Biffed BOMM, now what?

[hahayepyep]

I've made a few BOMMs with tremendous success, but I still managed to pooch my last batch due to careless error. I have a temp controlled fermentation space in my basement, BUT, I forgot to put this batch in there and left for a weekend trip!

This batch sat in my kitchen for the first few days with ambient temps about 75F, so I imagine ferment temps were easily pushing 80F and likely went over.

I proceeded as usual but it has an intense Belgian yeast character (dark fruit and some bubble gum) in both flavor and aroma as well as being a little fusely. It went dry in about 2 weeks, sat for another 2 weeks in primary and then I racked to secondary (purely to get it in glass since I figured there's be some aging to do). The jet fuel is already taming (and I fully expect that to age out in due time), but I'm not holding my breath on the esters going anywhere.

Don't get me wrong, I LOVE these flavors in beer and if I'd gotten this in a Belgian ale I'd be giddy. Thing is, it just doesn't work for me in a mead. Without the malt backbone and hops, it's quite out-of-place.

I'm thinking of what to do with it now:

Boring option #1) bottle it, forget about it, and see what it does in a year, if it's still bad, cook with it.

Crazy-enough-to-work option #2) make a few gallons of Belgian ale wort, ferment with 1388, mix the two to taste? Some sort of backwards Belgian braggot?

Probably not a good idea #3) rack onto plums, peaches, or somesuch to balance/cover the esters?

Any other ideas?

 

[loveofrose]

Szechuan berries. It will complement and make it an excellent mead. Just add as described in Step 5 here:
https://denardbrewing.com/blog/post/Szechuan-bomm/

Taste every few days until you are happy with it.

 

[hahayepyep]

Thanks! I could eat my weight in dandan noodles, so I'm no stranger to szechuan pepper. I was actually eyeing that recipe up a while back. I might just go that route.

 

[Drewed]

I like option #2. I would be tempted to get the wort going, perhaps lighter on the malt ( as the mead has the sweetness? or did yours go completely dry?), and when you start to get krusen, start adding the mead a couple of pints at a time, giving 12 hrs or so between additions so you don't shock the hell out of the yeast.
Might suck, might be ok.

 

[Dan_K]

Why not add some honey to backsweeten it a little? You might stimulate whatever yeast is still in there. If so, they may help clean up some of the badness that's still in there.

 

[hahayepyep]

The mead's dry, so my intuition was leaning toward going a bit heavy-handed with the specialty malts because it will be thinned out by the mead. If I go this route, I'm envisioning the finished product to be somewhat like a dark strong ale.

I'm pretty well lost with respect to beer:mead ratios, though. My thin air guess would be 2:1?

I also chilled half the taste sample I pulled yesterday and sampled that last night. I expected the chilling to subdue the alcohol heat (which it did nicely), but what I didn't expect was a tartness I can only describe as "sucking on a peach pit" came forward. The tartness was certainly not unpleasant and I wonder what bringing some sweetness into the mix would do.

 

[hahayepyep]

Why not add some honey to backsweeten it a little? You might stimulate whatever yeast is still in there. If so, they may help clean up some of the badness that's still in there.

This also crossed my mind. I didn't cold crash this batch as I usually do, so there's a fair bit of yeast in there yet.

 

[hahayepyep]

So, I thought I'd check back in on this. I ended up coarsely grinding a jar of those Bada Bing cherries in syrup and racking onto that. The ferment kicked back up for a while and eventually settled out very clear and a deep ruby red. Once it was clear I got it off the cherries and put it in the cellar. Due to the slight loss from the racking and cherries, I topped off with water. The mead was so strong at this point in both alcohol and flavor, that the watering down was actually welcomed. Then, I forgot all about it and there it sat until this week when I realized I was short a glass jug.

Anyhow, everything looked fine, so I just pulled a taste sample and it's simply divine! It's dry, smooth, fruity, unmistakably belgian, and pleasantly tart. The dark cherry grabbed right onto the stone-fruit esters and gave them the backbone that was lacking. Carbonation would be incredible in this and I wonder if the yeast is up to the challenge at this point. I'd hate to bottle and find they can't make it happen. I wonder if I should add something clean to make sure I get a solid carbonation. Unfortunately, I don't have a way to force carb and store this small volume.

I fully suspect that I may make this again, intentionally.

 

[hahayepyep]

Well, I decided not to carbonate after all and instead added some of the untoasted american oak tincture I made up for one of my ciders. I bottled dry and still.

Just opened the first bottle of this and enjoyed it over the course of the last two nights and I couldn't be happier with the result! Even my wife (who hates belgian ales and has never been jazzed about any mead she's had) was pleased with it.

Bing BOMM

• hahayepyep
• Jul 26, 2018

 

[AkTom]

I love a love story...