Easy low-alcohol mead

[sorginzorrotz]

Hi,
I'd like to share my recipe to make some mead.

We need:

-1L bottle, I make mine in 1L bottles because I can finish the bottle soon enough to avoid changes in taste due to contact with new air and bacteria.

-Baloon

-Needle

-A big bowl to mix

-Raw unheated honey. 50g (alcohol content will be %2 approx.)
50g/l is %2
100g/l is %4
I keep mine at %2 because alcohol is a known toxic compound, and I don't want to get drunk in my daily basis.
All enzymes present in honey are preserved in mead, but fructose is gone(alcoholic fermentation).

-Mineral water. Not chlorinated.

The process:
This mead is wild as it's not inoculated with some isolated strain.

Fill the bottle with water almost full.
Now, put that water in the bowl/container and add the honey.
Mix it thoroughly until totally disolved; by hand, with a processor, or whatever.
The sooner the mixing is completed the faster the fermentation.

Fill the bottle with the mix.
Perforate the baloon with the needle. That will be your valve.
Put the baloon in the bottle, it should be tight, if not attach with a rubber.
The gas created will be expelled slowly, and it will avoid anything to enter the enviroment.

WARNING1: Don't do mead in a closed jar, this is not lacto fermentation, alcoholic fermentation creates much more gas, and thus, pressure, so we need the valve.

My mead is done in ~2 weeks time.
WARNING2: You can sip to try your mead sooner, but be careful and don't drink more because if fermentation is not completed there will be tons of yeast yet that will trigger diarrhea.

Flavours:
I do mine in 3 different flavours. Try different ratios, to taste.
-Plain mead.
-Cinnamon, vaniilla and clove
-Raw fresh apple juice. It is halfway cider/mead, depending of the ratios.

It's refreshing, aids digestion and no sugar.
I don't think sugar is bad, but I don't want to eat sugar when I'm being sedentary or do nothing, I prefer to get my sugar when I'm about to workout.
Hope someone likes it.

[MarkR]

Thanks for the recipe. I had all the supplies at home, so i made a 1 litre test bottle during lunch. Let's see what happens :-)

[tonyvee]

Interesting idea. Any chance of a picture with how the balloon is setup ? I'm slow.

[sorginzorrotz]

I don't have a smartphone, so I can't take a picture.
I don't know if I can put links from other pages, but just type "mead baloon" when searching for images an there you have it.
It's just like putting a condom, hahah

[tonyvee]

Haha ! Now I see what you mean after searching for those words. Thank you 

[MarkR]

How long does it usually take before the balloon becomes inflated? I made my batch on 09-09, now there is a sediment growing on the bottom of the bottle, but there is no gas forming yet. That is normal? Do i need more patience? 

[sorginzorrotz]

Great Tony 

Hi Mark
Hmm, I'm not exactly sure, but less than a week.
Haw much have you filled the bottle? There has to be little room for the gas in order to inflate the baloon asap.
The soonest the better because when the baloon inflates there's nothing going into the mead as gas is leaving non stop.
I think it should have been inflated already, but don't worry.
What's your temperature? I have mine in the counter, it'll be like 68 F there.
It is raw unheated honey, isn't it? It's somehow silly to ask that in this forum, but just in case hahah
Keep me informed

[MarkR]

The bottle is not completely full. There are maybe 5cm empty before the balloon starts. So maybe it needs more time to also fill up this space.
Does it have to be stored in the dark? I have it now in our pantry, which is open, but dark-ish. Maybe i will not get to 68F in there. Maybe relocating to a warmer place might help, is there a minimum temperature required for things to get going? Or will it just take longer at lower temperatures?

It is raw unheated honey indeed, with (reverse osmosis) filtered tap water :-)

[sorginzorrotz]

Next time try to fill the bottle more.

Avoid direct exposure to sun light as it can degrade enzymes and kill bacteria by radiation.

Yeast starts growing significantly at ~ 60F, the higher the faster, as long as it's not more than ~100F(when enzyme and microrganisms start to die)

Yeah, you could find a warmer place, keep in mind that warm air has less density so the highest shelf of the counter will be the warmest.

[MarkR]

Update: It has now been ~3 weeks. There is some sediment (yeast?) in the bottom. I tried the mead 2 times. It tastes very fresh, a little bit sweet, and a little bit like honey. I do not taste any alcohol, but i made the 2% version, so that could make sense.

The balloon never inflated, but bubbles did gather at the top of the water level. So i guess some gasses were produced. I'm a bit unsure whether i succeeded. Either way, the liquid, whatever it is, tastes nice.

Can i keep the (yeast?) sediment from the bottom and use it to inoculate a new bottle? Maybe that will speed up the process a bit? For the next bottle i will search for a bit warmer place. Maybe on top of the fridge near the vent or something.

EDIT: i was just checking your recipe and saw that you use 50gr/l honey. I did only 25gr/l, so that might explain the lack of action haha. I will retry when this bottle is empty

[sorginzorrotz]

Hi Mark,
Sediment is perfectly normal, it's a good sign.
If it is a little sweet then fermentation is not completed*.
If you find the fermentation "active"=lots of bubbles, it means that yeast is still alive and eating the sugar.
THAT YEAST MAY CAUSE DIARRHEA. So it's important to wait until fermentation is completed.
Or you could drink some, but be aware.
When sugar is completely fermented, yeast dies by starvation.
When fermentation is completed there will be much less bubbles and zero sweetness. I've found mine to be ready at ~2 weeks, but YMMV.

*If you make %18-20 mead, then yeast activity will cease due to the yeasts being unable to live in a high alcohol enviroment.
That's the only scenario where sweet mead is safe.

About using the yeast for a new batch, yeah go for it.
About top of fridge, hmmm, that warm air from the enine it's not gonna be the cleanest.

If you are using less mead, it should have fermented faster, if I'm not missing sth...
Anyway, if it tastes good it will be good, so enjoy

[MarkR]

Well... my second batch, containing the yeast of the first, does not seem to do a lot more than the first. I did 50gr honey per liter. Wrapped it in a towel (to keep out the light) and put it in front of the window for more warmth. Still no action. Soon i will have an old fashoined woodstove in the house, so it will be more continously warm in that place. I will try again.

Also will be getting a kamboucha culture soon, so will try with that as well. I tried some storebought kamboucha's but most were pretty shitty. Barely tasted fermented and mostly tasted fake. And per default i do not trust anything from the supermarket. So i will make some myself. Sometimes i miss a 'nice drink', and i do not like water, and sometimes i'm done with drinking milk.

[sorginzorrotz]

I had the same problem.
I really enjoy warm water with salt.
Sometimes I add lemon juice or vinegar.
For me it does the trick and my milk cravings are gone.

[tonyvee]

...
Also will be getting a kamboucha culture soon, so will try with that as well.
...

Kombucha is cooked though, rather than raw. Are you alright with that ?

I used to make it years ago, if I remember correctly you have to make the tea, cool it, then put a slimy kombucha 'mushroom' in it to ferment.

[MarkR]

How is it cooked? I'm brewing up some right now. Indeed, just make some tea with sugar and add the 'mushroom'. It is now eating the sugar and making it 'vinegarry'. It is taking a long time though, but that is probably due to the lower temperatures here.

[MarkR]

I had the same problem.
I really enjoy warm water with salt.
Sometimes I add lemon juice or vinegar.
For me it does the trick and my milk cravings are gone.

I would prefer to not eat salt. But indeed making a drink with lemon juice or vinegar is very refreshing. Also making watermelon puree with eggs is very nice. Just get a seedless variety, else you have to take out hundreds of seed before making puree..

[tonyvee]

How is it cooked? I'm brewing up some right now. Indeed, just make some tea with sugar and add the 'mushroom'. It is now eating the sugar and making it 'vinegarry'. It is taking a long time though, but that is probably due to the lower temperatures here.

When you make tea do you not boil water ... is that not 'cooking' it if you expose it to heat ?

Aajonus suggests the same, see https://aajonus.online/qna/2000_05_21

"
Q: What about kombucha tea?

A: It is all garbage – you have to cook it to make it. It is not a real mushroom.
"

[MarkR]

Yes, of course you cook water to make the tea. But i do not really care about destroying the possible 'nutrients' in tea, i do not think there are any anyway. It is very likely that the toxins from the tea leaves will be in the tea, so i do not have the idea that Kombucha is a healthy drink. I am not making it with that in mind. Just experimenting with a variety of stuff, and i'm also interested in how food is made in general, you never know when it might be handy to know these things.

It is indeed not a real mushroom, but i never thought it was. Just a collection of bacteria and yeast that eat stuff and poop other stuff. I renamed our Kombucha 'poop-drink' to give my girlfriend more understanding of what is actually happening with the Kombucha haha