Frozen fruit

[leytonangell]

Would frozen fruit work in my mead?

 

[oklahoma_man777]

Yes but mash it first and then put it in

 

[Chris_The_Rogue]

I have used frozen fruit from the grocery store on numerous occasions without any issues. I normally add it to secondary along with a campden tablet to ensure nothing contaminates the mead. ( yes i know freezing kills most things and the alcohol content in secondary takes care of the rest, but it makes me feel better )

 

[leytonangell]

Yes but mash it first and then put it in

When you say mash you mean literally mash it up?

 

[leytonangell]

I have used frozen fruit from the grocery store on numerous occasions without any issues. I normally add it to secondary along with a campden tablet to ensure nothing contaminates the mead. ( yes i know freezing kills most things and the alcohol content in secondary takes care of the rest, but it makes me feel better )

Thanks for that, I'm still yet to make my first batch of straight mead (it's currently sat in a demijohn, although not doing much so not sure all has worked out right) but I have a load of ideas and flavours I would like to try when I get the process right but finding them frozen can be easier especially out of season

 

[bernardsmith]

I don't know that you really need to mash the fruit Freezing will have damaged the cells in the fruit and when the fruit thaws the cells will release large amounts of juice without you having to do anything. The yeast will be able to gain access to the sugars in the juice without any problem.

 

[Chris_The_Rogue]

I only mash the frozen fruit when im making fruitwine. For mead i just let it do its thing. Yeast will destroy it on its own if you give it a few weeks.

 

[MarkKF]

Frozen then thawed doesn't generally need to be mashed. Although when using a carboy I force it thru the funnel squishing the fruit a little more.

 

[BeerSmith]

Thaw it first, then mash it up a bit while its still in the bag (at least with berries, if it soft fruit you can probably just leave it sliced as is), and next put it in a large mesh grain bag like you would use for Brew-in-a-bag or a very large steep.

The grain bag will keep a lot of the excess fruit parts out of your mead and result in a lot less wasted mead and sediment. It also lets you control contact time with the fruit since you can pull the bag out when needed. Fruits high in tannins like blackberries need to have short contact times or you will impart a lot of tannins to the mead which will take a long time to mellow out. Softer fruits also tend to turn to mush if left in too long making it hard to separate the fruit from must.