Ask the Meadmaker EP. 69 – SO BOUNCY!

Next week is Vermont Pride and I'm so excited. I'm wearing my new shirt. It's my new favorite shirt! Can you read the back? It's hard to read while I'm bouncing, but I'm not going to stop bouncing for like two straight weeks.

Welcome to Ask the Meadmaker, where I, Ricky the Meadmaker, answer your questions about mead making, mead drinking, mead brewing, and really any question you're willing to send to me. 

The first one this week is part of a string of weird comments I've been getting recently. Our friend Azazeal was out at a wine tasting which also included some meats, which is very cool. Problem is, one of the meads smelled and tasted of cat urine. Now, after our bear incident in the last episode, I feel like I'm not the best person to ask these questions of. I have never had any animal things in any of my mead. This may be something you want to take to Google. Weird little side note: cat urine is not considered an off-flavor or aroma in Sauvignon Blanc. 

Curtis had one of the classic problems. Curtis is making a mead that's supposed to be 11-12% alcohol, but it isn't. It's about 6%. No matter what he does, it stops with 5% alcohol to go and he doesn't know what's wrong. Unlike most people who send me this question, "My mead won't finish," he actually sent me all of the details. He sent his fermentation temperature, his yeast strain, I mean, everything that we really need to diagnose the problem. The problem is, he seemingly did everything right. And it's amazing how often I get these issues. People send me these things. "My mead won't ferment." And they've done everything right. Why? And the answer is, I can't really tell you. See, for him, he experimented with yeast nutrient and no yeast nutrient, but I don't know how much and when. Maybe that's it. Maybe you didn't pitch enough yeast, maybe D47 quit. But there's one really important thing I wanted to pull out of what he said. He said that he was fermenting it a little cold at 78 ˚F. Now, I don't know where he got this information. But 78 ˚F is actually quite warm for that strain. D47 is a white wine strain. It really likes to be in the 60's. So, it's possible, unlikely, but possible that maybe this time it was too hot. Yeast is a fickle mistress. 

Paul is aging his mead and he wants to know if the thin level of lees that has developed is a problem. Not a problem in general, but a problem for refermentation. Should he rack off of that yeast and other particulate before he puts in his sulfites? And the answer is, if you have another vessel, it can't hurt. 

John from Georgia likes potent, high alcohol content, sweet, still meads and he wants to make a braggot. A braggot is a combination of grain and honey. And he's afraid that if he makes a high octane, sweet, still braggot, that it might just taste like boozy, flat beer. And he's wondering if this is true. Well, John, only one way to find out. Actually, in all honesty, back in my homebrew days I made something almost exactly like what you're talking about. And it tasted like liquid gold. This stuff was like barley mixed with brandy. It was incredible. Go for it. 

Our last question this week is a statement and then a question from me. Curtis said, "My understanding is that to be classified as a mead, it has to be at least 8% alcohol." I don't know where you got that. To be classified as a mead, it has to be fermented 51% or more from honey. So, my question is, where did you hear that? Anyway, that's our last question this week. I just need to send it over to Ricky with our word of the week. Ricky? 

Thank you, Ricky. Great shirt. This week's word is stuck fermentation. I use the term all the time in episodes, and I realized I've never said exactly what a stuck fermentation is. A stuck fermentation is whenever you're fermenting something, and it stops substantially short of completion. You want something that's 8% alcohol and it stops at 5%. A stuck fermentation is not wanting something that's 8% alcohol and getting only 7.2 or 7.5. A stuck fermentation is something that can usually be rebooted in some way. Additional yeast, and energizer, any number of things. A stuck fermentation is the bane of every brewer's existence. You get something that's sweet, and well, not boozy enough. Talk about a problem. 

Stuck fermentation. It's our word of the week and the end of our show. Keep sending your questions and I'll get to them as soon as possible. Cheers.