New Brewer!

[BrenMcgee]

Hey everyone

I am new to brewing and found this forum. When I say new to brewing, I should say I actually haven't even tried yet I want to have a go at brewing my own Mead though. Just looking for any advice, or maybe an easy recipe. I saw the JAO one which looks good, but I think for my first go I would like to try just a plain, quite sweet mead. No fruit or spices in it.

I don't really know a lot about the Gravity stuff either. What the numbers mean, what to do at what number etc.

Any help would be really appreciated.

Thanks
Bren

 

[Siborg]

Hey everyone

I am new to brewing and found this forum. When I say new to brewing, I should say I actually haven't even tried yet I want to have a go at brewing my own Mead though. Just looking for any advice, or maybe an easy recipe. I saw the JAO one which looks good, but I think for my first go I would like to try just a plain, quite sweet mead. No fruit or spices in it.

I don't really know a lot about the Gravity stuff either. What the numbers mean, what to do at what number etc.

Any help would be really appreciated.

Thanks
Bren

Hi Bren

From someone who is new to brewing (not quite sure what a mead is!), I'd like to say welcome and you're heading down a rewarding path.
My advice is start basic, and work into more complex stuff. The best thing is to get a coopers kit, throw away their ingredients and use something from a home brew shop, they sell better quality kits with better yeasts.

My first attempt at the coopers kit with included ingredients was dismal. It was flat, tasteless. My second attempt was a coopers set involving a real ale malt, brew enhancer (1 or 2) and light dry extract all bought from big w. Its a nice beer that I've nearly exhausted my supply of.

And read, read, read. Ask questions on the forums, theres heaps of experienced brewers on here that are happy to lend advice from their experiences. On the same token, I have found that everyone has there own way of doing things, so its up to you to determine whats consensus and whats differences in methods/techniques.

The gravity thing is easy... Water has a gravity of 1.000 at room temp. Adding sugars to water, makes it heaver, hence a higher gravity reading such as 1.050. When the yeast eats the sugars and makes the precious alcohol, there is less sugar, so the gravity is lowered, such as 1.012. Why is there still a gravity reading of more than 1.000? Because the yeast doesn't consume all the sugars in a brew.

Choose wisely before making any purchases, even ask on these forums. Alot of people have wasted money on inferior or unnecessary things.

Good luck with your brewing!

 

[avaneyk]

Hi Bren

From someone who is new to brewing (not quite sure what a mead is!), I'd like to say welcome and you're heading down a rewarding path.
My advice is start basic, and work into more complex stuff. The best thing is to get a coopers kit, throw away their ingredients and use something from a home brew shop, they sell better quality kits with better yeasts.

My first attempt at the coopers kit with included ingredients was dismal. It was flat, tasteless. My second attempt was a coopers set involving a real ale malt, brew enhancer (1 or 2) and light dry extract all bought from big w. Its a nice beer that I've nearly exhausted my supply of.

And read, read, read. Ask questions on the forums, theres heaps of experienced brewers on here that are happy to lend advice from their experiences. On the same token, I have found that everyone has there own way of doing things, so its up to you to determine whats consensus and whats differences in methods/techniques.

The gravity thing is easy... Water has a gravity of 1.000 at room temp. Adding sugars to water, makes it heaver, hence a higher gravity reading such as 1.050. When the yeast eats the sugars and makes the precious alcohol, there is less sugar, so the gravity is lowered, such as 1.012. Why is there still a gravity reading of more than 1.000? Because the yeast doesn't consume all the sugars in a brew.

Choose wisely before making any purchases, even ask on these forums. Alot of people have wasted money on inferior or unnecessary things.

Good luck with your brewing!

If I remember correctly, when making mead you can end up with a final gravity of less than 1.000. Residual sugars will give you an SG greater than 1.000 but since honey is completely fermentable and alcohol has an SG lower than water then the SG of a fermented mixture of honey and water can have an SG lower than plain water.

 

[Siborg]

If I remember correctly, when making mead you can end up with a final gravity of less than 1.000. Residual sugars will give you an SG greater than 1.000 but since honey is completely fermentable and alcohol has an SG lower than water then the SG of a fermented mixture of honey and water can have an SG lower than plain water.

There you go... I didn't know that. So a mead is beer with honey used instead of sugar?

 

[avaneyk]

There you go... I didn't know that. So a mead is beer with honey used instead of sugar?

Not really - mead is more like honey wine - it doesn't have any malt in it so its not actually a beer...

 

[BrenMcgee]

Thanks for the replies. Yes, basic Mead is made from just honey, water, and yeast. It is called honey wine because of the process of making it, or so I'm told, but it isn't really a wine.
Thanks for explaining the gravity stuff, knowing that will come in handy!

 

[gwozniak]

Meads are great if made well but they give you hangovers. I heard there's something in honey that stays in after the fermentation and buggers you up. I also know they take quite a while to ferment out.

But they are nice!!!! That's all I know, i'm all about beer.

 

[[email protected]]

From what I remember, mead takes somewhere in the range of 4 months to ferment, and i don't believe the FG would drop below 1000 as it is quite a thick drink with alot of unfermented honey left in it. But as far as any actual recipies, you would have to google it. But as far as never having brewed before, if your starting with mead it will be a long and anxious time. You might want to do some beers and stuff to get the hang of the brewing process, and then try some mead, at least you will have something to drink while you wait!

 

[pdilley]

Building upon gravity, yeast eats the sugars making alcohol and co2 (and a whole lot of other things in smaller quantities that change flavours, aromas, give headaches, and somewhat not good for you). Brewers refer to gravity numbers as "gravity points", so 1.050 gravity they drop the one which is no sugars and say they have 50 gravity points for the yeast to work with. A completely rough-as-guts guide is for every 7.75 gravity points consumed you get 1% alcohol out of the yeast.

You can say the above expression of gravity by starting (original) gravity minus the final (terminal) gravity equals what the yeast ate. What the yeast ate times 129 is a rough estimate of alcohol.

Generally speaking fermentations called beers have cereal grain bases to their recipe. Fermentations called wines have fruit bases to their recipe. Don't stress it because no one seems to know this and names are crossed (sake, made from rice, a cereal grain is called rice wine in the Western World incorrectly as its rice beer, and so on.)

Cereal grains are starch and yeast needs sugar instead so we need to make sugars. With barley beers malting (a form of sprouting) the grain and then holding the grain in heated water lets enzymes turn the starch into sugar for yeast. Rice needs mould to convert its starch to sugars. Honey is just dehydrated plant sugars so nothing needed except dilute it to desired starting gravity.

Barley conversion is not exact so you get residiual sugar elements that the yeast can not eat. This residual sugar gives beers its slightly sweet taste, body, etc.

Honey and fruits make for all intents and purposes fully digestible sugars for yeast to eat. More so than barley by comparrison. Here you can not rely on residual sugar to keep them sweet and completely bone dry is not favoured by most people. Beer makers have it easy and dont have to learn much about yeast performance when designing their recipes as do wine and mead makers.

This is why JAO for example on here has a starting gravity near 126 Brewer Points while your average beer is somewhere between 30 and 50 Brewer Points. JAO is matched to its yeast, in this case bread yeast, to finish sweet while beers dont care about yeast performance, instead relying on the residual unfermentable sugars to keep them from tasting bone dry.



Cheers,
Brewer Pete

 

[Siborg]

Building upon gravity, yeast eats the sugars making alcohol and co2 (and a whole lot of other things in smaller quantities that change flavours, aromas, give headaches, and somewhat not good for you). Brewers refer to gravity numbers as "gravity points", so 1.050 gravity they drop the one which is no sugars and say they have 50 gravity points for the yeast to work with. A completely rough-as-guts guide is for every 7.75 gravity points consumed you get 1% alcohol out of the yeast.

You can say the above expression of gravity by starting (original) gravity minus the final (terminal) gravity equals what the yeast ate. What the yeast ate times 129 is a rough estimate of alcohol.

Generally speaking fermentations called beers have cereal grain bases to their recipe. Fermentations called wines have fruit bases to their recipe. Don't stress it because no one seems to know this and names are crossed (sake, made from rice, a cereal grain is called rice wine in the Western World incorrectly as its rice beer, and so on.)

Cereal grains are starch and yeast needs sugar instead so we need to make sugars. With barley beers malting (a form of sprouting) the grain and then holding the grain in heated water lets enzymes turn the starch into sugar for yeast. Rice needs mould to convert its starch to sugars. Honey is just dehydrated plant sugars so nothing needed except dilute it to desired starting gravity.

Barley conversion is not exact so you get residiual sugar elements that the yeast can not eat. This residual sugar gives beers its slightly sweet taste, body, etc.

Honey and fruits make for all intents and purposes fully digestible sugars for yeast to eat. More so than barley by comparrison. Here you can not rely on residual sugar to keep them sweet and completely bone dry is not favoured by most people. Beer makers have it easy and dont have to learn much about yeast performance when designing their recipes as do wine and mead makers.

This is why JAO for example on here has a starting gravity near 126 Brewer Points while your average beer is somewhere between 30 and 50 Brewer Points. JAO is matched to its yeast, in this case bread yeast, to finish sweet while beers dont care about yeast performance, instead relying on the residual unfermentable sugars to keep them from tasting bone dry.



Cheers,
Brewer Pete

Good words brewer pete... Very informative.

 

[Airgead]

My 2c...

A sweet mead is probably the hardest thing to brew. Honey will (as others have said) ferment out dry. You really only have 3 options for making a sweet mead - 1 - use a yeast that doesn't ferment out fully (but this depends a lot on temp etc and can be hard to control especially for a beginner). 2 - make it really strong so the yeast dies of alcohol poisoning before it can ferment all the honey (needs a lot of time and is a bit hit or miss.. you can end up way too sweet if you add too much honey)_ or 3 - stop the fermentation early with chemicals/filtering (needs chemicals and/or filtering equipment).

A dry mead is much easier to make first up. Especially for a complete beginner to brewing.

You can try a JAO or something like that. I've never tried it but people seem to have some success with it. I'd ber aiming for a simple dry mead first up though (but then I'm not a fan of sweet wines).

Cheers
Dave

 

[BrenMcgee]

Thanks for the replies. I was hoping Brewer Pete would see this as I have read some of your posts and you know your stuff.

Thanks for the advice Airgead. I am not a big fan of dry wines and prefer sweet, hence why I'd like to do a sweet mead, but if it is difficult maybe I should try a drier one first. I was thinking about trying the JAO because it is apparently great for beginners, I just assumed I'd be better off doing a plain one first. Perhaps not though.

I am planning on doing some reading and research to try and learn as much as possible, but the best way to learn is to have a go, so will get in to it on my next break from work.

 

[Hatchy]

I may be displaying epic amounts of ignorance here (again) but can't you add lactose for extra sweetness? That's what the Mrs did for her cider.

 

[Airgead]

I may be displaying epic amounts of ignorance here (again) but can't you add lactose for extra sweetness? That's what the Mrs did for her cider.

You can add an unfermentable sugar at the end. Not an option for me as the missus is lactose intolerant so I always forget to mention that.

You can also add an artificial sweetener but that is evil and wrong.

Bren - The easiest way to do a sweet mead first time is to pick a yeast with a low alcohol tolerance. you'll have to look on the manufacturer's websites to find that out. You'll want one that tops out around 12-14% (unless you want rocket fuel).

Make up your initial must to a potential alcohol maybe 2-3% lower then the yeast's maximum tolerance. Oxygenate and nutrient well. You want this to ferment out dry. Pitch your yeast and let fermentation finish. When its don ad a little honey. Enough for an extra .5-1% alcohol. Don't add any extra nutrient or oxygen. You want inefficient yeast at this point. Let that ferment out. Repeat until the yeast can't take any more. Because you don't know exactly when the yeast will stop you need to be sure that you aren't adding too much sweetness in the later additions in case it stops right there and you end up with something too sweet to drink. You want to add enough each time to raise it to a sweetness level you would be happy to drink then let the yeast dry it back out again. Once the yeast has finished, you can add a final sweetening addition to get it to exactly where you like it.

Once you have done it the first time, you have some idea of where it will stop so you don't need to be as careful with the later additions. Eventually you will be able to formulate the recipe to stop exactly where you want it (the JAO recipe has been dialled in like this to balance with a particular yeast - in this case a bread yeast). Until you change yeasts and you have to start all over again.

Cheers
Dave

 

[pdilley]

Daves pretty good at this and I value his opinion.

I can see where he is coming from when he says that its easy for a new brewer to make something that goes dry. However, to balance I think its not much more difficult to make something that finishes sweet. For a beginner though, you have a few more things to consider, primarily centred around your selection of yeast, knowing when it will stop making alcohol, finding out how many Brewer Points that will chew up and then adding additional Brewer Points on top of that to give you a desired residual sweetness. And that is all. You are dealing with a living organism so you may not hit your exact specified target but you will be pretty close. Nothing prevents you from adding more honey after the yeast have stopped making alcohol if you finish on the dry side so this feeds back into Dave's opinion by saying erring on the the dryer side you can always add more honey to top it up to your wanted level of sweetness.

Any sack mead is easy, its designed to be quite sweet, if you err on the side of finishing slightly sweeter you will not notice it as much as if you tried to make a semi-sweet mead. A very sweet finish of a sack hides a tiny additional sweetness quite well. If you were trying to make a semi-sweet finish, that same number of residual Brewer Points that you had in a sack mead but now in your semi-sweet mead will now stand out like a sore thumb.

Thats why beginners are often asked to make a sack mead first. Once you are developing your skills and gaining experience with each type of yeast you will build a wealth of information on how they perform and where they stop producing alcohol.

Recipe formulation becomes a piece of piss at this point, you know your performance targets. The next phase of your brewing you want to gain consistency of the yeasts performance and make it a known target you will hit with almost pinpoint accuracy every time so you change your whole mind set completely from I make mead' to I make an environment that yeast not only live, but thrive in because I have learned that yeast make mead without my help quite well on its own and I'm not that important to the whole process except at the beginning and then all I do is a boring make sure that the temperature stays at a level they like. So now you study a little bit about yeast metabolism and requirements, and you start worrying about building environments that not only give them the best start in life, but will still be healthy after the toxins start piling up in their environment over their life until they are done producing alcohol and give up. Knowing how much their wastes will slowly toxify their environments you add in monitoring factors like starting pH into your brewing habits, you know their metabolism requirements so you start adding in factors like Standard Nutrient Addition schedules. So this is where you aim for if you want to get very good but its not where you start as a beginner. Start simple, you have plenty of time to learn the rest.

Yeast really are resilient little buggars and you can buggar up a recipe quite grossly and still end up with a mead and people have been doing exactly this for centuries untold, the only difference is you just won't have a healthy fermentation so it will take a longer time to complete and then because the yeast were stressed they throw out greater numbers of the unwanted byproducts and you have lengthy ageing periods to get rid of them. You'll get to the same point in the end, its just a choice of how slow or not so slow you want to go. This is what you get to decide and play with when you start to learn more and take it to the next level.

So again, don't feel you need to do a recipe with full SNA, pH and dialling everything in for your first mead. Stay simple and do something completely dead easy like bone dry or sack mead. I prefer sweet over bone dry any day but you may be different.



Cheers,
Brewer Pete

 

[Airgead]

I can see where he is coming from when he says that its easy for a new brewer to make something that goes dry. However, to balance I think its not much more difficult to make something that finishes sweet.

*snip*

Any sack mead is easy, its designed to be quite sweet, if you err on the side of finishing slightly sweeter you will not notice it as much as if you tried to make a semi-sweet mead. A very sweet finish of a sack hides a tiny additional sweetness quite well. If you were trying to make a semi-sweet finish, that same number of residual Brewer Points that you had in a sack mead but now in your semi-sweet mead will now stand out like a sore thumb.

Yep. Quite right. It is easy to make something that finishes sweet as long as you don't mind it being *really* sweet. What is hard to control with a sweet mead is just how sweet you want it to end up. A lot is easy. A little bit is much harder.

Really dry or really sweet = easy
In the middle = hard

The balance between the two is the hardest to achieve. Its the zen of mead making...

Cheers
Dave

P.S - BP - what's with this "Brewer Points" thing? Is this just a plot to have us all start using your initials in more posts ;-)

 

[BrenMcgee]

Thanks for all the input. I have been thinking and I reckon I will give the JAO a crack first up. Get a bit of experience with an easy to make recipe, then go from there. I have never brewed anything, so there are some things in your posts that confuse me, but I'll get my head around it easy enough. I believe there is an apiarist down the road from me so I will go see him about honey. Is there anything I should look for in honey choice?

By the way, I am based in Toowoomba in Queensland so if there are any other brewers up here, especially Mead brewers, please feel free to get in contact with me

Thanks again
Bren