Brewing - First batch of 2021

Today we laid down the first mead of 2021.  Generally we lay down one or two batches a year, largely because we are terrible at pulling them and bottling them, and it's just as easy to pull mead into a glass from a dipper as it is to pull it off into bottles.

The basic recipe for all of our meads is three parts water to one part honey, with two cups of brewer's yeast slurry divided between two pots of four gallons each.  Typically we do one pot plain and one pot not-plain; last not-plain was orange chai, the not-plain before that was cranberry, and this one's orange ginger.  We used approximately a pound of fresh ginger, peeled and cubed, six large juice oranges, peeled and sliced, and about two ounces of orange zest peeled off the oranges.  It will be consumable in about March, and it will be ready for bottling between March and June, at which time we may start another batch - or we may just forget to bottle it, as we've done occasionally before.

Basic steps:

1. Gather materials.

    Honey - 1 gallon per 4 gallons desired output

    Water - 3 gallons per 4 gallons desired output - because we are on a well, I do not need to do anything special for this, but if brewing from tap water, allowing to aerate to dispose of free chlorine is strongly recommended.

    Brewer's yeast - we use champagne yeast and prepare a slurry (about a packet and a half of yeast, two cups of water) ahead of time.

    Additives - yeast nutrient is an important add-on but it isn't going in at this stage and how much is needed depends heavily on the batch.  Fruit, spices, et cetera also fall into this category, and are going to be heavily dependent on personal taste and desired end-state.

2. Heat honey.

    Honey has a specific gravity of about 1.6 (that is, a cup of honey weighs about 1.6 times as much as the equivalent volume of water).  It also has a much higher viscosity than water, meaning that it does not like to flow, especially in cooler temperatures, and tends to crystallize.  Because of this, I generally put our gallon jugs in a medium stock pot filled with hot water and put them on low heat on the stove for twenty minutes per gallon, to re-liquefy any crystalline honey and to loosen them up.  A "production" setup, such as at a professional meadery, will just use a honey heater.

3. Prep fruit et cetera.

    While the honey is heating is a good time to get started on prepping fruit et cetera.  If it needs sliced, opened, or whatever preparation is needed, this is an opportunity to do so.  Some of this may be done ahead of time by using frozen fruit, where the ice crystals will damage the cellular membranes enough to open it up some, or by using a compote or syrup prepped ahead of time, but in this particular case we did not choose to do so.

4. Pour honey into container.

    This is obvious, straightforward, and requires no further commentary.

5. Pour water into container.

    When adding water, the chemistry, both putting the honey in solution and kicking off the fermentation, works better with water that is just hot enough to be uncomfortable to bathe in.  The water may be heated separately, or, as we did, well water as hot as it will come out of the tap is fine.  I prefer to use the same gallon container that I have used for the honey, because it collects the remaining honey and saves me a later cleaning step.  This might not be practical for someone using city water, as it requires aeration prior to use.

6. Stir thoroughly.

    While adding water, I also like to agitate the honey continuously.  The desired end state is a consistent honey-water solution, not layering, and because honey is so much heavier than water, both heat and agitation are important to making it mix well.  Since the water I'm using is scalding-shower hot, and since I know I've washed my arm prior to this, I typically use my entire arm for this so that I can feel whether the honey on the bottom has gone into suspension, but I would recommend very strongly against this for production purposes - among other things, the vats typically found in a production meadery are between eight and ten feet tall; it simply isn't practical.

7. Add yeast slurry.

    Add the yeast slurry - we use a cup of yeast slurry per four gallons of mead.  Stirring with a ladle, spoon, or other implement is optional but encouraged at this point.

8. Add additives (optional).

    This is where the fruit et cetera goes in.  Proportioning is really to taste, so I will not give recommendations, save to say that we have never over-flavored something, though I am quite certain it is possible.  Ideally, the additives will be in a "sock," strainer, or other container, but this is not always the case.  We have used tea bags, and I know from dye projects that clean nylon stockings are an acceptable option.  However, we have just as often merely left fruit or other solids free, and strained them out later.  Because the entire thing will be strained in a few months anyway, that is less risky than it sounds.

9. Housekeeping.

    I call this stage "housekeeping" because that's what it's called on construction sites, but the truth is that it's record-keeping, labeling, and clean-up, more or less in that order.  Write down what happened, what the ingredients were, et cetera, in a notebook for later consultation - either for repetition or tuning.  We do ours by batch, but by date could work in a larger production setting where multiple batches are running in different vats.  Label the pots with what they contain and the date they were laid down.  Clean everything - the countertop, the honey pots, spoons, ladles, et cetera.  Close up the mead pots.  Note that I did not say seal.  It is important that air be able to reach them but flies and other creatures be given as hard a time as possible.  We typically use a butterfly valve arrangement made out of strips of masking tape, but more professional setups are easy enough to come by.

10. Check up on it in about three months.

    The person who taught me to brew made the point that mead is one of the only hobbies where being a lazy procrastinator is a good thing.  It can be checked, and fed yeast nutrient, prior to three months, but it definitely needs a check at about the 90-day mark.

So - that is the basics of mead-making, and what the first batch of 2021 contains.