Cinnamon Metheglin

[jjwelchNola]

Accidentally posted this in the wrong thread so reposting here.

Chronicling my latest mead exploit and seeing if anyone has tips to make this better. Only my second mead so still learning. Added 15 lbs of honey to 5 gallons of water. Took a specific gravity after adding nutrients and yeast and discovered it was only 1.080, which I thought was odd but wrote it off due to mixing issues. Added nutrients again at 24 hours and at 1/3 sugar break. Realized one month in I made a mistake and had undersweetened my mead, and to get my yeast to the higher end of it's alcohol tolerance I needed to have 15 pounds of honey added to water until it reached 5 gallons, so decided to add some more honey when I moved to my secondary. It was also at this time that I added 3 cinnamon sticks.

Approximately 2 months after first pitch took an SG at 1.000 and moved to secondary with 4 pounds more honey. SG bumped to 1.022, which I believe will allow me to kill most of the yeast off through alcohol poisoning.

Separated into several 1-gallon containers and added vanilla to a few. Gonna check it again this weekend to check the strength of the cinnamon and vanilla flavors and remove them if necessary. Also gonna add some fruits to a few (peach, apple, maybe pear) to get a pie-type flavor going.

If anyone has any suggestions for what else I can add to this base to get some good/interesting flavors, or what has or hasn't worked for them, please let me know.

 

[Hoppy2bmerry]

Did you taste your sample? If so how was it?

 

[jjwelchNola]

Tasted it, it just tastes like mead. Not really getting much cinnamon flavor sadly. Gonna taste one this week to see if I'm getting those notes I'm looking for. I think I smell it more than I taste it.

 

[CKuhns]

Couple of thoughts

Cinnamin for some reason can lose some of its flavor during the ferment. Sometimes it just blows out the airlock. Also it does fade over time, so if your allowing it to age for an extended petiod you may want to slightly over shoot the flavor your looking for. But be careful. You can always add but once in cant remove it so monitor it well.

Adding honey as im sure you are aware adds fermentable sugars. I would not rely on that to inhibit / kill the yeast.

 

[jjwelchNola]

I was worried about over powering my mead with cinnamon flavor so I kept it to 1 stick per gallon. I'm monitoring it regularly and will take a taste test this soon. Maybe tonight. Is 1 stick per gallon not enough? Is this just a time thing? Maybe recipes I read say to MAYBE leave it in for 1 week.

Regarding fermentable sugars, since I'm using lalvin 71b, I was under the impression that if I get the alcohol content above their 14% tolerance they'd either go dormant or die. Is this not the case? Obviously backsweetening, if necessary, would charge the alcohol content and possibly restart fermentation, given any yeast were still alive.

Was also gonna add potassium metabisulfite a couple days before racking/backsweetening/ bottling.

 

[MightyMosin]

Cinnamon is easy to overshoot the flavor. Sample regularly.

It will fade some over time, but it seems to take a long time to fade.

 

[CKuhns]

"Regarding fermentable sugars, since I'm using lalvin 71b, I was under the impression that if I get the alcohol content above their 14% tolerance they'd either go dormant or die. Is this not the case? Obviously backsweetening, if necessary, would charge the alcohol content and possibly restart fermentation, given any yeast were still alive."

Yeast will do what they do. I have had some crap out well below their stated max range and some well above. 71b are pretty robust I have pushed some to 16+ ABV. There are all kinds of options to inhibit, remove or kill the yeast allowing for sqeetening. I prefer to pasteurize still. But am definately not in the majority. Others prefer to inhibit them using those chemiclas that do so and again a small minority predwr to filter them out.

 

[jjwelchNola]

Cinnamon is easy to overshoot the flavor. Sample regularly.

It will fade some over time, but it seems to take a long time to fade.

Sampled it today, still very pleasant but still not a strong cinnamon flavor. Will continue to sample.

 

[Raptor99]

This week I opened a bottle of 3 year old citrus spice mead, and it was awesome. I used cinnamon, cloves, and allspice, along with orange zest and juice.

I think that a blend of those three spices work very well together. You have to be especially careful with cloves, as it is very easy to overshoot. But in the right amount, the cloves are awesome in mead.

 

[Johnny2]

I made a traditional 14%, boiled down apple juice into a syrup to back sweeten and some apple chunks. I added american oak chips and mulling spice blend.

Spice is not my thing, but the mead had an off-flavor coming out of primary and the oak/spices blended nicely with the flavor. it's strong on spice (cinnamon, cardamom, clove..etc). At first the spices were fine, but a month or two in the bottle, some (cardamom flavor especially) had become stronger. I might pasteurize one of the bottles to see what it does to flavor. It's now 3.5 months old (after racking off the from spices.)

Uses for over spicy metheglin, good cocktails to drink it in?

 

[Raptor99]

The spices will probably mellow over time. 3.5 months is very young for a mead. Save a few bottles to taste after 2-3 years.

If it is too spicy for your taste, try blending it with some apple juice right before serving.

 

[Johnny2]

I don't have high hopes for it lasting 3 years, but I certainly can keep the last bottles for 12-18 months, maybe even 2 years, if I can keep the pace with other brews.

 

[Johnny2]

I took a bottle to sample. The spices are strong but not as overpowering as I remembered. With the spices and the oak, it kinda tastes like if a whiskey drinker made a white wine. It tastes and leaves the glass with a perfumey odor of cardamom and cinnamon.

One negative about this mead is that, there is barely any honey flavor. The base mead tasted mild on honey flavor and after I sweetened it with that Apple juice, it diluted the honey even more. It's more like a heavily spiced and oaked white wine.

Now I have only 7 bottles left

Tasted it, it just tastes like mead. Not really getting much cinnamon flavor sadly. Gonna taste one this week to see if I'm getting those notes I'm looking for. I think I smell it more than I taste it.

The spice blend I used did contain crushed cinnamon sticks, maybe give that a try. I had a similar experience with using cinnamon sticks in a spiced cider last year.

 

[Raptor99]

The base mead tasted mild on honey flavor and after I sweetened it with that Apple juice, it diluted the honey even more.

That's why I like to backsweeten with honey. It makes a big difference in the honey flavor.

 

[jjwelchNola]

Bottled most of it last night, save two gallons which still have cinnamon sticks. Sadly, not getting much cinnamon or vanilla, just the hint of honey. Didn't back sweeten. Ended up at 12.5% abv.

Two gallons that still have cinnamon sticks are JUST starting to take up cinnamon flavor, almost 5 months after adding.

Gonna let them sit for a few more months to see if we can get a nice strong cinnamon flavor out of them.

 

[Hoppy2bmerry]

Bottled most of it last night, save two gallons which still have cinnamon sticks. Sadly, not getting much cinnamon or vanilla, just the hint of honey. Didn't back sweeten. Ended up at 12.5% abv.

Two gallons that still have cinnamon sticks are JUST starting to take up cinnamon flavor, almost 5 months after adding.

Gonna let them sit for a few more months to see if we can get a nice strong cinnamon flavor out of them.

What typ of cinnamon did you use?

 

[jjwelchNola]

What typ of cinnamon did you use?

Ceylon cinnamon, got it from amazon. See link here.

 

[Hoppy2bmerry]

Ceylon cinnamon, got it from amazon. See link here.

That is usually a good choice with sticks being soft and a bit crumbly.

 

[jjwelchNola]

Yeah, these were easy to break apart. Maybe I should have done that instead of just putting them in whole?