Strawberry Mead

[Verbyla]

Looks great! I'll be planning on doing this one in the future.

Have you had a taste yet???

 

[watchUburn]

I haven't yet. But the will to resist is wearing thin...

 

[watchUburn]

Strawberry mead at 10 weeks. This time I'm taking pictures with and without a flash.
The difference is really noticeable.

 

[watchUburn]

And

 

[pdilley]

Sounds yummy.

Just for kicks I turned my Mead program on to its "American" mode and ran the numbers on the original recipe.

Just from the honey alone for 5 gallons the contribution will be 1.086 gravity points.
EC-1118 being a champers yeast will chew through everything in that to completely dry as it is an 18% ABV yeast.
This lets you carb up in the bottle later if you wish as the ABV from honey alone will be 11.28% to 11.81% depending on how dry the EC-1118 takes it.

That gives you 6-7% ABV extra room to play with chewing through the fruit, the bottling sugar, and any extra adjuncts you wish to add.

If your strawberry is too mild for your taste you can try adding in some of good quality Preserves and Conserves, the French import Bonne Maman is very decent quality conserves for fruit and is one of the only ones I buy now to put on my toast with loads of butter and love the rhubarb one :icon_drool2: --just avoid the cheap nasty ones that are just sugar, and food colouring in the jar with no fruit. Some of the major supermarkets carry it, although I've seen the local Woolies and Coles drop it while IGA still stocks it abundantly as well as all the specialty deli stores in the area. Has a checker pattern of picnic tablecloth style lid on the jars.

EDIT: Found a picture

Cheers,
Brewer Pete

 

[upsidefront]

Will Vintner's Harvest SN9 yeast work for this? LHS doesn't stock EC1118.

 

[watchUburn]

If your strawberry is too mild for your taste you can try adding in some of good quality Preserves and Conserves, the French import Bonne Maman is very decent quality conserves for fruit and is one of the only ones I buy now to put on my toast with loads of butter and love the rhubarb one :icon_drool2: --just avoid the cheap nasty ones that are just sugar, and food colouring in the jar with no fruit. Some of the major supermarkets carry it, although I've seen the local Woolies and Coles drop it while IGA still stocks it abundantly as well as all the specialty deli stores in the area. Has a checker pattern of picnic tablecloth style lid on the jars.

How would you suggest i do this? Put a couple of tablespoons in demijohn and rack the mead onto it for a few weeks?

 

[pdilley]

Will Vintner's Harvest SN9 yeast work for this? LHS doesn't stock EC1118.

This recipe ferments out dry, so you could substitute SN9 yeast for this if you can not find the original specified yeast.


Cheers,
Brewer Pete

 

[pdilley]

How would you suggest i do this? Put a couple of tablespoons in demijohn and rack the mead onto it for a few weeks?

When making wines from nothing but preserves or jams, the ratio of jam to pectin enzyme is roughly 1 1/2 teaspoon per 1 kilo of jam if the addition hazes the Mead and it does not clear on its own - so in other words you don't add the enzyme right away unless needed after watching how the Mead is ageing out. If you want any counter-balance a citric acid to jam additions of 1 teaspoon per 1 kilo of "higher acidity fruit" jam or 1 1/2 teaspoons per "low acidity fruit" jam addition.

As your jam addition will be small, so will be your other additions.

Your jar will list your Sugar contents per weight of jam and you can use that to calculate your amounts and their effect on finished alcohol - sweetness taken out of jam and more ethanol made increasing final ABV (if a high ABV yeast was used like the champers/SN9/EC1118). When you hit the yeasts ABV tolerance your sweetness will climb instead of any additional ethanol production.

Cheers,
Brewer Pete


EDIT: High ABV Meads made with these High ABV Yeasts means LONG ageing times. Low final ABV = Drink Early, High final ABV = Drink Late.

 

[Synthetase]

Will Vintner's Harvest SN9 yeast work for this? LHS doesn't stock EC1118.

Yes, I use SN9 frequently in mead making.

 

[BrenMcgee]

How is this going mate? I am just get interested in making Mead, and just read a thread about a red wine substitute that my girlfriend liked the sound of, so this had got my interest also.

Bren

 

[watchUburn]

This one turned out horrid. The honey was a very dark one with string smoky flavours, and I think I missed some of the strawberry when I racked off the fruit.
This batch has a very strong unpleasant flavour.

I'm planning on trying again with a nicer honey and following Airgead's method of fermenting the honey frst, and then racking it onto the fruit after.

 

[Airgead]

This one turned out horrid. The honey was a very dark one with string smoky flavours, and I think I missed some of the strawberry when I racked off the fruit.
This batch has a very strong unpleasant flavour.

I'm planning on trying again with a nicer honey and following Airgead's method of fermenting the honey frst, and then racking it onto the fruit after.

Honey is a very delicate flavour so a strong honey will completely overwhelm it. I have also found that it oxidises like buggery. I don't know why but anything with strawberry in it you need to be ultra careful with oxygen exposure.

If its not oxidised, keep it around for a while. It may well get better with aging as the strong honey will mellow over time. If it is oxidised then there is no saving it.

Cheers
Dave