1 gallon of boiled, sanitized water, 3 pound of honey, and some yeast (even baking yeast works fine) +3 days in clean-sanitized container with a gas-trap = a delicious refreshing drink with a little buzz. Boil the water, let it cool for 10min or to 180 or, add the honey, then let cool to 90 degree or lower to pitch in the yeast. cap, with a trap vent or even a loosely secured lid that will vent when the pressure builds up, and let brew in a comfortable spot out of sunlight. Remember if you are comfortable, yeast is happy, so...honestly your kitchen counter works great. You do want a vent though, as brewing makes CO2 and will cause your brew container to fail if doesn't have one. They sell all kinds of brewing gas trap devices online, so they are easy to find.
After roughly 3 days, or once it stop making new bubbles, pull the brew and strain into a pot, remember to not pour out the sediment at the bottom, and bring it all to about 170 degrees, or a light simmer for 5 min. Do NOT boil as you can kiss your precious alcohol content goodbye if you do (ethanol boils at 172f, water at 212f.) After lightly simmering to kill the yeast, It can then be "finished" with whatever you want. You can boil fruits and spices into a compot, strain and add, or steep mulling spices, even add premium, fragrant honeys to complete the final flavor.
My advice is extract fruits and other flavors and ADD to the finished mead, do NOT attempt to brew fruits into mead as the yeast will munch the fruit sugars and pectins and make a "sour" that will impart undesired flavors. If you want blueberry mead for example, just boil 1-2 cups of blueberries for 30 mins, sweeten to taste and dump into the finished mead. This is infinitely preferable to brewing with blueberries or even spices.
Its notable, for brewing, use inexpensive honeys as the fermentation process will digest most of the flavor aromatics. Save the premium, wildflower, or other flavorful honey for the finishing/flavoring process *after *you pasteurize your brew.
Then bottle, chill, and enjoy.
While aged mead is fantastic, given it takes 6 months or so to home age, the unaged style is much more accessible for people who want to ditch woke beverage makers.
Though to state the completely obvious, yes it is a light wine, so, no drink and drive ok?
Honestly, brew your own un-aged mead.
1 gallon of boiled, sanitized water, 3 pound of honey, and some yeast (even baking yeast works fine) +3 days in clean-sanitized container with a gas-trap = a delicious refreshing drink with a little buzz. Boil the water, let it cool for 10min or to 180 or, add the honey, then let cool to 90 degree or lower to pitch in the yeast. cap, with a trap vent or even a loosely secured lid that will vent when the pressure builds up, and let brew in a comfortable spot out of sunlight. Remember if you are comfortable, yeast is happy, so...honestly your kitchen counter works great. You do want a vent though, as brewing makes CO2 and will cause your brew container to fail if doesn't have one. They sell all kinds of brewing gas trap devices online, so they are easy to find.
After roughly 3 days, or once it stop making new bubbles, pull the brew and strain into a pot, remember to not pour out the sediment at the bottom, and bring it all to about 170 degrees, or a light simmer for 5 min. Do NOT boil as you can kiss your precious alcohol content goodbye if you do (ethanol boils at 172f, water at 212f.) After lightly simmering to kill the yeast, It can then be "finished" with whatever you want. You can boil fruits and spices into a compot, strain and add, or steep mulling spices, even add premium, fragrant honeys to complete the final flavor.
My advice is extract fruits and other flavors and ADD to the finished mead, do NOT attempt to brew fruits into mead as the yeast will munch the fruit sugars and pectins and make a "sour" that will impart undesired flavors. If you want blueberry mead for example, just boil 1-2 cups of blueberries for 30 mins, sweeten to taste and dump into the finished mead. This is infinitely preferable to brewing with blueberries or even spices.
Its notable, for brewing, use inexpensive honeys as the fermentation process will digest most of the flavor aromatics. Save the premium, wildflower, or other flavorful honey for the finishing/flavoring process *after *you pasteurize your brew.
Then bottle, chill, and enjoy.
While aged mead is fantastic, given it takes 6 months or so to home age, the unaged style is much more accessible for people who want to ditch woke beverage makers.
Though to state the completely obvious, yes it is a light wine, so, no drink and drive ok?