mouthfeel. Residual sugars is one. Others are things like tanins which you can get by adding oak or geape tannin (from the lhbs).

I'm playing with oaking at the moment. You can get some lovely flavours and better mouthfeel.

Cheers
Dave

 

[DUANNE]

thanks for the replies, so if with the next one i increase from a 1090 og to an 1120-1130 i should get better mouth feel. but how much will it affect the sweetnes of the mead. the last thing i want is an overly sweet drink. im only doing 5 litres at a time so am willing just to keep trying till i get it right.

 

[grantsglutenfreehomebrew]

I've been brewing mead for a few years now and have found the best way to get body is to add maltodextrin. I use a gluten free one made from maize bought from a specialty supplier but I've seen it at lhbs. I use 1 kg for a 20 litre brew. I find 3kg of honey by itself can make a 23 litre brew with a starting gravity of 1.050 and brew out to 0.998 or less. If I add 1kg of maltodextrin and use half the honey (1.5kg) it has a SG of 1.040 and brews out to 1.010. It has a great mouthfeel and body. I use this with hops and other things to make a beer type mead. It definitely has a good head retention as well. Just remember that maltodextrin is only about 30% fermentable.
I have a picture of the beer on my website grantsglutenfreehomebrew.webs.com/ I hope this is of some help.