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Newbie with a pair of jugs......

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C

ceekay

NewBee
Registered Member
Jan 5, 2013
2
0
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So I got a wild hair up my exhaust pipe and decided to make some mead a while back. I found what's supposed to be an easy low-volume (1gal) recipe, and tried to follow it to the best of my newbie ability......

12/21/12, I conceived a batch following a recipe calling for:
1gal water
3lbs honey
25 raisins (for yeast food, apparently)
1 orange, sliced)
1 packet Fleischmann's yeast

Since I am a newbie, I inadvertently modified the recipe....
1gal water (went with distilled, no idea why)
72 fl. oz. of honey because I figured a 24oz bottle was about a pound and put three in......... I later learned that 32oz is about 3lbs....
27 raisins (honest mistake, since I didn't double-check the recipe and just tossed two extra raisins in, but it's two whole raisins, shouldn't make -too- much of a difference)
0 orange, because I wanted the straight honey wine taste and not an orange/honey wine taste.
1 packet Fleischmann's Highly Active yeast

I figure that since it was conceived on the last end of the world, that I should save it for the real end of the world, and that's why I brewed an identical batch the next day. So my very first batch will be wax sealed and saved.... Let's just hope the real end of the world is more than 10 months away...............


- CK
 
kudapucat

kudapucat

NewBee
Registered Member
Dec 2, 2010
2,383
10
0
Bundoora, Melbourne, Australia
I can suggest two things to help you.
Unfortunately both include reading a chunk to digest.
First. The newbees guide, found on the left pane (I think - its hidden on the phone app I use)
Second. Find the JAO thread. It's miles long, but worth the read. It is all about the recipe you started with (not so much what you finished with)
Good luck, and get brewing!

Oh, and brew a JAO exactly to the recipe. I fear yours may take longer to age than 10 months.
 
Chevette Girl

Chevette Girl

All around BAD EXAMPLE
Moderator
Lifetime GotMead Patron
Apr 27, 2010
8,447
59
48
Ottawa, ON
Gimme a minute to run your recipe through my American-to-everyone-else conversion and figure out how much honey you've got in there...

...72 fluid ounces is 2.13 litres of honey... honey's approximate density is 1.36 grams/ mL = 1.36 kg/litre, so 2.13 litres x 1.36 kg/l = 2.9 kg (6.3 lb) is a LOT more honey than you need for one gallon and may well be more than your yeast can even get started in...

If you actually DO have a pair of jugs, I'd split the liquid in this batch to the other container, add a handful of raisins to the new jug, split another packet of yeast between the two, and then top up most of the way with water, that'll give you something closer to the original recipe (and JAO, if you added the orange, which is a nice counterpoint to the sweetness that will be left behind).
 
Last edited:
kudapucat

kudapucat

NewBee
Registered Member
Dec 2, 2010
2,383
10
0
Bundoora, Melbourne, Australia
WOWSERS!!!!
My Silly-Unit-Converter was on the fritz!
Yes 3kg of honey is MUCH too much I would think!

CG, he said he made two batches identical.
I'd go grab another two jugs from your LHBS. after all, 4 jugs are better than 2.

The OG must have been somewhere around 1.200!!!!
(based on 4 litres 5 kgs (3 honey, 2 water)

That's a heavy must.
 
J

JayH

Worker Bee
Registered Member
May 9, 2006
355
3
18
Corrales, NM
Several years back I was in Yosemite at a bar in the valley when two young German guys came in. One of them went up to the bar, got the attention of beautiful and well endowed young lady behind the bar and asked her if she had "Big Jugs". She gave him a look that could have pierced steel, but he finally got his beer.

Back at the at the table and obviously confused by what had happened, I took pity on him and explained, that while what some in the world call jugs, we Americans call pitchers, and what the colloquial for jugs meant.

Jay
 
C

ceekay

NewBee
Registered Member
Jan 5, 2013
2
0
0
Well, doing a bit more research online, I found out that my little oopsie is closer to something called Trójniak; a Polish mead-type brew that uses two parts water to one part honey.... Except it'd be a very honey-rich trójniak.

Either way, it smells delicious so far, and I cannot wait to finally taste it, even if I did totally mess it up.

Also, the water here is not good, so if I did want to split the mead and do a new ferment, I'd have to buy water and I'm broke at the moment....


- CK
 
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