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Mead Lovers Digest #0521
Subject: Mead Lover's Digest #521, 31 December 1996
From: mead-request@talisman.com
Mead Lover's Digest #521 31 December 1996
Forum for Discussion of Mead Making and Consuming
Dick Dunn, Digest Janitor
Contents:
request from the janitor (Mead Lover's Digest)
Re: Dry yeast suggestions sought, & grape juice v. commercial wine (smccullo@i
osphere.net)
Belgian & Lager Yeasts, Digbie, yeast extract (Joyce Miller)
Crazy In the Kitchen Mead experiment. ("Brander Roullett (Volt Computer)")
NOTE: Digest only appears when there is enough material to send one.
Send ONLY articles for the digest to mead@talisman.com.
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Subject: request from the janitor
From: mead@raven.talisman.com (Mead Lover's Digest)
Date: 25 Dec 96 00:17:33 MST (Wed)
Simple request: Don't spam the digest! It won't work anyway; it will get
caught before it goes out. It just annoys me. Also, I treat an obvious
spam from a subscriber as equivalent to an "unsubscribe" request.
Basically, anything having to do at all with mead (or the digest itself)
is welcome here, and anything not having to do with mead is not welcome.
Questions/comments on this? Send me email; I'll respond.
- ---
Mead-Lover's Digest mead-request@talisman.com
Dick Dunn, Digest Janitor Boulder County, Colorado USA
------------------------------
Subject: Re: Dry yeast suggestions sought, & grape juice v. commercial wine
From: smccullo@iosphere.net
Date: Thu, 26 Dec 1996 14:50:51 -0500 (EST)
> Having had pleasant success with several sweet meads, I'd like to now
>try a drier version of either a traditional mead or a pyement. Can anyone
>out there suggest a dry wine yeast that does not leave off tastes at the end
>of fermentation? Although I am prepared to age some of the batch, I see no
>reason to use a yeast which requires aging, unless there is no alternative.
I have only made still dry meads, and have always had good luck with both
Prise de Mousse and Lalvin K1-V1116 yeasts.
> Also, how about some discussion or suggestions concerning the advantages
>and disadvantages of using an organic grape juice with no chemical additions
>as opposed to using a commercial wine concentrate. O.K., I know it's
>porbably better to start with grapes, but I'm a bit lazy. I actually have a
>one gallon batch going made with muscadines, a wild grape with huge vines
>that grow up deciduous trees in the southern U.S. I'd like a tried and
>proven method to use with a three gallon batch. If the muscadine pyement
>turns out well, I'll do a larger batch late next summer, when they are ripe
>and fall from the canopy again. I have my hopes up for the muscadines, since
>the woods in Alabama are lousy with them. I also suspect that a combination
>of the two methods may have potential. What do y'all think? E-mail and/or
>MLD posts welcome.
I have been making wine from concentrate kits for a couple of years now. IMHO,
they make great plonk, but if you are looking for wine of quality you can't get
it from a concentrate. I continue using them because they provide cheap table
wine acceptable to accompany meals, and they provide me with a deep cellar so
I can play the magnanimous host. But, to my dismay, I have discovered that even
cheap bought wine is usually far superior. The concentration process destroys
complexity of taste and any bouquet the grape juice might have had as wine. The
quality of the results depends on what you are looking for. If you want "true"
wine, you have to use fruit or juice.
Steve
- ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Steve McCullough | And as for me, though that I konne but lyte,
Teaching Assistant | On bokes and for to rede I me delyte,
Department of English | And to hem yive I feyth and ful credence,
Carleton University | And in myn herte have hem in reverence
Ottawa, Canada | -Geoffrey Chaucer
- ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
------------------------------
Subject: Belgian & Lager Yeasts, Digbie, yeast extract
From: jmiller@genome.wi.mit.edu (Joyce Miller)
Date: Sun, 29 Dec 1996 17:05:31 -0500
I once experimented with using Belgian and Lager yeasts. The Belgians came
out terribly phenolic, and it never went away, while the lager yeasts
started out a little sulfury, but it went away quickly. In my opinion, ale
yeasts are the best, next to wine yeasts.
Regarding Digbie: A lot of nothing has happened, since I went back to
school & changed careers.
Yeast extract, or rather "powdered brewer's yeast" is an excellent yeast
nutrient, and is available in most health food stores, especially the ones
that sell things in bulk. That's where I get my honey, too.
- -- Joyce
===============jmiller@genome.wi.mit.edu===============
=====http://www.tiac.net/users/drbeer/homepage.htm=====
Visit the Ferrets in Art History page!
=====http://www.tiac.net/users/drbeer/frhistpg.htm=====
------------------------------
Subject: Crazy In the Kitchen Mead experiment.
From: "Brander Roullett (Volt Computer)" <a-branro@MICROSOFT.com>
Date: Tue, 31 Dec 1996 10:54:13 -0800
I am fairly new to making meads, and have been playing around with 1
gallon batches. One night as i was making up my second batch of Cyser
(my local store has these GREAT 1 gallon bottles that come with an extra
bonus, unfiltered pure apple juice), It was late, and i was starting to
get a little (ok, a lot) silly. I decided to whip up a batch of Mead
based on things i found in the freezer.( like i said, i was getting
silly)
Here is what i did...
For 1 Gallon.
2 lbs Honey (local honey, comes in 4 gallon bucket $35)
1 can Lemonade
1 can Oarnge Juice
1 Cinnamon stick
1 Packet Edme Ale Yeast.
i have racked it once, after a month or two of fermenting, off a
horribly thick layer of sediment(juice pulp), and at racking time i
added another 2 lbs of honey just for kicks. its been sitting for a
month since then.
at the first racking it tasted nasty.
Comments on ingredients, and the possibility that Aging might save this
wacky experiment?
thanks
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End of Mead Lover's Digest #521
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