Copy Link
Add to Bookmark
Report
Mead Lovers Digest #1512
Subject: Mead Lover's Digest #1512, 21 January 2011
From: mead-request@talisman.com
Mead Lover's Digest #1512 21 January 2011
Mead Discussion Forum
Contents:
Re: Mead Lover's Digest #1511, 18 January 2011 ("Dennis Key")
Re: Mead Lover's Digest #1511, 18 January 2011 (MeadGuild@aol.com)
Balche (rob roadie)
balche (rob roadie)
Re: Clay and sulfites (mail-box)
sulfites (Re "Clay and sulfites") (Dick Dunn)
NOTE: Digest appears whenever 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 and admin requests.
Digest archives and FAQ are available at www.talisman.com/mead#Archives
A searchable archive is at http://www.gotmead.com/mldarchives.html
Digest Janitor: Dick Dunn
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Subject: Re: Mead Lover's Digest #1511, 18 January 2011
From: "Dennis Key" <dione13@msn.com>
Date: Tue, 18 Jan 2011 14:57:03 -0700
When forwarding or replying, please remove all email address at the top and
use Bcc like I did on this one:
<SNIP>
> I have a question for the gurus out there. A wine maker friend and I have
> been debating the effects of sulfites in mead/wine. I would like to say
> upfront that I avoid any additives I can, including sulfites. In particular
> we were debating the aging of a fine ferment. His stance was that sulfites
> help with producing a high quality product years down the road. The debate
> hinged around two points, 1) sulfites help keep out unwanted yeast strains,
> such as mother of vinegar. I understand that this can be circumvented
> through a reasonably high alcohol percentage. 2) Sulfites bond to the same
> molecules which would oxidize without the presence of sulfites, and thus
> help preserve the fresh fruity notes that would otherwise degrade with
> time. This arguement intrigued me.
<SNIP>
I have stopped using sulfites because I read other meaders were just boiling
the water, turning the heat off and stirring in the honey and getting good
results. I believe the fewer chemaicals, the better.
More importantly, there are people out there who are allergic to one degree
or another to sulfites.
I am a retired emergency nurse and I recall a case where a person ate at a
salad bar where the veggies had been rinsed in a sulfite solution (a common
practice then). Within a few minutes of leaving, he suffered a very nasty
asthma attack and unfortunately died before we could get his airway open.
By history from his family, he knew he was allergic to sulfites but didn't
know it was on the veggies. This is why this is no longer done at salad
bars.
You will see on many wine labels, "Contains Sulfites" a warning to those
who are allergic. People at wineries tell me the addition of sulfites
preserves the wine for aging and most use it. The very few bottles of my
mead that have escaped consumption within a year don't seem to be badly
affected by not adding sulfites
<SNIP>
> FWTW a change in the iron content of your water (higher) can create a
> haze in the must. You can have you water analyzed if you are on a well
> or ask your city water dept if on public water.
> I use soften and carbon filtered water for mead making to even things
> out.
I believe softening adds a significant amount of sodium to the water. Not
enough, perhaps, to taste, but unhealthy nonetheless. On recommendation
from my supplier (Victor's Grape Arbor in Albuquerque) I use RO filtered
water available for $.25-$.35 per gallon at most supermarkets. It has
worked well for years.
Dione Greywolfe
Dragonweyr, NM
------------------------------
Subject: Re: Mead Lover's Digest #1511, 18 January 2011
From: MeadGuild@aol.com
Date: Tue, 18 Jan 2011 18:33:42 EST
In response to our colleague Graham Clark. I reply:
Clay will settle out and, in my experience, will do a great job
causing almost all yeast to flocculate. If you rack after you
think you have achieved 100% flocculation (which never happens),
you only need to add crushed Camden tablets to stop secondary
fermentation.
Sulfites are a matter of taste. It???s your Mead. If you like it,
that is all that counts.
------------------------------
Subject: Balche
From: rob roadie <fukkinroadie@yahoo.com>
Date: Tue, 18 Jan 2011 17:26:51 -0800 (PST)
i was wondering if anyone has ever experienced a true Balche mead. in the
search i've only seen it mentioned back in 2003, and that was just a mention.
it's produced with what traditionally seems to be stingless bee honey
from the Yucatan, fermented and seasoned with bark of the balache tree.
to save everyone the wiki search, here's the best description of it's
manufacture i could find online:
Balche is a kind of mead, an intoxicating beverage consumed by the ancient
Maya and by some of their descendants today. These people make the drink in
a trough or a canoe, which they fill with water and honey, adding chunks
of bark and roots from the balche tree. The mixture begins to ferment
immediately. It results in an inebriating drink the people consume during
rituals and believe to have magic powers.
The peoples of Mesoamerica have long held the balche tree and their
mysterious beverage sacred. Because the drink had strong religious
significance to the Maya, the Spaniards banned the beverage in an attempt
to convert them to Christianity. The ban was observed until a Maya named
Chi convinced the Spaniards that balche had important health benefits and
that many Maya were dying as a result of the prohibition. The Spaniards
then lifted their ban, and balche rituals resumed. . . .
The Lacandon. . . believe that the gods gave balche rituals to them, and
that because the gods themselves first became inebriated by the beverage,
the people from then on had a duty to imitate the inebriation of the gods
and to experience that same exhilaration. The Lacandon chant incantations
while preparing the balche. . . First, the brewer offers his drink to the
gods; then, later, the people partake of it, usually just before dawn. The
Lacandon call the balche brewer "Lord of the Balche" and they identify
him with Bohr or Bol, the god of inebriation.
Nectar and Ambrosia: An Encyclopedia of Food in World Mythology, Tamra
Andrews 2000, ISBN 1-57607-036-0
"The ban was observed until a Maya named Chi convinced the Spaniards that
balche had important health benefits and that many Maya were dying as a
result of the prohibition."
=-=We will be like Chi! haha just wondering if anyone has tasted it,
if htey can describe it, and if it's worth pursuing.
------------------------------
Subject: balche
From: rob roadie <fukkinroadie@yahoo.com>
Date: Tue, 18 Jan 2011 17:45:12 -0800 (PST)
forgot to link the only review i could find of it:
"Another drink, specially flavored for ritual purposes, was a rather nasty
brew called balche made from fermented honey and the bark of the balche
tree. I have tried this delightful cocktail and rate it right up there
with really bad cough medicine."
- -Dr. Herman Smith
taken from
http://ambergriscaye.com/museum/digit6.html
------------------------------
Subject: Re: Clay and sulfites
From: mail-box <mail-box@comcast.net>
Date: Tue, 18 Jan 2011 21:26:39 -0500
On 1/18/2011 11:11 AM, mead-request@talisman.com wrote:
> I have a question for the gurus out there. A wine maker friend and I have
> been debating the effects of sulfites in mead/wine. I would like to say
> upfront that I avoid any additives I can, including sulfites. In particular
> we were debating the aging of a fine ferment. His stance was that sulfites
> help with producing a high quality product years down the road. The debate
> hinged around two points, 1) sulfites help keep out unwanted yeast strains,
> such as mother of vinegar. I understand that this can be circumvented
> through a reasonably high alcohol percentage. 2) Sulfites bond to the same
> molecules which would oxidize without the presence of sulfites, and thus
> help preserve the fresh fruity notes that would otherwise degrade with
> time. This arguement intrigued me. My organic chemistry is rusty, so I
> thought I would ask our little community here what people have noticed. Do
> those of you who add sulfites notice that your older batches are more fruity
> then your batches without sulfites. This may affect malomels and metheglin
> more then a traditional mead, as there are more complex molecules available
> for oxidation. I know many good wineries are moving to screw tops for the
> wines they want to age, because cork lets too much air in. They save their
> cork for the middle of the road consumers, who will still pay 40 bucks for a
> corked wine over not. So the logic is there in the market as far as I can
> see. Any opinions on this one out there?
I am no guru. But I am opinionated. I'll start by saying that your
post used the term "additive" rather than "chemical", and that I am
replying in general rather than specifically to your post.
I find the reluctance to use chemicals in wine making or mead making to
be baffling. I do not understand or condone the practice of those who
insist that making mead without "chemicals" is somehow a better practice
than those who adopt the use of modern methods which are proven to
result in a better product. The term "chemical" is misused, and much
misinformed stigma is attached to it. Water is a chemical, but you
won't find any of those who rail against the use of chemicals in their
mead making refusing to use water for the reason that it is a chemical.
Ignorance would seem to be bliss.
Winemakers many hundreds of years ago learned that burning a sulfur
taper in their wine barrels helped to prevent those barrels from
producing sour wine. Why then should a mead maker reject the use of
sulfite? The intent is the same: To prevent the product from souring.
This is a good thing! If you have perfect sanitation, you may not need
to use preservatives such as sulfite. But if you are rejecting the use
of sulfites due to a desire to make your mead "yea olde fashioned
manner", then you are most probably not able to say that you have
perfect sanitation. Go ahead and risk your mead, it is your own product
you are refusing to protect. Perhaps you drink it up fast enough that
spoilage isn't a factor. Perhaps you make it of a "heroic" strength
(yet another rant, but for another day) and thus a slight sourness is
masked behind the alcohol level, and your imbibers get too hammered to
notice the flavor anyway. And perhaps you just get lucky. Me, I'll
keep right on using cheap and reliable modern methods to ensure that my
meads are still palatable even after 5+ years in the bottle, and no
matter how much fresh fruit with who knows how much wild yeast and
bacteria on it I used in the making of my mead.
Regards,
Ken
------------------------------
Subject: sulfites (Re "Clay and sulfites")
From: Dick Dunn <rcd@talisman.com>
Date: Fri, 21 Jan 2011 15:54:32 -0700
Regarding the sulfites part of M Graham Clark's posting in the last
digest...
> ...A wine maker friend and I have
> been debating the effects of sulfites in mead/wine...
...[contentions being]...
> ... 1) sulfites help keep out unwanted yeast strains,
> such as mother of vinegar. I understand that this can be circumvented
> through a reasonably high alcohol percentage...
Couple wrong things there. First, mother of vinegar is a culture of
Acetobacter, which is a bacterium not a yeast. Second, high alcohol
won't help, because Acetobacter is in the business of turning alcohol
into vinegar...all you'll do is make stronger vinegar! (This holds at
the level of fermented beverages, not distilled.)
Proper use of sulfite will help some in preventing Acetobacter,
but the main way to prevent it is to keep air out. That's simple!
Acetobacter is highly aerobic; if it doesn't have oxygen it won't grow.
So keep fermenters topped up, or purge the headspace with CO2. Keep
liquid in fermentation locks. Use high-enough fill levels in bottles.
Fundamentally, if you need sulfites to prevent vinegaring, you're doing
something wrong and you need to fix that instead.
Sulfites are more helpful against molds and fungus, but those are rarely
problems in mead.
>...2) Sulfites bond to the same
> molecules which would oxidize without the presence of sulfites, and thus
> help preserve the fresh fruity notes that would otherwise degrade with
> time...
Basically correct. Keep in mind that a -little- bit of oxidation will
add an interesting note of its own, BUT it only takes a little. People
whose meads taste "sherry-like" at all have real oxidation problems.
Particularly with a melomel, oxidation gives off-tastes. Yes, a touch
of sulfite will help there, especially if you're expecting to keep the
mead for years. This is assuming you haven't already gotten oxidation
started earlier in your process, say during the latter period of bulk
fermentation.
Keep in mind that sulfite added early in the fermentation has a different
purpose than sulfite added just before bottling. To protect the mead
during aging, you'll need to add the sulfite late...because sulfite added
early will (almost) all be bound up by the time fermentation finishes.
Also, it takes very little sulfite for protection at bottling--20 ppm or
less.
But the flip side is that sulfite added late will leave available SO2
in bottle (that's the whole point), which can trigger a reaction in
sulfite-sensitive individuals. Yet a third side to the coin (!) is that
many people who believe they're sensitive to sulfites (particularly if
with red wines) are actually experiencing histamine reactions unrelated
to the sulfites. And you don't need a lot of sulfite late.
> ...I know many good wineries are moving to screw tops for the
> wines they want to age, because cork lets too much air in...
No, other way around. Screw caps are going on the less-expensive bottles
which see very little aging before they're consumed. Corks are still
used on more expensive wines, and in fact the slight oxidation that occurs
during aging is deemed desirable, as long as the cork remains sound.
>...They save their
> cork for the middle of the road consumers, who will still pay 40 bucks for a
> corked wine over not...
A "corked" wine is not oxidized. It is contaminated with TCA, which is
most often due to contamination on the cork itself.
- --
Dick Dunn rcd@talisman.com Hygiene, Colorado USA
------------------------------
End of Mead Lover's Digest #1512
*******************************
