Mead Making 401 | Making Better Mead |

Welcome to Mead Making 401! In this series we dive deeper into mead making. I’ve already done 101, 201 and 301 - so we are now on 401! Today’s topics are:
1.) Backsweetening without Stabilizing
2.) Show, Great & Long Meads
3.) Organic vs Inorganic Nutrients
4.) Step Feeding a Brew
5.) Sulfites for Long Term Aging
101: • Video
201: • Video
301: • Mead Making 301: Done ...
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Find the notes here: docs.google.com/document/d/1m...
0:00 Introduction
0:20 Today’s Topics
1:18 Backsweetening without Stabilizing
6:04 Show, Great & Long Meads
8:05 Organic vs Inorganic Nutrients
12:40 How to Stepfeed a Brew
20:38 Sulfites in Brewing
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[@davidmcdonald4771]

Wow! Thanks for clarifying some questions. Just figuring out step feeding.

[@ehisterikal3351]

I love your channel. My brewing things be here tomorrow and because of your channel im not going in blind. Keep up the great content

[@aqhan]

I very much appreciate all the info! Also, the way I step feed is I plug my volumes and yeast percentages to BatchBuildr, then choose my nutrient progression. Then I divide honey needed in half (to add first), then remaining in half again, and add them in two more separate occasions. I tend to arrive around needed final gravity every time.

[@tomknight2366]

Great rundown of info and I appreciate the doc to review! You're always teaching via youtube but you're really giving a full on 25 minute class here :)

[@ManMadeMead]

I have a lot of fun with these videos!

[@gapey]

Good info, I didn't know about those different meads. I have my first "show" mead that's ready to bottle. Been aging for a year now. I've been calling it traditional mead but good to know it has another name. I tried to make my first wine (a dandelion wine) without a nutrient just to see if I could. It started out ok but stalled well before it was done so I ended up having to add nutrients to get it going again. I went with DAP this time though I normally use Fermaid O. Didn't know about not adding it after a certain ABV but it was at around 4% when I added it. It was an interesting experiment. I just posted the video of that experiment today.

[@Troscoman]

12:12 As personal rule, I stop adding nutrients on half of the fermentation, which will be like 6,5 to 7,5% ABV.

[@ManMadeMead]

That’s fine for lower abv stuff, but if you are step feeding - nutrients are necessary the whole time!

[@FifthElement-ct7hp]

Great 👍🏻

[@ManMadeMead]

Thank you! Cheers!

[@jasonlayman8817]

Good video. You should do open fermentation verse closed fermentation to see if one is faster or better tasting.

[@ManMadeMead]

I’ll have to try it one day!

[@tkdyo]

Thanks a lot for this video. Very interesting stuff. Is there a good alternative to sulfites for long term aging? I am not anti sulfite in principle, but when I drink a lot of something with sulfites I tend to get headaches much more frequently than without, so I would prefer to avoid them in my home brews.

[@UponGiantsShoulders]

Another way to halt the yeast is fortification using cask strength spirits.

[@kb2vca]

Interesting video. Using non-fermentable sugars to back sweeten a mead creates a separate problem , in my opinion. Don't you want to highlight the flavors of the honey in every mead you make? When we use a non honey sweetener to sweeten the mead, don't we lose (or at least diminish) the honey flavors? On a second note, if we pasteurize the mead to kill off the yeast then we cannot use sugars to carbonate the bottle. You have to force carb by pumping in CO2. One other option I have not tried is to ferment brut dry, then add enough sugar to prime the bottles with just enough to add the sweetness you are looking for. If you then monitor the pressure caused by the CO2 and pasteurize at that point, there will be enough sugar left to sweeten the mead. BUT, as you suggest, thee is some risk to heating gas filled bottles filled with liquid. Last point: as you say, tea is not a nutrient for yeast but black tea contains tannins and that is typically the only reason why someone might add tea to their mead. How much tannin does a strong cup of black tea provide? I have no idea and that is sometimes the problem. If you use standard tannin powders (typically made from chestnuts) there is a known, if not precise, amount of tannin made available. and so the manufacturer can suggest that you add a specific quantity of the powder to every gallon of mead. That is much harder to determine with "strong black tea" - How much tea did you use? How long did it stew? Are you adding the leaves?

[@GenesisGameGenie]

Nice video! I actually didn't know that you shouldn't use DAP over 9%. In the past, I've used fermax and fermaid K later in fermentation to try and push a strong mead to finish. It didn't work out as well as I would hope, and now I know to avoid this in the future.

[@jgar538]

Actually the 9% would only apply to meads intended to ferment up in the 13% + neighborhood. Many of us make meads below 9%, so 2/3rds fermented is a better bar to set. Cheerz.

[@ozoneswiftak]

Yeah thanks for all the info I wish you would have talked a little bit more about the flavor of dap

[@gamecollector7930]

SO2/burning silver in a cask was mainly used for sanitization of casks more than liquid stability…even though the sterile environment would most definitely help lol

[@jkwynn87]

Question. So, I like the taste of maraschino cherries and wanted to brew with some. Problem is, they have Pottassium Sorbate as preservative mixed in with them. But that got me thinking about using a jar of them during back sweetening. Would the mead absorb enough of the maraschino cherry taste to be worth it, and would the potassium sorbate already in the cherries be enough to stabilize the mead without needing to add a separate dose?

[@julietardos5044]

Did you make a video comparing two meads, one aged with sulfites and one aged without?

[@ArrowtotheMead]

Weird story! My early brews had a pretty lackluster homemade boiled yeast slurry for nutrition. The efficacy of this "nutrient" is probably best-demonstrated by the traditional I brewed with it (since there's no natural YAN in such a recipe). And that traditional stalled out at just under 14% - with a 17%-rated yeast that is **literally advertised for restarting stuck fermentations** lol But I also did two batches where I used chai tea instead of water - same boiled yeast slurry attempt at nutrients - and both took off like rockets. The first broke 15% ABV and the second broke 16% ABV; both were using 71B with an on-paper tolerance of 14%. I have done no further research on the matter, so please let's not have anybody interpret this comment as an endorsement of chai tea as a nutrient replacement. In fact, I consider the taste of the meads I made with chai tea replacing 100% of the water to have been an abject failure. That was absolutely not a good recipe in spite of the apparently successful fermentation lmao, so if it turns out you need such a high level of tea to have an impact it would absolutely not be worth it. I'm only wondering out loud if it might be worth doing a deeper dive into the impact of tea on fermentation... my sample size is 3, but it does suggest there *might* be something to it.

[@BernardAnlageIV]

Overall a good video, but there is a much easier and more accurate way to do the math when it comes to dillution. The water content DOES NOT matter. Only the change in volume. This makes the math much simpler than what you showed. Using the same numbers and ABV equation you used in your example, we get the following: 1 gal @ 1.130 --> 1.070, ABV so far (1.130-1.070)*131.25= ~7.87%, Dilute with .66 gal honey. New volume =1.66. New ABV = Old ABV*(1/1.66)= ~4.74% 1.66 @ 1.130 --> 1.000, ABV (1.310-1.000)*131.25+4.74= ~20.76% Remember, anything that is soluble that is added to a brew dilutes it and lowers the ABV. Honey is soluble, not just the water.

[@colinbrown4008]

👍

[@bucky1670]

The distinction of organic vs. inorganic nutrients has nothing to do with whether they are naturally derived or made in a lab. It isn’t the food-labeling distinction but rather the chemical one. An organic nutrient is carbon-based and an inorganic nutrient is not. DAP molecules have no carbon as part of their chemical makeup, so DAP is not organic. Fermaid K is about 2/3 Fermaid O and 1/3 DAP so it provides a mixture of organic and inorganic nitrogen, so it’s a great well-rounded nutrient. Fermax doesn’t publish information about its composition, but it’s probably something similar.

[@annadalnoki9396]

Do you add sulfates once you are going to bottle. Does it change the taste.

[@kentaltobelli1840]

2 corrections: -osmotic pressure is usually the pressure "sucking" water out of the yeast. -adding Metabisulfite actually *increases* SO2 in solution which reacts to Oxygen to neutralize O2 (turns into SO4) and prevent your delicate flavor/aroma molecules from oxidizing.

[@chelseajoslin205]

Quick question about DAP- you said after 9%. I've heard this before so, the clarification I'm looking for is after the brew has reached 9% or the brew's estimated final ABV is above 9%? Just looking for that clarification!

[@ManMadeMead]

Normally you don’t want to include after the brew has reached 9%. So when you’re including nutrients that have DAP in them, make sure you stop using them at that point!

[@trevorschmied797]

Very informative and useful! I did not know about DAP being harmful past 9% so I for sure took something away from this video. Good stuff

[@hugoboivin4675]

Hey! If ever I add honey to raise my abv a week after day 1, should I stir or not, also with fruits in secondary, should I stir it up or shake my carboy?

[@ManMadeMead]

You can stir both in! Just don’t go crazy and stir too vigorously!

[@yin333]

I know you're a mead channel but do you enjoy Sarsaparilla? If you do, have you ever made an alcoholic sarsaparilla? I'd love to see a recipe for this or even a sarsaparilla inspired mead.

[@ManMadeMead]

I do like it! I haven't used it much in mead or many capacities though!

[@martinsramek8594]

How do you mix the honey you add during step feeding? Wouldnt shaking the jar oxidise the mead?

[@ManMadeMead]

So as long as the fermentation is still active, the oxygen shouldn’t be a huge problem. The yeast will use it during fermentation so it won’t really oxidize the brew

[@enkhyy]

Hey 3M. Are there traditional sources for yeast nutrients, i.e. nitrogen and phosphate, other than contemporary additives (DAP, etc.)? I prefer a metheglin-style mead. Thanks for your time.

[@ManMadeMead]

I’d recommend Fermaid O! It’s natural and gets the yeast all the nitrogen and complex yeast nutrients they need!

[@enkhyy]

@@ManMadeMeadThanks for your suggestion. Rather than buying a modern compound, what other common ingredients can be used. I currently use raisins and teas for tannins and I have lots of yeast for hulls. What about the vitamins and micronutrients? It would be interesting to know what meaderies used prior to these commercial compounds.

[@bputzke4256]

I’m making raspberry, it’s dry. It’s at .998 right now. Im about to rack to secondary after a week to verify it stays at .998. If I back sweeten with Splenda in secondary, how much would you recommend for 1 gallon? Im going to use Splenda so I don’t have to worry about starting fermentation again. Thanks

[@ManMadeMead]

I would back sweeten to your own taste! Splenda can be strong so just try adding a little at a time

[@nigel900]

Very interesting. I saw a video where they were making Lemon Mead (I’m interested it trying to make some), and in addition to lemon zest and juice, they used a handful of white raisins. Was the purpose of the raisins to create a nutrient for the yeast? What if I’m using Fermaid-O…. can I omit the raisins? Just curious… Thanks, and great videos. 👍🏻

[@ManMadeMead]

Lots of people say to add raisins for nutrients but we know they don’t do anything! I’d add that Fermaid O!

[@nigel900]

@@ManMadeMead Got it… Thanks.

[@Greez1337]

I tried using Lactose to sweeten a mead, but eventually the Lactose separated and settled at the bottom of my mead; I dissolved the lactose in some water then added it to the brew. What's the best way to get lactose into your brew?

[@ericlarson2775]

Backsweetening will always add some haze that will settle at the bottom eventually. I wait another couple months after backsweetening and then rack a final time before bottling

[@ManMadeMead]

Hmm... I haven't had that happen before but I'm not sure what I did different! You might just have to keep mixing it?

[@PraetzelProjects]

How much k metabisulfite do you add when going into bulk aging/bottling per gallon?

[@ManMadeMead]

1/2 tsp of Sorbate & 1 Campden Tablet per gallon!

[@PraetzelProjects]

@@ManMadeMead I’ve got powdered potassium metabisulfite, what does that translate to, I can find any consistency in the brewing forums and I trust your advice haha Thanks!

[@ManMadeMead]

@@PraetzelProjects It should be about half a gram!

[@PraetzelProjects]

@@ManMadeMead per gallon, perfect! Thanks!

[@Lauli55]

Hi, newcomer here - started my first batch last week, your videos made me do it ;) Have a question about sanitizing equipment. I also am growing mushrooms and the sterilization process over there is much more rigorous as compared to how it is here with brewing. Even a small gust of "domestic air" could contaminate the produce - a liquid culture solution for instance. So I'm a bit surprised when I see brewing guides just rinsing stuff off with some cleaning agent but then afterwards still have everything exposed to contaminants. What's the thought process (?) behind sanitization with brewing? Why does it have to be specific products like Star San? I used regular isopropyl alocohol for cleaning that I had from the mushooms - does that make much of a difference?

[@julietardos5044]

Contamination is a much bigger problem with mushroom growing than home brewing. Most of the time, soap and clean water are enough to clean your home brewing equipment, but it's best to use a sanitizing agent on top of that, just to be sure.

[@Lauli55]

@@julietardos5044 cool thanks! The biggest challenge in both brewing and mushroom growing appears to be the waiting game though ;)

[@julietardos5044]

@@Lauli55 Right! You do the thing...and then you wait...and wait...and wait...

[@royalecrafts6252]

how do you prevent air to enter when doing step feeding honey or step nurturing with nitrogen?

[@ManMadeMead]

I wouldn’t worry about oxygen until you finish fermentation completely! During fermentation stirring the mead up won’t hurt it

[@ashleysmith4155]

How are you liking Shawn's Hawaiian honey? What varieties have you tried?

[@ManMadeMead]

I love it! I’ve used mamane, mango and eucalyptus so far! They’re all great!

[@ashleysmith4155]

@@ManMadeMead I've tried tangerine, mamane, wililiki, and coconut. All were good for me.

[@Hannibalking16]

I wish I could post a picture in the comments there's a whole match computation I do when making my mead

[@Funpants94]

I see some honey from Shawn back there....which ones did you get?

[@ManMadeMead]

I’ve tried the mango, eucalyptus, princess blossom and elui so far!

[@Funpants94]

@@ManMadeMead princess tree is stupid good. I have about 60-70lbs of various honey from him. I picked up a coffee/citrus blossom from him a while back that's excellent as well. Using that on some tepache at the moment.

[@almirria6753]

Hey guys I have an idea for a new brew honeysuckle [since they are in bloom here right now], vanilla about a 1 pound of blossoms, 1/2 a gallon of homey, 1 vanilla bean [cut up & mashed] & a gallon of water with half a pack of Lavin DVII yeast. What do you think

[@ManMadeMead]

I think it sounds good!

[@kjdevault]

Did you try this? How was it?

[@charlessiems5100]

Is one pound of honey per 1/2 gallon about right?

[@ManMadeMead]

That would be pretty sweet! I would start with a half pound per gallon

[@thosesguys6489]

I had a question on the nutrient section. You cite yeast hulls as an example of organic nutrient and then cite boiled bread yeast as a poor source of nutrients. I was under the impression that boiled bread yeast is a method of making yeast hulls at home. Are you saying that it is an organic nutrient and a poor nutrient (as the two are not mutually exclusive) or is there a big difference between the two?

[@ManMadeMead]

They are okay! I would say they are leaps and bounds better than Raisins or any of the other. However, they don’t contain all the micronutrients that Fermaid O or K have.

[@wallyklw5]

You didn’t list allulose

[@JustaSpaceCowboy]

"High gravity requires your yeast to go through some serious osmotic pressure. Sometimes yeast can struggle and present off flavours because they get stressed in their fermentation stage". I disagree with this statement. Commercial brewing under great volume creates higher pressure due to weight. Pressure fermentation has proven to perform great results, reduce off flavours, and able to tolerate higher temperatures, especially around 10-12psi.