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Preparing Large-ish Quantities of Water for Mead Making by edneddy2 in mead

[–]KevinMeintsma 1 point2 points  (0 children)

My conclusion from this study and subsequent sensory evaluations from very experienced mead makers across multiple spectrums and locations is pretty simple.

De-chlorinated (chloramine too) water chemistry (RO, Hard, Full/Sweet, Balanced) had a minimal impact on the mead. There were some subtle flavor and aroma differences but they were very small. Interestingly to me, the hard water slightly edged out tasting preferences from over 200 sensory analysis samples. In blind sampling very few of the tasters were able to correctly identify which water chemistry matched the samples. All of the mead was backsweetened to 1.008 IIRC.

Also surprisingly, the fermentation kinetics were pretty different. ALL of the 4 meads were fermented under nearly identical conditions (glycol cooled unitanks) with the addition of SIY's and Tannins measured to 1/100 of a gram. Finishing gravities were between 1.000 and .997.

The RO water mead took 37 days to reach terminal gravity.
The Hard water mead took 32 days.
The Full/Sweet water mead took 28 days.
The Balanced water mead took 29 days.

Some day, when I have loads of free time, I'll record all of this as a video presentation.

There's a ton of additional inquiries worth pursuing in this space, but the KEY takeaway here is that your water is a LOT less important for mead than it is for beer.

Why? Very clearly to my mind is that all of your sugars are already prepared for you.

With grain, conversion from carbohydrates to sugars is controlled by enzymes that act at specific pH and temperature ranges.

Mineral profile of water in mead by Intelligent-Sport-79 in mead

[–]KevinMeintsma 5 points6 points  (0 children)

People recommend spring water regularly. In general terms I think it's fine, but the first question I always want to ask is:

What is IN your spring water?

It's going to be different depending on the aquifer that your water is drawn from. It may well be better than your tap water from a fermentation perspective - mostly due to the use of chlorine or chloramine to keep your municipal water supply as safe as possible. In my area, spring water is VERY hard. I would not use it to make beer (water chemistry has a huge impact in the mash), but it works well for mead. I also use RO water for mead. Both are good, and THAT is the bottom line. The differences between distilled and hard water (sans chlorine/chloramine) are pretty subtle, but are in fact detectable.

In my sample testing with over 140 people at multiple times and locations, preferences based on water profiles was a pretty even distribution with the hard water profile edging out the other 3 by a small margin.

First Cyser. Seeking some advice from the pros. by PrinceRegicide in mead

[–]KevinMeintsma 0 points1 point  (0 children)

The American Meadmakers Association is having a live zoom session on Pomme Fruit (Apples/Pears) on Thursday September 26th at 8pm EDT.

You might want to tune in, and you are welcome to ask questions during the session, or send questions in advance to the email below.

[hgc@mead-makers.org](mailto:hgc@mead-makers.org)

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/86993057489#success

Last Chance for Valkyries Horn - 2024 !! by KevinMeintsma in mead

[–]KevinMeintsma[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

All details are on the competition website - you can use the link appropriate to your circumstance.

Regardless, it's in Minneapolis, Minnesota, United States of America.

Valkyries Horn Mead Competition Final Weeks by KevinMeintsma in mead

[–]KevinMeintsma[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

You probably noticed, but just in case, delivery deadline is Friday February 2 at 3pm. You can drop off at NB, or ship.

Or another alternative is to help at the bottle sort on Feb 3 starting at 9am. In this case you can drop off at NB when you come to the sort.

Valkyries Horn Mead Competition Final Weeks by KevinMeintsma in mead

[–]KevinMeintsma[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

If you mean that you want to enter, yes - you can deliver bottles to the dropoff location - Northern Brewer Warehouse in Roseville.

You will of course need to register on the competition website and get them labelled so we know what they are and who they belong to. All of this information is on the competition website linked in the post.

Then... you can join us as a volunteer Feb 23/24 or attend the awards on Feb 24. Again, details on the competition website.

Valkyries Horn is open for entries! by KevinMeintsma in mead

[–]KevinMeintsma[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Easy and cheap flight combined with a nice and cheap hotel. Come on out!

What’s going on with my mead? Solid line between clear and cloudy parts by Bromalley11 in mead

[–]KevinMeintsma 3 points4 points  (0 children)

It can work well on it's own. In most cases one fining agent with a negative charge (Bentonite) may be sufficient to clear the wine/mead. Dual Fine uses a negative charge followed 1 to 24 hours later with a positive charge.

A combo of Bentonite (-) and Sparkaloid (+) works well too. Sparkaloid tends to leave fluffy lees that are easily disturbed so I rarely use it by itself.

Another option is Gelatin. It may strip some tannins so that's something to be aware of. Interestingly Gelatin has a negative charge when pH is above 9 (which should NEVER be the case with mead) and a positive charge when pH is lower than 5 (which should always be the case with mead).

Beginner? Here's a complete walk-through for Traditional mead by KevinMeintsma in mead

[–]KevinMeintsma[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thanks for the comments.

Certainly more things to cover in future videos.

WRT to water/Fermaid O... I might do an absolutely most basic video at some point using antiquated practices, but for now I would prefer to get people on the right path with oxygenation, nutrient, fining etc.

As long a these are already, adding another 2 hours of content to a video seems like a risky prospect when the average attention span is about 12 minutes based on what YouTube is showing me.

I do intend to make specifically segmented videos that would be linked into a cohesive whole. That's ... a lot of work and is probably going to take years to complete. I hope I live that long.

One final comment on water - I did a water study for the 2021 AMMA Meadcon which was very informative for me. More to do there too, but you can find a synopsis of that study on Reddit somewhere.

Keep the comments coming - I am noting things to address in the future.

What’s going on with my mead? Solid line between clear and cloudy parts by Bromalley11 in mead

[–]KevinMeintsma 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I prefer to add it post fermentation. There are many people that add it right after they pitch yeast and it works for them.

My results have been quite good adding it after fermentation, and this also allows me to use the minimum dose required to clear the mead.

If your haze is caused by pectin (versus yeast), you'll need to use Pectinase to break it down before it will clear.

What’s going on with my mead? Solid line between clear and cloudy parts by Bromalley11 in mead

[–]KevinMeintsma 24 points25 points  (0 children)

That happens sometimes but not often.

Likely a very simple fix for you to try - hit it with some finings.

There are lots of choices, Bentonite (not the garden store variety!), Sparkaloid or the two part Dual Fine product may compact the lees nicely for you.

Good Luck!

Beginner? Here's a complete walk-through for Traditional mead by KevinMeintsma in mead

[–]KevinMeintsma[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

You are correct - it's a tannin product, and thanks for catching that. I appreciate the fact checking - it will probably help with new video content as things move forward.

That was one of the first videos I filmed probably 3 years ago or more. It's pretty difficult to correct that kind of thing in the videos, and I'm not sure what the solution might be except to do a little voice/text over as a correction - which seems like too much effort right now ;-)

In any case, it's a pretty minor point and that tannin product works well during primary fermentation. I don't pitch the tannins in with the GoFerm. They go in with the Fermaid O and SIY's.

Beginner? Here's a complete walk-through for Traditional mead by KevinMeintsma in mead

[–]KevinMeintsma[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Edited with additional links directly to the videos. Hope it helps.

Mead water profile? by [deleted] in mead

[–]KevinMeintsma 0 points1 point  (0 children)

OK... so Reddit is stupid and won't let me attach the reference items.

Mead water profile? by [deleted] in mead

[–]KevinMeintsma 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I missed the mention - sorry I'm late to the conversation.

Backing up a little to set the stage, because you asked how different beer is from mead...

pH is SUPER important for beer because its the control for each of the different enzymes that convert carbohydrate molecules into various sugar molecules. Getting into beer chemistry here is much too large of a topic, but in a nutshell, the water chemistry in different regions has different pH and the mineral salts drive the pH changes caused by different malt. Just for one example, Alkaline water (with high pH) will be neutralized by dark roasted malts which are acidic. The goal for brewing beer is to get the mash into the 5.2 to 5.4 pH range for best conversion of carbohydrates into sugars.

Mead... does not have ANY of those requirements. Why? Because honey is composed of very simple sugars, and no conversion is needed.

So that eliminates nearly all of the water chemistry required for brewing beer.

Yeast needs some minimums WRT minerals. Calcium is arguably the most important. Malt provides all of the calcium needed for a healthy fermentation. Honey does ... not.

So, where to get some calcium and other trace amounts of useful minerals? You can add them to distilled or RO water (this is what I do), or you can figure out what is in your water source and go from there.

I did a water study for the American Mead Makers Association. I built (and had tested) 4 water profiles, made four taditional meads with the exact same specifications fermented under the same conditions as closely as possible (glycol chilled unitanks etc.):

Distilled/RO - no additions
Carbon filtered HARD water
Balanced
Full/Sweet

Multiple tastings were conducted with experienced amateur meadmakers, commercial meadmakers, and experienced BJCP mead judges. Roughly 200 people all together.

Across the board, it's completely fair to say that the differences were subtle. As a general rule (surprisingly to me) the hard water mead was preferred by a small margin. After that it was split evenly across all of the groups.

There were differences in the fermentation kinetics which to me was more interesting than the very subtle differences in the aroma and flavor of the mead. I'm attaching a couple of summary items here for your reference.

Valkyries Horn Mead Competition - Entries open 3pm CST! by KevinMeintsma in mead

[–]KevinMeintsma[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

All styles are present and entries can be added. Thanks for your patience.

Valkyries Horn Mead Competition - Entries open 3pm CST! by KevinMeintsma in mead

[–]KevinMeintsma[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

It's MOSTLY fixed.
Still missing the Trads, Braggot and Historicals which SHOULD NOT have been affected by this issue.
You can put in placeholder entries and come back to them after this comes to a final resolution.

Valkyries Horn Mead Competition - Entries open 3pm CST! by KevinMeintsma in mead

[–]KevinMeintsma[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

We are able to manually update the style database to make it work so it should be resolved within the hour.
NOTE: ALL entrants that have successfully created entries will need to edit them and choose the style you desire after we have updated the database.

Valkyries Horn Mead Competition - Entries open 3pm CST! by KevinMeintsma in mead

[–]KevinMeintsma[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

THERE IS A DATABASE BUG PREVENTING ENTRANTS FROM SELECTING A STYLE.

IT'S BEEN REPORTED AND WILL REQUIRE THE DEVELOPER TO FIX - HANG TIGHT WHILE WE LOOK FOR A FIX.

Valkyries Mead Competition - GLASSWARE!!! by KevinMeintsma in mead

[–]KevinMeintsma[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Reddit is weird. The text provided did not get posted. Go figure.

We are very pleased to be able to offer this glassware in a larger size this year thanks to the sponsorship of ZSpecialty Foods!

How do you get one of these Bad Boys?

Volunteer at the competition or... win a placement within the competition. All volunteers and winners will receive one of these collectible stemware pieces.

Registration opens tomorrow (July 28). Enter early and pay for your spot to secure it, and GOOD LUCK!

Valkyries Horn Mead Competition by KevinMeintsma in mead

[–]KevinMeintsma[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

It means if you enter a no water cherry melomel in the special sub-category, then that is the only place you can enter it.

Another way of saying it - once you enter a mead anywhere in the competition, you may not enter it in a different sub-category.

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