Mouko's Cherry Cyser

Hi everyone. This is my first original mead, and I like it enough to post pictures of it.

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As the title indicates, it is a cherry cyser, though leaning very heavily on the cherry part. The apple flavor is present, but isn't strong.

Although it is semi-sweet to sweet, it is still young, and will benefit from several months of bottle aging. You can tell that there is alcohol, but the cherry flavor (and sweetness) comes on so strong, it overwhelms the alcohol burn. However, when allowed to warm to room temp, the burn becomes more substantial.

When cold from the fridge there is little cherry nose, but when warming it lets off a little more aroma. Sadly though, not too much. But what it lacks for aroma, it makes up for in flavor. The cherry flavor comes to attack the taste buds. Don't get me wrong, it isn't overly cherry, but more of a cherry blitzkrieg... but a nice cherry blitzkrieg. Maybe without the apple the cherry would be too much, but they tango oh so well.

Well, I'll wrap it up, with a few thoughts: Don't lambaste me for the impromptu label; it's more for organization. And finally, I wish it hadn't only been a 1 gallon batch. :'( But I did just order a 5 gallon carboy, and guess what's in store for it!!! : ;D

Heh, I'm not one for scientific organization, so my notes are really, how do you say, weak. Here is my initial batch (for 1 gallon):

3 pounds Clover honey
1/2 gallon apple juice (I used Indian Summer)
bit of Tart Cherry Juice (That's real scientific notation there!)
14.5 oz tart cherries
71B yeast


I don't remember if I watered to 1 gallon or if the jug was pretty full... I did add more tart cherry juice during secondary, though at undefined amounts. I think a smart idea would be to take a sample and add a little bit of juice to it until you are satisfied. And this part is important: I did stabilize and backsweeten. That cherry juice is like yeast steroids; when you add more, they can keep kicking. I am confident that this would've gone dry, so if you like dry mead, great! Otherwise, stabilize and sweeten, or let it go all the way but still be sweet.

For the next batch, I may add more cherries to the primary, and hold the juice off until late in secondary. Then again, maybe not; it doesn't seem to have had any adverse effects from being fermented.

Also, I'm going to use wildflower for the next batch (cheaper, and want to try it), and also D47 instead of 71B. 71B did just fine with this batch, but I'll be going to school, and will want to be able to leave it sit on the sediment (after the initial racking of course).


Jeez, I'm not sure I'd try that again with those hectic thoughts above. But, as you can tell, this batch was more of a, "let's throw some stuff in a jar and see what happens!" type of deal. ;D