Unloading some notes and info and appreciate any help or tips!
Drinking an Arizona green tea I thought it would be awesome to make something that tasted similar that but with a little booze. I decided to put together a green tea mead recipe and see how it goes.
I have an available 3 gallon fermenter and I'm aiming for a light, dry to semi-sweet drink that's around 5% with notes of green tea and honey
-Hydrated a pack of EC-1118
-Started with 3.5lbs of tupelo honey and 1 gallon of water with some Fermaid K and DAP in there as well. Nabbed a OG of 1.12 and locked away to ferment at 60 degrees.
-After 3-4 days added another 1/4 tsp of DAP and Fermaid K and after 2 weeks of being in the primary reached a 1.004.
-Boiled 2 gallons of filtered water, took off heat, then steeped 40 bags of Japanese Sencha for a strong green tea with a 2 tablespoons of honey and an ounce of lemon juice and reracked the original mead into this tea. Also put 4 more bags of (I felt the tea flavor was light but ran out of Sencha so Oolong and jasmine green tea in the secondary).
- next day got worried and in my head about what kind of bacteria could be on the tea bags in the secondary (didn't sanitize them...), saw a few floaties which shocked me however they looked like creamy yeast rafts from the second, smaller, fermentation. Saw the airlock bubbling at around 1.5 minutes apart also helped knowing there is some protective blanket of CO2. Added a 1/4 tsp. potassium metabisulfite to help fight infections and keep my mind at rest a little lol. Continuing to watch for any fuzz and film.
- Brought the temp down to 55 degrees. Will cold crash soon for about a week then planning to back-sweeten with more tupelo dissolved in a concentrated green tea. Will try to add only another 8oz to keep it at 5%
First time playing with HG (normal OG to a lot of you lol) & dilution and with teas but figured they are probably like other spices and hops...lol I'm finding the tea is even more delicate and soft then I was imaging and hard to retain it's flavor and aroma. Even with adding 2 gallons of strong brewed tea to the secondary it's still very light in tea qualities. May play around with concentrating green tea and getting more flavors from less volume additions. Will definitely make a concentrated batch of tea for back-sweetening probably using 8x the amount of green tea (8tsp of green tea for 8oz of water compared to the 1.25tsp of tea per 8oz of water I used in the secondary).
Anyone with some tea experience please lmk what you did and how it turned out!
Drinking an Arizona green tea I thought it would be awesome to make something that tasted similar that but with a little booze. I decided to put together a green tea mead recipe and see how it goes.
I have an available 3 gallon fermenter and I'm aiming for a light, dry to semi-sweet drink that's around 5% with notes of green tea and honey
-Hydrated a pack of EC-1118
-Started with 3.5lbs of tupelo honey and 1 gallon of water with some Fermaid K and DAP in there as well. Nabbed a OG of 1.12 and locked away to ferment at 60 degrees.
-After 3-4 days added another 1/4 tsp of DAP and Fermaid K and after 2 weeks of being in the primary reached a 1.004.
-Boiled 2 gallons of filtered water, took off heat, then steeped 40 bags of Japanese Sencha for a strong green tea with a 2 tablespoons of honey and an ounce of lemon juice and reracked the original mead into this tea. Also put 4 more bags of (I felt the tea flavor was light but ran out of Sencha so Oolong and jasmine green tea in the secondary).
- next day got worried and in my head about what kind of bacteria could be on the tea bags in the secondary (didn't sanitize them...), saw a few floaties which shocked me however they looked like creamy yeast rafts from the second, smaller, fermentation. Saw the airlock bubbling at around 1.5 minutes apart also helped knowing there is some protective blanket of CO2. Added a 1/4 tsp. potassium metabisulfite to help fight infections and keep my mind at rest a little lol. Continuing to watch for any fuzz and film.
- Brought the temp down to 55 degrees. Will cold crash soon for about a week then planning to back-sweeten with more tupelo dissolved in a concentrated green tea. Will try to add only another 8oz to keep it at 5%
First time playing with HG (normal OG to a lot of you lol) & dilution and with teas but figured they are probably like other spices and hops...lol I'm finding the tea is even more delicate and soft then I was imaging and hard to retain it's flavor and aroma. Even with adding 2 gallons of strong brewed tea to the secondary it's still very light in tea qualities. May play around with concentrating green tea and getting more flavors from less volume additions. Will definitely make a concentrated batch of tea for back-sweetening probably using 8x the amount of green tea (8tsp of green tea for 8oz of water compared to the 1.25tsp of tea per 8oz of water I used in the secondary).
Anyone with some tea experience please lmk what you did and how it turned out!