I’m pleased to report that unlike the utter foulness of the manuka mead, the second batch of Prison Mead has turned out quite drinkable indeed.  This 3 gallon batch was made with unpasteurized wildflower honey and off-the-shelf Fleishman’s yeast.  I think of it as a proof-of-concept experiment.

From ferment to glass in three months means that while it’s certainly on the “aggressive” side, it nevertheless is still quite drinkable.  While the nose is a bit on the “clear your sinuses” meter, the taste is surprisingly mild and very sweet.  It’s almost like a fruit wine in it’s character.   There was no finishers or clarifier used so of course it’s on the hazy side, but in many ways this is speculative archeo-brewing.  This mead is probably very close in colour and taste to what ancient peoples would have been preparing.

I’m considering this a success, which means that for the small-scale home experiments I’ll be on to something different next.  I think next up will be some recipes I’ve been reading for Short Mead, which has an even quicker ferment-to-table time than this three-month mead.

All in all, good times.

This past Friday it was the 3 month mark for the first batch of Prison Mead.  Unfortuantely, it looks a bit of a bust.

While the fermentation was just fine and everything went as it should, it seems that the manuka honey just isn’t suited for mead making — there are nasty flavor compounds that developed.  What starts as a nice dark caramel-like taste in the original honey, translates into a bitter and oddly plastic taste in the ferment.  Not good at all.  Perhaps there are some hillbillies somewhere that would like to get drunk off of it, but not me.  I’m going to take just one bottle from it and dump the rest.

Happily, it’s not all bad news.  The second batch which will be coming to maturity next month is tasting very good.  This was made with simple wildflower honey, and has developed a very mild and sweet taste.

This was always a big experiment, so now we know: manuka honey is fit for toast, not mead.

Upon returning from the gang meading last night, I observed that two of the three new batches of Prison Mead seemed to have extremely lethargic yeast .  One was foaming and filling it’s baloon just fine, but the other two were limp noodles.  There was some bubbling, but not much foam action.  Gave them a good shake but this morning they were still flatlined.

Just a bad batch of yeast I suspect.  Going to pitch another lot and toss it in later today and see if that livens up the party.  More anon.

At the one week mark all three gallons of Prison Mead are coming along nicely.  The balloons are still maintaining an even fill and the bubbles are still rolling along, indicating that the yeast is still doing it’s yeasty thing.  The must is a lovely amber colour, and over the next couple of weeks should start clearing as the yeast finishes it’s job and shuffles off this mortal coil.  Not much point in taking a photo since there’s nothing new to see, but in this case that’s good news.