So we had a great crop of Raspberries last summer and froze several pounds for future projects. Then, I visited a local beekeeper and made a deal for several pounds of honey. Time to make some raspberry mead.
Ingredients:
13 lb. Honey
10 lbs. Black and Red raspberries and some Blackberries
Campden Tablets
Potassium Sorbate
Oak chips
Xylitol
acid blend
pectic enzyme
grape tannin
1 tsp yeast nutrient
Champagne yeast (Red Star)
I followed Jack Keller's recipe for fruit wines, except I substituted honey for the sugar. Copied here:
Pick only ripe berries. Combine water and sugar and put on to boil, stirring occasionally. Wash and destem berries. Put in nylon straining bag, tie, put in botton of primary, and crush berries in bag. Pour boiling sugar-water over berries to set the color and extract the flavorful juice. Add acid blend, tannin and yeast nutrient. Allow to cool to 70 degrees F. and add crushed Campden tablet. Cover primary with plastic wrap secured with a large rubber band. Add pectic enzyme after 12 hours and wine yeast after additional 12 hours, resecuring plastic wrap each time. Stir daily for a week, replacing plastic wrap if it looks like it needs it. Remove nylon bag and allow to drip drain about an hour, keeping primary covered as before. Do not squeeze bag. Return drippings to primary and use bag of pulp for "second" wine if you made a double recipe (combine bags, but only make one gallon of "second" wine). Continue fermentation in primary another week, stirring daily. Rack to secondary, top up with water and fit airlock.
After two weeks, I racked. There was a lot of sediment and some berry seeds. I added 1oz of oak chips in a muslin bag and left it in for one week. I also added 2/3 cup xylitol for sweetness.
Finally, I added 2 campden tablets and 2 tsp of sorbate to stabilize and protect.
After one week, the oak flavor was strong, but this was mostly gone after two months.
In January, I sampled. It has a rose color and is very clear. There is just a hint of raspberry scent and the "mead" flavor is not too strong.
Update (April, 2013)
Having enjoyed this mead on a few occasions now, I would make the following changes in the future.
First, I would increase the pounds of raspberries to 12. The raspberry flavor could be more pronounced and the mead is on the thin side currently.
Second, I would keep the oak chips in for two weeks. The flavor was strong at first but was barely noticeable after a few months. I'm scared of oak because I have heard it can overpower and ruin batches, but 1oz for 2 weeks sounds good.
Third, I visited a meadery in the finger lakes and learned that the brewer there makes the mead separate from the wine and then mixes them after fermentation to maintain flavor. I would at least like to try this some time to see if it makes a noticeable difference.
Update (April, 2013)
Having enjoyed this mead on a few occasions now, I would make the following changes in the future.
First, I would increase the pounds of raspberries to 12. The raspberry flavor could be more pronounced and the mead is on the thin side currently.
Second, I would keep the oak chips in for two weeks. The flavor was strong at first but was barely noticeable after a few months. I'm scared of oak because I have heard it can overpower and ruin batches, but 1oz for 2 weeks sounds good.
Third, I visited a meadery in the finger lakes and learned that the brewer there makes the mead separate from the wine and then mixes them after fermentation to maintain flavor. I would at least like to try this some time to see if it makes a noticeable difference.
