First try at mead

[JPStinky]

Hello everyone!
Let me preface this post with a disclaimer: This mead was a spur of the moment product of sheer boredom. My wife had accidentally bought an extra pack of honey because she thought we were out. I had some extra yeast from making root beer with the kids. Here is what I ended up with:
2 gallons of water
2 lbs of honey
1 sliced orange
1 sliced apple
Red Star Wine Yeast

My primary fermenter had some porter in it, so I threw this all into my old Mr. Beer to ferment. It's been in there about 2 weeks. I tasted a little bit. It tastes like there is some mead in there, but also like you are chewing on that white part of an orange.

Following the pattern of beer brewing, I feel I should put it into a secondary fermenter next. Do you put the fruit into the secondary as well?

My plan is to try a "real" batch later this summer using fireweed honey and some local blackberries (and actual mead yeast)

Any thoughts?

 

[Arpolis]

If you did not peel the orange then that white pitch flavor you are getting is going to dominate the flavors here. Read up on the following here:

Got Mead Newbee guide

And also pay attention to the recipe portion of the guide. It mentions the JAOM recipe which is one of the few ways you can work a whole orange into a recipe and it come out ok.

So first yes I would rack to secondary off the fruit. I would also let it ferment dry and once there, rack again off sediment and stabilize with sulfites and sorbate to prevent further fermentation and sweeten this with another couple pounds of honey at least. Give it a taste and go from there. The bitter may fade a little with aging but sweetness is what masks that with the JAOM recipe which is meant to be really sweet.

 

[Kdog22]

2 pounds of honey for a 2 gallon batch will likely yield a dry, very low ABV mead. Might even taste a bit "thin" when it's done. Most meads ballpark around 3 pounds of honey per gallon as a general rule of thumb and that's adjusted to make a dry mead or sweet mead. Either way it's your first mead and you've gotta start somewhere! As arpolis noted above, follow that link and read up. You will feel ready to create a great mead in no time.

 

[fatbloke]

With 2lb of honey in 2 gallons its not surprising its dry and bitter.

Without some sort of beer yeast, even with bread yeast as per the JAO recipe to end up with enough residual sugar youd need a further 5lb of honey.

Anything that changes that making it dryer means the flavour is focused on the pithy bitterness......

Oh and mead is more wine like than beer like so follow wine type methods not beer. Beer guidance will not help with some of the weirdness we often see with meads.....

 

[jonmohno]

Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo.....