I have recently taken up mead making. We have had bees for several years and ended up with a pretty hefty stock of honey. Mead was always something I enjoyed a great bit, best in my opinion being Lurgashall out of England.
On 3/25 I started my first batch using honey from 2001(yes, that old) collected during the nectar flow of mainly Lirodendron(Tulip Poplar) but obviously other things are also blooming around that time. Honey can keep for years, I'm not at all worried about the honey being too old for brewing. I chose this particular one because I have always liked honey collected during Tulip poplar blooming. The honey tends to be dark and deep but subtle enough to enjoy in large amounts.
I started at 1.090, am currently setting at 1.040 and about to rack(likely tonight). If all goes well and it finishes out by the end of summer I would like to take the mead to our State Fair.
The only thing I worry about, especially with this being my first brew are the ingredients I had used. I followed a recipe for first timer's sake but feel like it called for unnecessary additions. It had listed to add Yeast Nutrient(no brainer since honey doesn't quite have the properties of fruit) and Malic Acid, which after a midway tasting seems to do really well. But it also had Tartaric Acid and Tannin, I understand these are for mouth feel purposes but they really seem to draw away the characteristics of the honey. When I tasted it I could taste the honey and I could taste the Malic Acid and the apple tartness blended really well with the honey I used. But the aftertaste was screaming grape(especially that of an american grape). It may settle down towards the end of fermentation but I think for my next brew I will likely just use Malic, a tad of Citric and place whole comb in the fermentation bucket.
