Mead?!

[Madadh]

I also make my own mead. I have 8 Litres of Scottish heather honey mead just cooling its heals. It 4 years old now and just getting into its mellow state. I also have 5 gallons of clover honey mead almost ready to be bottled.

[warrior]

As a beekeeper mead is definitely on my to do list. Never done home brew but I keep eying my muscadines and honey with some thought as to what I could do with them.

[Laird_M]

I've made a lot of mead in the past including metheglin which is fortified and melomel which has herbs in. I think that's the right way round...

Sweet mead sure does give a killer hangover, but the medieval recipes I've used create a drier mead more like a dry/semi-dry table wine which is very drinkabel and doesn't give much of a hangover.

Its the ONLY time I use marmite as its a great yeast booster to convert the sugrs in the honey to alcohol.

Might have to have a go again sometime.

A friend who was a muslim, loved the stuff as apparently the Koran says he can't drink any fermentation of the grape or the grain, but honey is neither...

[Woodsman]

I believe I got the Carroll's Mead Sweet Honey Wine from New York. I bought that one because they said they never really have it in stock and the other kind is always there so I might as well try this one now and compare the taste to the other later. The other kind was Bunratty's from Ireland.

Once I found out it was honey wine I was all for it. I love honey in liqour. Drambuie being one of my favorites on ice or as a mix.

BM,
I can attest to this being the exact same mead served before the medieval banquet at Bunratty Castle. When my brother-in-law was in Ireland, he purchased several bottles to bring home only to find the same on the shelf in his local PA Wine and Spirits store.

[jkane]

I've made a lot of mead in the past including metheglin which is fortified and melomel which has herbs in. I think that's the right way round...

Metheglin is spices or herbs. Melomel has fruit added, with grapes being a special category called Pyment and Cyser is honey and apple juice together. all other fruits get called Melomels. Acer is made with maple syrup/sap.

Fortified as in liquor added? I guess that would be Port Style! A sac or sack is mead that is over 14% abv. That is what high alcohol meads are called as long as the alcohol came from the honey naturally by the yeast. A Hydromel is less than 7% abv. Anything between is a Standard. Those 3 are alcohol descriptions instead of ingredients.

The other descriptors are Dry, Semisweet, ans Sweet. They should be self explanatory.

There are a few more different styles out there.

[Mark E.]

My first mead experience was at a rendezvous in Friendship Indiana. I was in a group, and a visitor supplied it-being all fellers, we were very willing to try. Few drinks affect me-vodka, yes. Tequila, yup. Mead, oh, shoot. I think I had one mug of it. I shoulda wondered why the feller that brought it wasnt drinking it, but oh well. I woke up to cannon fire at 7am the next day, and woulda swore it blew the tent off of me...except I had never made it into the tent. Nor had anyone else, for that matter. I rolled over grabbing for my dirk and wondering where and when the heck I was...took a while to figure that out. Burped honey for three days.

[Ryan Ross]

You haven't drunk mead, until you've drunk mead from one of these:



WARNING: Once you put warm mead into a horn, said horn will never smell the same again... regardless of how much Guinness you drink from it subsequently.

[Mark E.]

You haven't drunk mead, until you've drunk mead from one of these:



WARNING: Once you put warm mead into a horn, said horn will never smell the same again... regardless of how much Guinness you drink from it subsequently.

Nay, laddie-that is a WHISKY horn ye hae there!

THIS:





Is a MEAD horn!

Unless you are one of those wee Viking fellows.

[Ryan Ross]

Nay, laddie-that is a WHISKY horn ye hae there!

THIS:





Is a MEAD horn!

THAT, my friend, is called compensation.

[Mark E.]

THAT, my friend, is called compensation.

Touche'. Seemed a shame...It's not mine, by the way-did some research a while back...was planning a drinking horn from a Texas longhorn as a gag at some point. Never got to it though.