Mead and other brewing update

[mrsbrown]

The magic number is 1040.  That's the hydrometer reading of the mead.

The mead had stopped bubbling, except for changes in temperature, but there is still sugar to be made into alcohol.

So tonight I added yeast nutrient (about a teaspoon) and a new batch of yeast.  The yeast is EC something, and was described as a good "killer" yeast.  It will kill the old yeast, if there's any left, and start the process again.

If all goes well, we should be able to bottle the mead for secondary fermenting in two weeks or so and it will likely be drinkable at Festival.  The good news is that the mead is quite tasty, even at this stage.

I think we'll put the mead into bottles instead of one of the Abbotsford kegs because Festival is only 66 days away, that's less than 10weeks.

Allowing at least 4 weeks in the keg and 2 weeks fermenting plus a week for faff, means that the mead has to be out of the large fermenter in the next 3 weeks so we can make the Festival beer.

doushkasmum can you make cider in your big fermenter?

Comments

[wenchilada.livejournal.com]

Goodluck with the mead! We made some but won't get to test it for a couple of years... I guess it's either going to be passable or really, really baaaaaaad....

[sjkasabi.livejournal.com]

omg, after curfew, but I just finished talking to the Steward.

Short version: soup cooking on Tuesday night, v small amount of other pre cooking this Sunday, a bit more if 10B is still interested in making sausages. Will discuss in more detail tomorrow. Most cooking will be at the event.

Right, so, now, hang on, the whole point of getting those kegs was so that there would be NO BOTTLES at Festival. 10B gave up STUBBIES that we might keg. Is Festival really too close to use the kegs? Are there any ways to get the proportion of the mead that goes to Festival into something better than crown sealed bottles? Can we drink the mead young and sweetish from the keg? Can we put it in a wineskin? An amphora? Anything that's not modern bottles?

[mrsbrown.livejournal.com]

The mead's not ours. St Barts got a grant to buy a lot of honey, which we used to make this mead.

If we bottle it we will be able to share it most easily amongst its owners.

We need to get it out of my large fermenter so we can make the abbotsford keg filler for festival.

So, not many bottles of mead in our campsite - we'll just visit St Barts to get some.

[sjkasabi.livejournal.com]

Ah, it's that mead. Sorry, didn't realise. Yay for bottles!

[doushkasmum.livejournal.com]

Yes, I can do a cider. The kegs are 25L, yes?

[mr-bassman.livejournal.com]

yup!