Jao The Ultimate Beginners Mead Recipe

[Kingy]

2 batches of this today with some fresh local honey. 1st was made as per original. 2nd i used 1 and half cinnamon sticks and 2 cloves.

 

[Croc_TFNQ]

I know nothing about mead never tasted it . However I love your sense of humor with this bit :lol: (This recipe is designed for beginners. Everyone else with an opinion can just buggar off!)

 

[mr_wibble]

I made the 25 litre batch over easter.

It was difficult to mix $100 worth of top-quality local honey with the ****** oranges coles sells.
(i had to discard 3 rotten ones from a brand new bag)

Anyway, it seems to be fermenting along nicely.
I hope it's making all the clothes in the wardrobe smell spicy-orange

-kt

 

[troopa]

Mr Wibble
I have a wine fridge tucked down the back that i brewed 4 batches of Mead in over 3 years ago.. to this day the fridge still smells So damn good every time i open it, even though the demijohns were taken out 2.5 years ago

 

[Kingy]

Its hard waiting for this stuff to clear and drop out. But the one on the right is clearing up so not long now. It smells and tastes amazing. (Yep pulled a small amount out with a syringe for a tester, i was to inquisitive ) im definately going to make a full sized batch sometime before the weather warms up.

 

[Moad]

I just did a batch with some raw honey a friend had, tastes good unfermented so hopefully it turns out.

I left out the raisins, just threw the oranges and a couple of cloves and cinnamon in. Also did a smaller batch with some oak in there that was left in the demijon from a bourbon.

Great thread

 

[Steed]

Hi Pete, thanks for the recipie! I was hunting for a mead recipie in metric and after reading your fantastic post I knew this was the one. I'm just about to add the yeast and leave it to relax in a cupboard, fairly stable 20c tempreture in there so fingers crossed. My only concern is the yeast I used (Doves Farm Quick Yeast), it includes an emulsifier sorbitan monostearate.... hopefully this won't do anything too scary to the brew.

Also, current room is ~20c and the liquid in the demijohn doesn't want to go down below 25 it seems... I've left it to aclimatise for almost two hours and very little change. Reckon it's alright to throw the yeast in at this tempreture?

Edit: Wow, the forum dreged up that photo... some mankey wort from about 5 years ago!

 

[philmud]

Here's my effort, brewed 6 months and one day ago. It's not too shabby, a bit sweet for mine, but quite smooth and the spices come through in a good amount.
I also did a metheglin that's still in the demijohn & I'm hoping that's drier.
If I do a mead again it'll be a larger batch. As for this one, I think I'll leave it for a few more months before trying again. It's pretty good, but a couple of flavours coming through that I'm hoping will mellow.

 

[NickZed]

Good morning one and all,
Long time lurker, first time poster here....

I just put my first batch of Mead on to brew last night (as per Brewer Pete's recipe on Page 3)...

---------------------------------------
1. 1.5kg Stringy Bark Honey (purchased from Archibald Honey on line...$22 for 2 litre...really dark...yum)
2. Warm water added to Honey. Stirred slowly with spatula until liquid like pancake syrup.
3. Honey poured into 5L demijohn using small plastic funnel.
4. 8 slices of a washed and scrubbed Orange added.
5. 1 clove added.
6. 1 stick of cinnamon, smashed into pieces added.
7. 25 Raisins added.
8. Cold water to bring total volume of must to 3.8L added.
9. Closed Grolsch style lid and shook to oxygenate wort and mix in yeast.
10. S type airlock and bung fitted.
11. Airlock filled with sterilisation mixture.
12. 5L demijohn added to dark cupboard.
13. One sachet (8 grams) of Coles Tandaco dried yeast

This morning this baby was bubbling a treat...roll on Mead.

I was wondering...what are the tell tale signs that the mead is ready for bottling...from my reading I'll be waiting 4-6 weeks until visible bubbling has disappeared and the mixture had settled down. Is there anything else that I should be looking for prior to bottling?

I'm going to bottle in some Grolsch type bottles.

Thanks
Nick

 

[LiquidGold]

Kingy's post above (#815) is a good example of how the mead clears when its ready to bottle. If you wait even longer the fruit will begin to drop to the bottom also.

Both my yellow box and orange blossom attempts have turned out quite well and I have some other honey types to try next although I'm going to go with only 1 kilo of honey for a bit less sweetness.

I'm also really keen on doing a big 20L batch but perhaps not as a JAO.

 

[NickZed]

nice one Mash Maestro, thanks

 

[Gunplumber]

G'day all. Virgin brewer here. Well unless you count coffee. 2 batches of JAO bubbling away now. Only problem might be I started too late this year for lower temps as I have no temp control. I'll keep an eye on it anyway and do my best to keep the temps down. Fingers crossed it works out for me!.

 

[kaiserben]

The OP recipe is for a 5L demijohn.

I want to make some in a 10L cube/jerry can and was just going to double the amount of everything. Is doubling everything a good/bad idea?

Is it okay to glad wrap (rather than air lock) during initial ferment? And then each time I rack to another cube/jerry can to squeeze as much headspace out as I can and tighten cap to seal it?

 

[Kingy]

I just bottled my 3rd batch of this and done a side by side test with some that's nearly 6months old. It's good straight out of the fermeter but it's incredible at 6months.

 

[Kingy]

Cheers

 

[blotto]

I just bottled my 3rd batch of this and done a side by side test with some that's nearly 6months old. It's good straight out of the fermeter but it's incredible at 6months.

ImageUploadedByAussie Home Brewer1447552302.446163.jpg

Hi Kingy,

I like your syphon technique here mate, can you block the short hose to stop the flow? It's very similar to one of these I've been looking at getting one. Did you drill the stopper yourself?

 

[Kingy]

Yea mate just drilled 2 holes and used beer line. I let the beer line sit up from the bottum and wet the outside with starsan so it slides easy through the rubber, as I fill the bottles I move it closer to the bottum as the sediment is fairly floaty as you know if Ya bump it. I just give a little blow in the short tube to get things going.
I've never tried to stop the flow by blocking it as I just transfer to each bottle untill I'm done. Using beer line the flow is steady and doesn't make much mess when you move onto the next bottle.

 

[arpie12008]

Just finished making this along with another similar recipe from elswhere (Champagne yeast). The difference is huge. Yours is perfect and the other........YUCK!!! 5 different people tasting and they all loved this recipe.
THANKS, THANKS, THANKS!!!

 

[skb]

I am going to try this (yes a lame post so it stays in my history)

 

[blotto]

I am going to try this (yes a lame post so it stays in my history)

Just make sure you use regular oranges, I used the only ones I could find at my local little Shop and I think they were a marmalade orange. Bloody bitter as! Been sitting for about a year now so it's time to give it another test.

 

[Deep End]

I cracked my last bottle of JAO at a christmas party earlier this week. I have not tasted it since I bottled it, and then it was "Hot" and like drinking Orange Peel. I have given bottles away over time, entered them in shows etc, but never actually got down to the business of drinking it.
I, and the half a dozen other people game enough to try my wares, were pleasantly surprised. The volatile flavours and racing fuel burn have subsided and mellowed into something quite palatable over the last 2 and half years, not dry not cloyingly sweet either. But the honey profile was there for sure, as was a hint of citrus and a touch of spice.
One guest suggested it was reminiscent of Brandi vino (correct spelling?) I just thought it was a far more relaxed bevarage than the angry liquid it once used to be. And on that basis I am mixing up another batch of JAO this afternoon. Some other meads I have made in the meantime have had a much blander flavour profile than the JAO, so pretty happy about it to be honest.
Cheers
Deep End (Michael)

 

[Simdop]

How does/would Petes original recipe go with White Labs sweet mead yeast (WLP720)?

 

[jewwie]

I've never used WLP720, but from what I can see it has a high alcohol tolerance (15%) so it will finish very dry. I tried this recipe with a champaigne yeast and it turned out extremely hot and took 9 months to settle down. I've also made it with Tandaco bread yeast and it was delicious in only 2 and a half months. The idea of using bread yeast it has a low alcohol tolerance so will the yeast will die out and leave more residual sugar (sweetness). Plus Tandaco is a lot easier to get and cheaper.

Hope that helps.

 

[Simdop]

It does have a high tolerance but according to their description, "A wine yeast strain that is less attenuative than WLP715, leaving some residual sweetness" so I wondered if it would actually work rather well?

 

[Simdop]

Where are people getting their Fleishman's bread yeast from?

 

[kaiserben]

I made this for the first time at the weekend and just used Tandaco Dry Yeast from Coles.

 

[Simdop]

I made this for the first time at the weekend and just used Tandaco Dry Yeast from Coles.

How's it working for you?

 

[Simdop]

I've never used WLP720, but from what I can see it has a high alcohol tolerance (15%) so it will finish very dry. I tried this recipe with a champaigne yeast and it turned out extremely hot and took 9 months to settle down. I've also made it with Tandaco bread yeast and it was delicious in only 2 and a half months. The idea of using bread yeast it has a low alcohol tolerance so will the yeast will die out and leave more residual sugar (sweetness). Plus Tandaco is a lot easier to get and cheaper.

Hope that helps.

Sure does. I misread it before. I'll give Tandaco a whirl. How do you think it would go in a big batch?

 

[kaiserben]

How's it working for you?

It's definitely fermenting. Started up very quickly (an hour or 2). It'll be a couple of months before I package it up and taste the results.

FYI the box of Tandaco I bought has 5 x 7g sachets of yeast. So I used 7g (the recipe calls for a "teaspoon", so 7g is close enough).

I would think 5 x 7g would be more than enough yeast for a ~25L batch.

 

[jewwie]

Hey Simdop, I would only use 2 packets of yeast for 20 to 25L (any more would just be an overkill cause those yeasties will double in population as soon as they acclimatise). If you want to deviate from the recipe (which I am not recommending), you could rehydrate your yeast for 10 to 15 minutes then pitch.
As far as "some residual Sweetness" from the WLP720 that would depend on the OG (which is high in this recipe because it is meant to be a sweet mead) but it will still be a lot drier than the bread yeast. If it was me, I'd do one batch original and one with WLP720 to compare because you don't want anyone telling you not to try something that could just turn out to be the best mead ever :super: