have ya had it? was it great? what did you like/dislike? homemade or store bought? I'm thinking about getting into the homebrew hobby side of it.
I've had it once, at the Rennaissance Festival. Just whatever they had, served warm. I enjoyed it as a once-off. It's too sweet for me to drink often.
I make mead regularly. Fun drink. Can be very strong if desired, which is a plus since the alcohol is not so overt that it ruins the taste. I like mine very lightly carbonated, but no carbonation is typical and still excellent. Mead is also considerably easier to brew than beer, although it takes a lot longer and requires bottling, which is a pain (I keg my beer).
My wife has made a few batches of Honey Mead. It is VERY strong. 2 will wipe her out. I think it is pretty easy to make but it takes a long time.
Thanks for the help guys. I want to make/homebrew something cheap and easy. I have heard for really good stuff it takes months. Any input on value of adding fruit/berries, etc? I'll let y'all know how it goes
my cousin made some honey mead with rasberries and brought a batch home for the holidays. i dont think it took him months, per se. he's a chemist so he knows what's going on...
I regularly use fruit. My favorite is a mix of rasberries, blackberries, and blueberries. It certainly does not require months, but if you can be patient it will taste better.
Typically I add them at the beginning. It's also your call on whether to use pectic enzyme or not to reduce the cloudiness caused by the pectin in the fruit skin. It won't affect taste (as far as I know or can tell). Also, some recipes have you boil everything but that is not necessary and I actually recommend not doing that as it ruins the honey flavor. Honey is a natural antibiotic (sort of) and so you don't need to "clean" it in a boil. Again, it won't ruin the mead but boiling tends towards the final product tasting a lot like an alcoholic juice with honey hints than a mead with fruit hints. IMHO. If you're looking for ideas there's a website called the bees-knees or something with a TON of mead recipes. EDIT: It's called the Bee's Lees.
Cool, thanks Rhad! Imma start w/ this no brew gear method to see if I even care. http://www.stormthecastle.com/mead/fast-cheap-mead-making.htm I like the moonshineyness of the whole thing : )
So i'm all in to Mead making. Keeping it all local, all Texas ingredients. Going to have a few different variants, (different honey, water, berries, ferment times) and in anywhere from 6 months to a year will let ya know. If ya've not had Mead but like white wines you gotta try it!
Good luck with the "skeleton" setup. I'll be curious to see how it turns out in that arrangement. I'm making a batch myself this weekend.
