I took this recipe for my second mead. I used only orangeblossom honey, and substituted grovestand OJ for 4 gallons, sqeezed the other gallon from zested oranges i got in florida.
Was my 2nd batch. almost gone. Recomendation. Zest 2-3 oranges/gallon for your first batch instead of 6.
P.S. Zesting is hard work only zested about 8 oranges. Got some orange oil extract and added some of it. in hind sight. zesting about 12 total might have been better. While very good, the zest/oil is quite noticeably present.
P.P.S. I know nothing about the chemical listed below on moroccan oranges. If his comments concern you, do your own research on it. And on the fruit you buy. Most of us know people who are very ... umm .. discriminating (yeah thats the word i want) about possible carcinogens. We also know what company sponsered research is likely to claim. Also I doubt extensive research has been done as to how soluable this chemical is when absobed in orange peel soaked in wine.
We also know that the modern legal envionment people will sue companies over such things as the fact that a driver in a mobile home wasn't warned in his owner manual not to leave his seat to use the bathroom while the vehicle was traveling highway speeds down an interstate. So a wise grower of oranges puts warning labels on his crates.
In theory comercial food grade extract should be clear of this... How much to use .... well that is what test batches and blending are for
But that is more advanced.
------- Reposted from Mead lovers Digest ---------
Subject: Orange/lemon zest and mead
From: "Wout Klingens" <wkling@knoware.nl>
Date: Sun, 7 Nov 1999 18:20:20 +0100
Meadlovers,
Adding zest to a mead is a rather common thing to do, if I read the
literature.
Well, I make a "mean" orange mel. With lots of zest. *Everybody* likes it.
The main reason I guess is, that I am blessed with the opportunity to get
Moroccan oranges.
The other day I asked my greengrocer when they are due. He told me to wait
until Januari for them to be at their best.
I casually told him, that I liked the zest especially. He looked at me
totally shocked and said that the zest is absolutely not to be consumed
because of pesticides and he showed me the crate with the warning on it. It
has Thiabendazole in it.
Not shocked at all I told him, that I read somewhere that those pesticides
are highly soluable in water and easy to rinse off with water and some soda
to remove the wax as well.
But he had me worried. The warning on the crates aren't there for
nothing....
So I did a search on the 'net on "thiabendazol" (without the "e") and came
up with some excellent German texts about this stuff.
It's a lot worse than I thought.
- - T. partially penetrates the peel. And therefore (my conclusion) impossible
to remove completely.
- - T. is always present in homepressed orange juice. Though not in dangerous
concentrations, it's there. The article states, that the benifits of
homepressed juice outweigh the disadvantages of the toxin relative to the
amount present. (Of course some of the peel oils will be in the juice, hence
the presence of the poison).
T. induces blatter cancer in animal testing.
T. is also used in worminfection of the skin. The remarks about this
application were, that though it is partially absorbed, no ill effects have
been proved to pregnant women and their baby. (Contradictory??)
While I was at it I also looked at the remarks about sorbate and sulfite.
Sulfite is toxological suspect. And to my extreme surprise, sorbate isn't!
At all!
Anyway, I dumped a perfectly good 6 gallon batch of OJ-mel
I knew I am
not going to drink it so I did.
I'm not going to make another OJ-mel again. The oranges I need are too expensive and I'll never find any zest that is as perfect as the Moroccan.
For those who want a real good recipe: well, here's my secret:
For 25 liters:
The juice of 100 oranges (1 crate).
1 pound of heather honey.
Dark wildflower honey.
Zest of 30 oranges.
An attenuative yeast, whichever you prefer.
Use as much of the dark wildflower you like. Depending on personal taste. The more honey the more alcohol. Feed if you like, or don't. Add zest only,
when fermentation is done. The d-limonine in the zest will kill off the
yeast, which is a fine way of stopping fermentation prematurely thus leaving
some residual sugar.
Remarks.
I made my most successful one very strong indeed. Something like 18% or so. In this year's Mazers I entered it outside contention. McConnell scored 40, Schramm scored 39.5 and Thomas scored 40. My apologies to these reknowned
judges for trying to poison them
This mead will never fail. The only thing, that will make it better is using less zest, like 20 oranges, because this particualr mead had a definite acid burn, though the TA was only 7.0. I suppose that it will vary with the type of zest you use.
Disheartedly yours,
Wout.