The only place I can even find mead in Wisconsin imports it from Ireland. I'm not even joking. Couldn't get it for a year because the annual shipment disappeared in transit. I've got a bottle in my possession now which I'm torn between keeping just in case the same thing happens again, and drinking it all up. Maybe I'll save it until my birthday and toast the memory of the viking warrior-poet whose birthday I share. I'd have bought a case of the stuff if I had the wherewithal to keep it without friction in the family about why I was hoarding booze. Likewise the discussion about why I'd be making my own.
Is that stuff really that hard to find in Wisconsin? It's really common here in Pennsylvania (a state not famed for wide selection of alcohol). It's not too bad. I had an Egyptian Honeywine in an Ethiopian restaurant in Ohio that was REALLY good, but I can't recall the name sadly.
I've tried the homebrew thing, but I'm pretty useless in the kitchen, so I blame myself for the poor result.
Is that stuff really that hard to find in Wisconsin? It's really common here in Pennsylvania (a state not famed for wide selection of alcohol). It's not too bad. I had an Egyptian Honeywine in an Ethiopian restaurant in Ohio that was REALLY good, but I can't recall the name sadly.
I don't know why, maybe it's just southeast Wisconsin that has that trouble (though I doubt it's any better anywhere else in the state). I tried many, many stores before I gave up. Maybe there's too little demand for it compared to beer. I was never spoiled for choices of mead in Tacoma, WA, but I could find the stuff easily enough without driving two towns over. I guess I should be happy it's still the same county (when they have it)!
I'm a passionate lover of mead.
Over here in the Netherlands it's only available in a couple of stores and at medieval/fantasy fairs/festivals. Luckily I am also a frequent attendee of those festivals so I can buy some bottles every two monts, roughly.
My own preferences go out towards dark cherry mead or apple-cinnamon mead, which is frequently described as "liquid apple pie" by a lot of people.
When buying from other stores, my frustration goes out towards labelling and description.
See for example OP
Spoiler
Originally made by the Celts for healing purposes, this mead is spiced with ginger, cinnamon, cloves and rosemary. A rich spicy aroma precedes the enjoyment of this superb mead. The honey flavour is beautifully married with the spices . An ideal wine to have after a meal, with a cheese and fruit platter or enjoy on it?s own in the evening. Of course there is nothing better then a mulled Metheglin on a cold winters night in front of a log fire. Drink now or cellar for several years.
This is except for ''ginger, cinnamon, cloves and rosemary'' and possibly ''rich spicy'' a description which could fit to about 80% of all meads, which just doesn't work when there is so much variation in mead.
But that might be me just being a stuck up fine taster of mead.
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The best mead I've had was from Denmark, but I don't recall the brand. It was NOT Gulden Draak, and I'm pretty sure it was not Vikingernes Mjød, though their bottle styles are very similar to what I had (maybe it was Vikingernes Mjød, but I'm pretty sure it wasn't). I was really surprised at the spice in this mead. It was almost peppery, but still sweet. The stoneware bottle just added to the charm and when I drank it out of my ceramic mead goblet (which I acquired years ago at a Ren Faire), I felt as Viking as I could without drinking it from a horn.
I've also had Chaucer Mead from Oliver Winery here in Indiana. It's well-reviewed, but I found it a bit sweet. Yes, I know it's made from HONEY and therefore, I should expect it to be sweet, but I like drier alcoholic beverages, in general.
I cannot even begin to point out how much I echo this statement!
Homebrewing mead is EASY! Yes you have to maintain all the sanitary issues, since you run the risk of infection (botching your batch), but it doesn't take nearly as much time in the kitchen to make as does brewing beer.
Comparibly, I could "brew" a batch of mead in about an hour, wheras making beer could take me almost 8 hours.
Someone else mentioned liking things more dry... if you add extra nutrient to the mead, the yeast will eat more sugar and cause a drier batch.
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The best mead I've had was from Denmark, but I don't recall the brand. It was NOT Gulden Draak, and I'm pretty sure it was not Vikingernes Mjød, though their bottle styles are very similar to what I had (maybe it was Vikingernes Mjød, but I'm pretty sure it wasn't). I was really surprised at the spice in this mead. It was almost peppery, but still sweet. The stoneware bottle just added to the charm and when I drank it out of my ceramic mead goblet (which I acquired years ago at a Ren Faire), I felt as Viking as I could without drinking it from a horn.
I've also had Chaucer Mead from Oliver Winery here in Indiana. It's well-reviewed, but I found it a bit sweet. Yes, I know it's made from HONEY and therefore, I should expect it to be sweet, but I like drier alcoholic beverages, in general.
I want to make my own, but that should take some time and need some attention, which I don't have at the moment. (moving aroudn a bit lately)
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Hey smellie hippie, how much did the ingredients cost for your mead? I'm pretty sure I don't want to use the tap water from the city system, and we don't have a well, so how does that factor in to flavor? I have hard(ish) water that's contaminated with chlorine or whatever the "cleaner" is. Smells like a swimming pool if we let any of the tap water stand for five minutes. What about the honey? I did some quick pricing online last year when the local supply dried up, and it looked pretty expensive.
I'm pretty sure I don't want to use the tap water from the city system, and we don't have a well, so how does that factor in to flavor? I have hard(ish) water that's contaminated with chlorine or whatever the "cleaner" is. Smells like a swimming pool if we let any of the tap water stand for five minutes.
The best thing I've found for city water is to let it sit in a jar (uncovered, or covered by cloth) for 24 hours or so. If it's really bad, I boil it, let it cool, and then put it in the jar. Yes, well-water is preferable (if you have a good well), but even well water can taste brackish or smell funny. Letting it sit, or boiling it and then letting it sit, is the best solution I've found.
Quote:
What about the honey? I did some quick pricing online last year when the local supply dried up, and it looked pretty expensive.
Honey's not cheap, unfortunately. Around here, I usually go to a farmer's market--they tend to be a little cheaper than the grocery store. I'm also fortunate enough to know some bee keepers, so I have good sources ... when they have anything available (they don't always).
I want to make my own, but that should take some time and need some attention, which I don't have at the moment. (moving aroudn a bit lately)
The actual process itself only takes a few hours, but the end results have to sit fairly still for several weeks at a minimum. If you're moving around a lot, that's kind of impractical, yeah.
Hey smellie hippie, how much did the ingredients cost for your mead? I'm pretty sure I don't want to use the tap water from the city system, and we don't have a well, so how does that factor in to flavor? I have hard(ish) water that's contaminated with chlorine or whatever the "cleaner" is. Smells like a swimming pool if we let any of the tap water stand for five minutes. What about the honey? I did some quick pricing online last year when the local supply dried up, and it looked pretty expensive.
Honey can be pretty expensive, but you could probably get by with somethign you bought in bulk at SAMS club etc. You should also be able to buy drinking watre fairly cheap at your local grocery store.
Other ingredients that you would need would be yeast, cooking equipment, additional flavorings or additives (cherries, cinnamon, vanilla, etc) and a vessel for fermentation (with an air-lock). This allows the yeast to convert the sugar and let out CO2, without lettign oxygen back in to contaminate.
I could feasibly make a 5 gallon batch for under $50... but I already have the necessary equipment.
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I think I could safely ignore the cost of the initial set up, well not ignore exactly, but it's either a one time or a once per few batches kind of cost.
By the way, does mead scale down well? I don't know that I want to tempt a 5 gallon batch on my virgin homebrewing run and end up with 5 gallons of honeyed sludge. Homebrewing isn't apparently in my family's blood, my dad's attempts at it were somewhere between "yuck" and "get me to an emergency room".
additional: What's your experience with different kinds of honey? Costco's got nothing but clover honey these days, instead of the regular stuff. I know I'd certainly never use fireweed honey (it's an Alaskan thing), because I have an allergic reaction to it and the fireweed itself.
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Last edited by Winter_Wolf : 11-20-2012 at 01:41 PM.
Reason: additional info
I think I could safely ignore the cost of the initial set up, well not ignore exactly, but it's either a one time or a once per few batches kind of cost.
By the way, does mead scale down well? I don't know that I want to tempt a 5 gallon batch on my virgin homebrewing run and end up with 5 gallons of honeyed sludge. Homebrewing isn't apparently in my family's blood, my dad's attempts at it were somewhere between "yuck" and "get me to an emergency room".
additional: What's your experience with different kinds of honey? Costco's got nothing but clover honey these days, instead of the regular stuff. I know I'd certainly never use fireweed honey (it's an Alaskan thing), because I have an allergic reaction to it and the fireweed itself.
My first batch of mead was with a clover honey. It was just bog-standard mead--no special spices, no juices to flavor it--and I still got rave reviews from one of our local restauranteurs who's locally accepted as a wine expert. (She does know her stuff.)
And I've always made one gallon batches--mead scales fine.
Mead is awesome. Around here all I've been able to find is Bea's Sweet Mead. It's not exactly well respected, but I enjoy it. It goes excellent with the spicy food we love around here. I need to check with the liquor store that has the most superb selection in town, but I never get to it.
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This forum is the same format as ours, so fairly easy to navigate. They have good discussions on recipes, beginner questions, links to suppliers to buy kits and ingredients and so forth.
Happy Brewing!
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Now that I've successfully made several batches of beer and one batch of wine, I intend to approach this drink which made me want to brew in the first place. I love the idea of mead even if I rarely get the chance to drink it. It is almost never carried in the liquor stores here, and while there are many meaderies across Canada, they charge too much for shipping.
Quote:
Originally Posted by smellie_hippie
I cannot even begin to point out how much I echo this statement!
Homebrewing mead is EASY! Yes you have to maintain all the sanitary issues, since you run the risk of infection (botching your batch), but it doesn't take nearly as much time in the kitchen to make as does brewing beer.
Comparibly, I could "brew" a batch of mead in about an hour, wheras making beer could take me almost 8 hours.
Someone else mentioned liking things more dry... if you add extra nutrient to the mead, the yeast will eat more sugar and cause a drier batch.
Do you have any recipe in particular that you recommend, sweet Hippie? Something on the plain side for a beginner?
Quote:
Originally Posted by Riverdance
This thread makes me want mead like Game of Thrones makes me want wine. I've never had mead, and I don't even like wine.
I know exactly what you mean [although I love wine in a deeply creepy ex-boyfriend kind of way]. I re-read Game of Thrones back at the beginning of year and hit the bottle atrociously because of Tyrion's chapters.
I have distilled rum for a school project before, so I know my way around fermenting a little (I fermented molasses to make the rum alcohol, and then distilled it at school with permission from the schoolboard). (I think I still have the equipment somehwere, though it was makeshift). I used a waterproof vat like thing like this, they are cheap and readily available. make sure you wash them properly before use! then I drilled a hole in the top, put a rubber plug in there, pulled some tubing through the plug. here you ahve to make sure the tubing doesn't go too deep, else the fermenting liquid will enter the howe and you will lose it all. the other end of the tube I put in a bucket of water. This seals just like a waterlock, allowing the excess gas to come out and not allowing contamination to get in. it actually has an advantage: if the fermentation goes too wel the foam will end up in the bucket, minimizing the mess.
Now I only need to have a clear set of instructions/recipe to try it out again (and I need to get the yeast, other ingredients, etc.). I might try it out over the weekend. One question though: some recipies mention multiple weeks fermenting, and some a few hours, would any of you care to explain?
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I like mead. My favourite mead is the Drunken Monk varieties (Spiced and Banquet) they have here at the living history fairs. There's only one mead I've met that I haven't liked and that was a dutch one (sorry DD! ) due to it being too sweet.
Really good mead is found at the random little farms off the edges of roads in farms that brew their own, or have rare brands of mead for sale. It's amazing. :3
To be fair, the harder it is to find the farm, generally the better the alcohol they have is.
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I like mead. My favourite mead is the Drunken Monk varieties (Spiced and Banquet) they have here at the living history fairs. There's only one mead I've met that I haven't liked and that was a dutch one (sorry DD! ) due to it being too sweet.
Really good mead is found at the random little farms off the edges of roads in farms that brew their own, or have rare brands of mead for sale. It's amazing. :3
I first learned to enjoy mead at the NY Ren Faire; it would be an annual treat. Then I discovered the vinyard that served the Faire was local (and turns out, America's oldest winery). Now I make sure there's always some in the house.
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I'm a passionate lover of mead.
Over here in the Netherlands it's only available in a couple of stores and at medieval/fantasy fairs/festivals. Luckily I am also a frequent attendee of those festivals so I can buy some bottles every two monts, roughly.
My own preferences go out towards dark cherry mead or apple-cinnamon mead, which is frequently described as "liquid apple pie" by a lot of people.
When buying from other stores, my frustration goes out towards labelling and description.
See for example OP
Spoiler
Originally made by the Celts for healing purposes, this mead is spiced with ginger, cinnamon, cloves and rosemary. A rich spicy aroma precedes the enjoyment of this superb mead. The honey flavour is beautifully married with the spices . An ideal wine to have after a meal, with a cheese and fruit platter or enjoy on it?s own in the evening. Of course there is nothing better then a mulled Metheglin on a cold winters night in front of a log fire. Drink now or cellar for several years.
This is except for ''ginger, cinnamon, cloves and rosemary'' and possibly ''rich spicy'' a description which could fit to about 80% of all meads, which just doesn't work when there is so much variation in mead.
But that might be me just being a stuck up fine taster of mead.
I was in Santa Fe for Thanksgiving, and we went to Mass at this little Benedictine monastery in the middle of nowhere forty miles of dirt road from the nearest highway.
Turns out they brew beer and mead.
Monk's Wit, the mead, convinced me that not all alcohol is disgusting. Thanks, Benedictine Bros!
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Mead drinkers unite!
I've got a bottle in my possession now which I'm torn between keeping just in case the same thing happens again, and drinking it all up. Maybe I'll save it until my birthday and toast the memory of the viking warrior-poet whose birthday I share. I'd have bought a case of the stuff if I had the wherewithal to keep it without friction in the family about why I was hoarding booze. Likewise the discussion about why I'd be making my own.
