Vegan Mead???

Hey! I'm Amber, and I live in CT. My fiancee and I have never made mead, yet, but we'd love to try. There's just one thing that's stopping us: We're vegan! That means we don't eat anything that comes from an animal, including honey. A lot of vegans use rice syrup in place of honey, it comes in honey, maple, and other flavors. Now, would that work as a substitute in mead? If not, would maple syrup work? And if you can use maple as a base instead of honey, can you still add the different ingredients, such as wood flavors, fruits, etc. Please tell me if anyone has had any experience with this, good or bad. Besides what I suggested, please tell me if anyone has any other ideas for vegan mead. Thanx a ton!

[WRATHWILDE]

HoneyBunnyPony,

Maple wine would work well for you, it gives a wonderful complexity that you won't get from rice syrup. Use pure maple syrup, not the maple flavored rice syrup. 6 pounds for every 5 pounds of honey called for in a recipe, every thing else should be the same. Don't Boil the maple as some recipes advise for honey. You'll have to promise not to tell your fiancee that yeasts are living creatures who need oxygen to reproduce, sugar to feed on, and die by the millions to turn your sugar sources to alcohol.

Wrathwilde

[Tylor!!]

Welcome to Got Mead!! I'm not sure about the rice syrup, but if it has a high sugar content then I would assume it would work. You can make wine from sugar and fruit and yes maple syrup is used in making mead as well. As for adding fruit and things as long as you think the flavors would go well together it's fine. Hope this helps. Take care. Tyler

[abejita]

Hi!

I consider myself a vegan, though I do use honey. It's the only animal product I use.

You can make wine without any animal products at all. Check out Jack Keller's site, winemaking.jackkeller.net, for a ton of recipes, techniques, and ideas.

[teucer]

Some vegans make an exception for honey, since the arrangement is beneficial to both the beekeeper and the beehive, but assuming you don't mead is not for you. You can try maple wines or agave wines that will be somewhat meadlike, but fundamentally the essence of mead is honey.

[mouko_yamamoto]

My vegan friend said that yeasts don't have feelings, so it doesn't matter that they die by the millions, even billions in alcohol. But I say that's crazy. Yeasties are very tempermental, and if you do not cater to them, they get angry and go on strike. They also need special considerations just to do their job properly. Sounds like they have feelings to me.

[Lugh]

According to cooking recipes, rice syrup is a one to one substitution on honey. BUT:

Rice + Koji-Kin (Fungal mold) + yeast = Sake. The Koji-Kin converts the rice starch to sugar which the yeast then converts to alcohol.

Rice + Cereal/Fungal enzyme + processing = Rice Syrup + yeast = Dunno if you would get Mead, more of a sweet sake drink? Hmmm, this has possibilities...

[teucer]

Originally Posted by mouko_yamamoto

My vegan friend said that yeasts don't have feelings, so it doesn't matter that they die by the millions, even billions in alcohol. But I say that's crazy. Yeasties are very tempermental, and if you do not cater to them, they get angry and go on strike. They also need special considerations just to do their job properly. Sounds like they have feelings to me.

Technically, they aren't classified as animals.

But if "feelings" is your cutoff, then no microorganism can be said to have them, as they tend to lack neurons.

[hellbringer]

im not totally sure but i think i heard yeast is actually a plant or fungal. Plus, yeast is used to make bread and im sure everyone has had at least one slice of bread. :P

as to feelings i believe plants have them. I read an experiment once where they hooked a plant up to a machine i think it was a polygraph...but im not certain. Anyways as they stressed the plant it would show the same signs as a human being stressed. I found it very interesting, and it opened my eyes to certain beliefs.

even so, it doesn't stop me from having a good glass of mead.

cheers

[mouko_yamamoto]

Yeast is classified as a fungi.

Good day everyone, Hellbringer, you are correct. I read the same artical about putting plants on a polygraph. I believe it was started in Canada and now here in the U.S. It was to prove that plants have feelings. I don't agree that honey is an animal product. Honey is processed necture which comes from flowers. A plant. Bees like humans, process there own food and it is the beekeepers job to manipulate the bees into processing more honey than they need. Processing is done by taking necture into the honey stomach and adding enzimes, it is then taken to the hive and transfered to a hive bee. She also adds enzimes. this can happen several times before the now predigested necture is transfered into a cell and evaorated. Animal product? Plant byproduct? No, it's bee barf! Maybe that's why vegans don't eat it. Any how, Have a good day everybody, Dennis the honey farmer

[CheshireCat]

If it doesn't have honey, it's not mead. But, uh, if you go ahead and make that maple stuff, let us know how it turns out.

[teucer]

Originally Posted by The Honey Farmer

Good day everyone, Hellbringer, you are correct. I read the same artical about putting plants on a polygraph. I believe it was started in Canada and now here in the U.S. It was to prove that plants have feelings. I don't agree that honey is an animal product. Honey is processed necture which comes from flowers. A plant. Bees like humans, process there own food and it is the beekeepers job to manipulate the bees into processing more honey than they need.

The usual vegan claim is that this manipulation exploits the bees.

My answer to this is that the process is beneficial to both the bee and the human, rather than oppressive of the bees.

[mouko_yamamoto]

Do vegans see the "smoking" of the hive to get the bees inside as cruel? I wouldn't think so, but then again, maybe some do.

[SteveT]

Originally Posted by mouko_yamamoto

Do vegans see the "smoking" of the hive to get the bees inside as cruel? I wouldn't think so, but then again, maybe some do.

I can understand vegan eating and lifestyle, I'm not understanding how insects (bees) or yeast (fungi) are considered animals?

Steve

[mouko_yamamoto]

Actually, they don't consider yeasts as animals. Like my friend told me, they don't have feelings, so nobody cares.

[Angus]

But, one of the items listed in the contents of honey that can be removed with the scum during boiling is bee parts.

It is a shame you can't eat honey hunnybunnypony. It is my opinion, as humble as it is, that it is the most delicious food nature has given us. But I respect your decision.

Angus

[Scadsobees]

If you feel this way about honey because of the PETA standards:
http://www.peta.org/mc/factsheet_display.asp?ID=122

If this is the case, you could probably find a local beekeeper that doesn't engage in the practices that they accuse beekeepers of . Most hobby beeks take extremely good care of their bees, leave plenty of honey for the winter, and don't do anything to the queen that the hive wouldn't do(ask and theyll show you). More aphids and apple worms are killed when I boil a head of my homegrown cabbage or make a batch of homegrown apples sauce than bees killed during extraction of honey (or the billions of critters killed in the rice harvest). Very symbiotic(even though the bees don't think so sometimes) and extremely fascinating and educational. The interesting part is that migrating beekeepers get very little honey harvest from the pollination that they move to(california), moving the bees around mostly for the purpose of pollinating the fruits, vegetables, and almonds that most of us enjoy all year 'round.

Besides that, honey is nutritious and delicious, especially when used as an ingredient in our favorite adult beverage

[abejita]

As a vegan, I would like to say that PeTA can suck it.

[mouko_yamamoto]

That is so awesome.