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Mead Lovers Digest #0833
Subject: Mead Lover's Digest #833, 31 December 2000
From: mead-request@talisman.com
Mead Lover's Digest #833 31 December 2000
Forum for Discussion of Mead Making and Consuming
Dick Dunn, Digest Janitor
Contents:
Re: Reusing Yeast (BillPierce@aol.com)
Re: bentonite ("Paul Hudert")
restarted fermention? NO, it's a barometer! ("Paul Hudert")
Sparkalloid (Nathan Kanous)
Re:glass grenades (MLCrary@aol.com)
RE:any danger? ("Matt Maples")
ANN/CFV: Reggale and Dredhop Homebrew Competition ("John J. Allison")
Clarifying mead ("michael m")
Mead recipes (Rogers Michael B)
Re:Reusing Yeast (Rogers Michael B)
Re:Old Recipe Question (Rogers Michael B)
NOTE: Digest appears when there is enough material to send one.
Send ONLY articles for the digest to mead@talisman.com.
Use mead-request@talisman.com for [un]subscribe/admin requests.
Digest archives and FAQ are available at www.talisman.com/mead. There is
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----------------------------------------------------------------------
Subject: Re: Reusing Yeast
From: BillPierce@aol.com
Date: Sun, 17 Dec 2000 04:16:50 EST
In MLD #832, Holly asks about reusing yeast. It's not worth reculturing dry
yeast, as it is too easy and inexpensive merely to rehydrate and pitch a
couple of new packages of yeast. However, you can save money and a little
time by reculturing liquid yeast strains.
I've been reusing liquid beer yeast for several years now, and I do the same
for liquid mead strains. My method is this:
Just before you rack the mead to secondary, boil a little more than a quart
of distilled water for about 15 minutes to ensure that it's nearly sterile.
Then cool the boiled water. Sanitize a quart mason jar extremely well.
Harvest the thick yeast sediment at the bottom of the fermenter with a
sanitized spoon. Place about an inch of sediment in the bottom of the mason
jar, then fill the jar the rest of the way with the distilled water. Seal
the jar and place in the refrigerator. Store at below 40 degrees F.
The distilled water offers no nutrients whatsoever to the yeast and causes
them to go into a kind of suspended animation. They will keep this way for
18 months or even longer. When you wish to reuse the yeast, make a starter
of a quart or so with honey and water and a little yeast nutrient. Pour off
the distilled water and pitch the yeast sediment at the bottom the jar. It
may well take 4-5 days for the starter to show activity if the yeast is more
than a few months old, but eventually you will have very active and healthy
yeast to pitch into your mead.
There is debate about how many generations of yeast you should repitch this
way, but if you practice good sanitation I wouldn't have any problem using
the same strain seven or eight times.
Wassail!
- -- Bill Pierce
Cellar Door Homebrewery
recently relocated to Salt Lake City, Utah
------------------------------
Subject: Re: bentonite
From: "Paul Hudert" <paulgarbanzo@hotmail.com>
Date: Sun, 17 Dec 2000 13:09:15 -0500
>
>Try sparkolloid. An owner of a commercial meadery once told me that
>bentonite doesn't work with mead but sparkolliod does. Can anyone confirm
>this?
>
>Christopher Hadden
>
I have used bentonite quite successfully in my batches. I have used it for
a couple different meads, and it has always worked. I always wait for the
mead to stop fermenting before using it, and in most instances the mead will
drop totally clear within 2 days (but I always give it 2-3 weeks to make
sure all the invisible particles have a chance to settle.
Paul "no problems here"
------------------------------
Subject: restarted fermention? NO, it's a barometer!
From: "Paul Hudert" <paulgarbanzo@hotmail.com>
Date: Sun, 17 Dec 2000 22:05:15 -0500
if this is on a FAQ sheet somewhere, I've never seen it, so I appologize in
advance if everyone already knows this...
I have 4 batches of mead that all have stopped fermenting, and now I'm
waiting for it to clear. I happen to have walked by them yesterday and all
of their air locks were bubbling away! I looked at the mead itself and
didn't see any bubbles, the mead was calm and settling. I had no idea what
was going on. I was worried because I had just bottled the oldest batch and
was expecting all the bottles to pop their corks. today I looked at them,
and all of the air locks were calm and unmoving. No air coming out of the
airlocks at all.
Then I had an epiphany. I was looking through a christmas catalog at
colonial style barometers. Filled with water, with a bubble of trapped air.
when bad weather is coming, the pressure is low, the trapped air expands,
pushing the water up a little indicator spout. clear weather is high
pressure, and the air compresses, the water gets sucked down the spout.
Sure enough, last night was 6 hours of intense thunderstorms. today was
clear. our airlocks also serve as barometers! keep air pressure in mind
when looking at your airlock for activity!
Paul "I feel like I discovered steam power" Hudert
------------------------------
Subject: Sparkalloid
From: Nathan Kanous <nlkanous@pharmacy.wisc.edu>
Date: Mon, 18 Dec 2000 09:16:59 -0600
Hi All,
With the talk of sparkalloid and bentonite, I've been wondering. Somewhere
I read that one of these can remove some color from red wine (and mead, I
assume) but the other does not mention this. Does that mean it
won't? I've got some mead in the basement that I'd rather not lose color
on (it's light anyhow). What sayeth the masses? Does sparkalloid change
color of finished meads?
nathan in madison, wi
------------------------------
Subject: Re:glass grenades
From: MLCrary@aol.com
Date: Mon, 18 Dec 2000 18:59:07 EST
Well, most of us have dealt with glass grenades at one time or another. They
are no fun. Someone else may have a reliable way for dealing with this
problem by simply stopping fermentation, but I don't know how you would do
it. The replies should be interesting; you are almost sure to get several
stories, here is one. When my brew partner and I got one glass grenade from a
metheglin, we tried just popping the caps, wiping the lip of the bottle with
a cotton ball full of Everclear (cut by half with water), then recapping.
This took off some pressure, but not enough. We then did a reverse racking,
racking the mead out of the bottles and back into a carboy. We considered
just using a sanitized funnel and pouring carefully, but decided the
potential for oxidation was fairly high, so we racked the hard way. It was at
this point in our brewing career that we began to take specific gravities.
The mead, originally "Midwinter Tiger" ( we used Bengal Spice tea) was
renamed "Tiger Bomb" and turned out very well. Good luck with your glass
grenades, whtever method you try.
Marcia
------------------------------
Subject: RE:any danger?
From: "Matt Maples" <matt_lists@hotmail.com>
Date: Wed, 20 Dec 2000 15:11:29 -0800
The answer is no. There is a maxium in homebrewing and that is "there is
nothing that can live in beer (or mead) that can kill you". I'm sure there
are some that could give you a mean hangover but then again if it is "Bad"
you probably wont want to drink that much of it. Don't worry too much about
it, if it taste good drink it. If tastes or smells bad give it to a
certified judge and maybe he can tell you what exactly is wrong with it.
Things to look for is ropey slime suspended in the carboy, white film on
top, rotten smells (sulfurous and acrid smells can occur normally depending
on what you are fermenting) medicinal and band aide taste can mean there
was a problem with fermentation but they might age out. Wild fermentation's
can give you weird flavors but I have done some that taste just fine.
>Subject: any danger?
>From: "Tom O." <tomos@ptd.net>
>Date: Thu, 14 Dec 2000 11:18:01 -0500
>
>
>Hi all,
> Get ready for a real newbie question: I am completely new to mead
>making in general and have a question concerning safety.
>Is there anything that can go wrong in the fermentation process that could
>render the batch not only bad, but dangerous to drink?
Matt Maples
Anagram: "Tap me malts!"
May mead regain its rightful place as the beverage of gods and kings.
------------------------------
Subject: ANN/CFV: Reggale and Dredhop Homebrew Competition
From: "John J. Allison" <john@joss.ucar.edu>
Date: Fri, 22 Dec 2000 16:02:40 -0700 (MST)
Initial Announcement and Call for Volunteers:
The Reggale and Dredhop Homebrew Competition, sponsored by
Hop Barley and the Alers of Boulder County, Colorado,
will be on Sat March 17, 2001 at the Falling Rock Tap House
in Denver, Colorado. Entry deadline is Fri March 9, 2001.
The Dredhop will be an AHA Sanctioned Competition and an
MCAB Qualifying Event.
More details (such as rules, how to enter, etc) will soon
be posted to this forum and the website at:
http://hopbarley.org/dredhop/
Please hold entry-related questions until reading that
future posting. Potential volunteers, including judges,
stewards, gofers, etc. are encouraged to contact us anytime
via email at: dredhop@hopbarley.org
John Allison
webmaster@hopbarley.org
Boulder, Colorado
------------------------------
Subject: Clarifying mead
From: "michael m" <indmike@hotmail.com>
Date: Sat, 23 Dec 2000 21:10:12
Greetings Al,
This is my first post here, so let me introduce myself. I am Michael
Murray, a 41 year old mead and wine maker and brewer,in the hills of south
central Indiana.
I followed with interest the thread on the various methods of getting a
betonite slurry to homogenize, and I use a method that I didn't see posted.
I boil an appropriate amount of water, and when it is rolling, add the
bentonite, sprinkling it into the water, then allow it to roll boil for a
few minutes, stiring occasionally.My mead is usually crystal clear within
24-48 hours.
With meads that do not go clear, as mentioned below, I tried something
that usually works. Pick up the carboy/fermenter, making sure that the cap
is sealed, and shake it, then invert it, and then set it bcak down. I have
found that re-suspending the bentonite and honey sediment seems to take out
the previously remaining suspended particles when it re-settles. My last
batch didn't clear even after trying this method, so I racked it and
re-clarified it with more betonite slurry. It went clear in 48 hours, and is
one of the best that i have made so far.
Be well,
Michael Murray
>>I made a slurry of the bentonite with 500 mls or so
of water and mixed it into the carboy 48 hours ago. It has settled to
the bottom of the carboy, but the mead is still cloudy. It tastes great
and I am about to give up on the clarity and just bottle it. Any
suggestions? >>
------------------------------
Subject: Mead recipes
From: Rogers Michael B <avatar@hemc.net>
Date: Tue, 26 Dec 2000 08:54:53 -0500
Okay all you mead-monkeys-
I am currently collecting recipes from the internet, etc. and
collecting them into a text document to be shared with other mead
hobbyists. If you are interested in receiving this, just e-mail me with
mead recipe request in the subject line and your address in the body. It
is not ready to be sent yet- I am currently working on getting
permission to reproduce the recipes from their various authors.
About the document: Currently it is just cut and pasted to a word
processing document, so there are varying fonts, etc. which makes it a
little dificult to read. I will probably correct it at a later date.
If you have any recipes that you wish to contribute, I will be
sending a template so that the entries can be standardized more easily.
Also, if you do not specify otherwise, you will be added to the mailing
list to recieve future updates. I ask that you join the list because
some authors will not be able to be contacted, therefore I am assuming
that because it was posted on the internet, it is meant to be shared for
non-commercial means. This document would fall under that criteria.
However, any person who has a recipe in this document and has not been
connected should contact me regardless of whether permission is granted
or withheld. I will be modifying this document by the permission
granted/withheld status. In other words, this collection is copyrighted
and cannot be shared, but is available for free from me so that I can
monitor this copyright issue.
Wassail!
Ben Rogers
------------------------------
Subject: Re:Reusing Yeast
From: Rogers Michael B <avatar@hemc.net>
Date: Thu, 28 Dec 2000 09:59:43 -0500
I have been contemplating doing the same thing with my yeast. I,
too, haven't caught anything on a method of doing this. However, here's
a way you might want to try:
Make a simple mead, no spices or anything. The idea would be to
create a mead that is neutral to any other flavors you might wish to
create. Just honey, water, and be sure to include yeast nutrients. Add
this sack mead whenever you start a batch of your "good" mead.
Then, all you do is rack n' sack. Just add some new honey on
occasion to keep the fermentin' a-goin. You may also want to try keeping
your lees to use as nutrients. Just drain them, freeze for a couple of
days to kill off any remaining yeast, and add that to your mead... Since
you didn't add any flavorings, all of your lees will be spent yeast.
The mead you get from this will be sweet and high in alcohol. You
may want to use this for cooking (deserts mostly). Seems to me it would
make a good no-bake cheesecake, bavarian cream, jello jigglers, meading
fruit garnishes, etc. I can send you my (untried) recipes if you like.
My first batch disappeared in the form of Christmas gifts before I could
try them.
The only problem with using this method is the induction of one
variable- your sack mead yeast starter. Because you may not be able to
tell where exactly your yeast starter is in it's own fermentation, it
will be harder to reproduce EXACTLY the mead that you started with it.
However, you should be able to adjust your recipes accordingly by taste.
------------------------------
Subject: Re:Old Recipe Question
From: Rogers Michael B <avatar@hemc.net>
Date: Thu, 28 Dec 2000 10:30:57 -0500
I don't know anything about this recipe for Brushka, but here are a
few thoughts:
It sounds to me like the missing ingredient(s) that cause the
semi-paralysis is a question of either herbalism or a fungus in the
grain used to make the bread. From what little I know of herbalism, it
sounds more like a fungus in the grain due to inferior storage or after
the bread was cooked. Funguses are notorious for creating neurotoxins-
that is how the Argos fungus is cultivated (the natural source for LSD).
As for this relating to semi-paralysis, l have seen a relatively small
amount of pellet feed paralyze my brother's chickens and cats to the
point of seeming dead. They were not breathing enough to be able to
detect. Luckily they later revived without any ill effects. It was all
due to a fungus on the feed pellets.
The bottom line: This recipe may actually be dangerous.
------------------------------
End of Mead Lover's Digest #833
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