ginger mead?

[Packman715]

any good recipes out there?

 

[Arpolis]

any good recipes out there?

I have a ginger mead in Primary right now. It is my first attempt at a Ginger mead. First here is a quote from Jack Keller on his take of Ginger mead.

Zingimel (Ginger Mead) 1 gallon



2-1/2 lbs clover honey (you can use any honey)
1/2 oz ginger root, peeled and sliced crosswise
juice of one large orange
water to 1 gal
1 Campden tablet
1/2 tsp yeast nutrient
1/4 tsp yeast energizer
1 sachet Lalvin 71B-1122 (or Red Star Pasteur Champagne) wine yeast
Heat 1 quart water to perhaps 120 degrees F. and stir in the honey. Cover and remove from heat. Meanwhile, brought a separate 2 cups water with the ginger root slices to a gentle boil. When ginger slices begin to turn translucent carefully strain water into honey-water, discarding the root or saving for a mild tea. In primary, combine two quarts cold water, orange juice, yeast nutrient and energizer, and combined honey- and ginger-waters. Bring volume up to one gallon, cover and allow to cool to about 80 degrees F. Pitch activated yeast and recover primary. After 2 days stir daily until s.g. drops to 1.010 (mine did this on day 9), then transfer to secondary and attach airlock. Ferment 30 days and rack, add a finely ground and dissolved Campden tablet, top up and reattach airlock. Wait 60 days and rack again, then repeat after additional 60 days. After third 60-day period, inspect bottom of secondary for sediment. It should be clean, in which case you can bottle the mead, but if a very light dusting is visible rack once again and bottle after a few days. Bottle age at least 3 months and serve chilled. [Author's own recipe]

For some reason I was distracted when I pitched the yeast and did not take a starting specific gravity reading so I didn't know how much alcohol this mead had. Because it fermented dry (0.998), I used a vinometer and measured about 10.5% alcohol. At bottling time, this mead tasted marvelous. An ounce or so I chilled tasted even better.

Here is my recipe for comparison:

5 gallon batch

12 lb of Honey with two small bricks of honey comb from the raw honey
2oz "4 TBS" of crystallized ginger
1 TBS of powdered ginger
50 golden raisins cut in half
2.5 tsp of yeast nutrients
2 tsp of yeast energizer
Lalvin K1V-1116 Yeast

1) Mixed everything lack yeast and energizer together at room temp "No Boil"

2) Whipped the heck out of it with my home made wine whip.

3) Pitch yeast

4) Plan to add yeast energizer 24 & 48 hours after yeast pitch at 1 tsp each

5) Plan to let ferment dry then prime and bottle for sparkling ginger mead.

My OG is at 1.084 which is right at where I figured it would be. I estimated 1.086 and did not really scrub my honey containers clean so thought it would be just under. I should have 11.5% – 12.0% ABV in the end.

 

[shawnbou]

I just made ginger mead on Sunday, so no idea how it will turn out, but here's how I did it:

• 14 lbs honey
• 4.1 oz peeled, diced ginger root
• 10 g Lalvin K1V-1116 (rehydrated in Go-Ferm)
• SNA per hightest's FAQ on this forum

The ginger isn't very noticeable in the must sample I tasted, so I expect I'll add more closer to bottling. I will probably use a combo of fresh ginger root and crystallized ginger.

I plan to serve it as a still mead.

 

[AllusionsOfGraindeur]

My friend and I recently made a batch of Ginger Mead using a recipe from the AHA Mead Day 2011 (http://wiki.americanhomebrewers.org/MeadDay2011#Ginger). The only alteration we made was to use Wyeast Sweet Mead Yeast, since we want a good bit of residual sweetness in the finished product.

It's been in primary for about 1.5 months now and already tastes amazing. Very nice orange blossom character with a great ginger bite. I'm looking forward to seeing how it develops.

Good luck.