Fruit: How and When to Add?

[suitablefortreatment]

About to embark on my first batch of mead making, and I’d like to make a cherry mead, but am finding myself wracked with indecision as to the variety of methods of introducing the fruit, when, and how. I know I could add cherries to the primary fermentation or secondarily, and that the flavors will be different, but it also occurs to me that it is possible to simply add cherry juice, also either in the primary or secondary fermentation, or simply as a back-sweetening agent after stabilizing. If anyone has any experience experimenting with these and any other methods of adding fruit flavors to mead, your assistance would be greatly appreciated in determining how it changes the flavor of the final product. Thanks.

 

[Steveruch]

I have one bottle left of a cherry mead that I made almost 17 years ago. It's really good.
I racked the finished mead on top of the cherries.

 

[Brett_Bellmore]

I've got a batch of blackberry mead I'm going to be stabilizing and aging later today. I put juice in the primary, and the result was a rather pale purple. I put the whole berries in the secondary, and the result was such a deep purple you couldn't see through it, and pale white berries floating in the carboy.

I think the alcohol helped leach the color out of the berries, and it was mostly in the skins.

So I'd use whole fruit in any mead where I was trying to capture the color of the fruit. Don't know how it impacts the taste, though.

 

[CKuhns]

Fruit or juice in primary, fruit in secondary or both? - Everyone will have a preference or opinion and many folks have kicked around the pros and cons of each. Interestingly enough IMO none are wrong! It all really depends on what flavor profile you are trying to achieve. If fruit forward flavor then a good bit of fruit or juice in primary (but juice in primary tends to require a bit of age) where as fruit is a bit easier on the ferment. If you are looking for the honey to come through with the fruit flavor as a nice after thought then fruit in secondary with the added bonus that you can rack from it when it hits your flavor preference. If you are looking for a well rounded full bodied fruit flavor where the fruit is the star then fruit in both primary and secondary.

See the fruit chart I use below. It's a pretty good place to start for fruit in secondary - Each of us have differing flavor preferences and will require some experimentation. Fruit with small seeds on the outside or near the surface have the potential to cause what i consider unpleasant flavors if left longer than 14 days. Fruit with pits removed or seeds on the inside can go longer than 14 days but IMO all fruit pretty much gives up all its flavor in about 2 weeks.

All of these Fruit additions would take place in Secondary (After freezing and thawing and are for a 5 gallon batch but do scale down for lesser volumes.)

8 – 10 Days
Raspberries – Blackberries - Cranberries
Mild Fruit Character – 4 to 6 lbs
Medium Fruit Character – 7 to 9 lbs
Strong Fruit Character – 9 lbs or more

Strawberries
Mild Fruit Character – 5 to 7 lbs
Medium Fruit Character – 8 to 10 lbs
Strong Fruit Character – 11 lbs or more

10 – 14 Days
Blueberries, Cherries (Sweet)
Mild Fruit Character – 5 to 6 lbs
Medium Fruit Character – 7 to 8 lbs
Strong Fruit Character – 9 lbs or more

Pears, Apples
Mild Fruit Character – 6 to 8 lbs
Medium Fruit Character – 9 - 11 lbs
Strong Fruit Character – 12 lbs or more

Citrus Fruits (Lemons, Limes , Oranges)
Mild Fruit Character – 5 to 6 lbs
Medium Fruit Character – 7 to 8 lbs
Strong Fruit Character – 9 lbs or more

Sour Cherries, Peaches, Plums
Mild Fruit Character – 4 lbs to 5 lbs
Medium Fruit Character – 6 to 8 lbs
Strong Fruit Character – 9 lbs or more