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Back sweetening pyment - honey or sugar

Barrel Char Wood Products

What should I do?

  • 1.Stick to recepie and back sweeten with sugar

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • 2. It will be better to back sweeten with honey

    Votes: 6 100.0%

  • Total voters
    6

leyus

NewBee
Registered Member
Jan 25, 2020
19
0
0
Hello guys!

I have a pyment recipe which is almost ready for back sweetening and it says to use sugar, but I always thought that for mead (well type of melomel really) it would be better to back sweeten with mead.

I've tried it and it is definitely too dry for my liking, so I will back sweeten it for sure.

Question is what should I do?
1. Stick to recipe and add sugar
2. Ignore recipe and back sweeten with honey
 

rb2112br

Honey Master
Registered Member
Mar 27, 2018
156
34
28
If I don't have enough honey to do the job, I wait until I can get some more.
 

leyus

NewBee
Registered Member
Jan 25, 2020
19
0
0
You'd only use sugar if you didn't have enough honey to do the job.


I stocked up long time before coronavirus so I have plenty, I assume every mead maker beyond first batch keeps some extra ;)
 

bernardsmith

Got Mead? Patron
GotMead Patron
Sep 1, 2013
1,611
32
48
Saratoga Springs , NY
The thing about using honey to backsweeten is that it is likely to make your bright mead cloudy. But the thing about using honey is that you can emphasize either the flavor of the honey you used as the base of this mead OR you can highlight more complexity by using a different honey...
 

leyus

NewBee
Registered Member
Jan 25, 2020
19
0
0
The thing about using honey to backsweeten is that it is likely to make your bright mead cloudy. But the thing about using honey is that you can emphasize either the flavor of the honey you used as the base of this mead OR you can highlight more complexity by using a different honey...

Interesting I didn't think of that. So is it flavour versus look choice?
 

Medsen Fey

Fuselier since 2007
Premium Patron
If you briefly bring it to a boil with a little mead and skim it before you add it, that can prevent it causing cloudiness. I’m usually not in a hurry, and don’t mind waiting for clearing.

I don’t have your recipe details, but have you stabilized it so it won’t ferment the added honey?
 

leyus

NewBee
Registered Member
Jan 25, 2020
19
0
0
6 lbs. (2.7 kg) orange blossom honey
(1) 96-oz. can Chenin Blanc grape juice concentrate (or your choice of
other wine-grape juice)
4 large pomegranates
10 kiwi fruit
Juice of 2 oranges
8 tsp. acid blend
0.25 tsp. sulfite
1.5 tsp. tannin
2 tsp. pectic enzyme
2.5 tsp. potassium sorbate
7.5 to 9 oz. (213 to 255 g) of sugar for final sweetening
Wine yeast of choice
Step-by-step
Dissolve honey in enough warm water to bring volume to just over six gallons. Add rest of ingredients except sulfite, pectic enzyme, fruit and yeast. Remove 1 cup of must and heat it to 80 °F (27 °C), pitch yeast into cup of warm must. Add sulfite to the 6 gallons (23 L) of must and cover. After 12–24 hours add the cup of fermenting mead starter to the 6 gallons (23 L) of must and stir well. Cover and fit airlock. Check must in 24 hours and stir, then add fruit and pectic enzyme to must. Ferment mead to dryness or near dryness and rack to secondary container. You may add a common fining agent if mead is dry at this racking, or allow the mead to clear naturally. Rack mead again in 3–4 weeks, and then again in 4–6 weeks (add a pinch of sulfite at each racking). Allow mead to clear and age for 4–6 months. For final sweetening 2 to 2.5% residual sugar is suggested. Dissolve 2.5 teaspoons of potassium sorbate in a small bit of water, and stir into the mead. Add the sweetening sugar. If mead is at room temperatures, you can stir the sugar right into the mead. If mead is at cooler temperatures, remove 2–3 cups of the mead and heat it to 80 °F (27 °C) in a sanitized pan, and dissolve your sugar in this. Add to mead and stir. Wait several days before bottling.

That's the pyment I already modified it by replacing grape juice with fresh grape. And I do have campden tablet and potassium sorbate ready for stabilizing than few days later I will back sweeten.
 

leyus

NewBee
Registered Member
Jan 25, 2020
19
0
0
That sounds like that should work.

I've tried it and for a gree and dry mead it tastes good. I modified it twice so far, I replaced grape juice with 700g of grapes (I've done it for 4.5 liters) and than I added another 250g of honey since initial sg was 1062 so I wuld end up with very small %. Now I think I will backsweeten it with honey and it should be good.
 

Medsen Fey

Fuselier since 2007
Premium Patron
Not to be snarky, but until it is clear.
Given the Chenin Blanc juice, if you can put is somewhere cold, like in a fridge, to precipitate any cream of tartar crystals that may also drop many other things out faster. Two to four weeks will allow you to see what is going to settle. Even then, after bottling, you will likely get sediment if you age this for more than a few months unless you fine it with Bentonite or some other agent.
 

leyus

NewBee
Registered Member
Jan 25, 2020
19
0
0
I added K-meta and Potassium sorbate , then I waited few days and back sweeten. 2-4 weeks sounds reasonable.
 

Squatchy

Lifetime GotMead Patron
Lifetime GotMead Patron
Nov 3, 2014
5,542
261
83
Denver
I added K-meta and Potassium sorbate , then I waited few days and back sweeten. 2-4 weeks sounds reasonable.

Yes. that could work. I like to advise newbies to take a small portion of your stabilized mead in a glass and add some honey and wait a few days before you move to the big batch. Often times we hear of people who just went ahead and back sweetened the whole batch and it started to preferment. If you check the small glass first you can confirm you stabilized correctly before you make a mistake on the entire batch.
 

leyus

NewBee
Registered Member
Jan 25, 2020
19
0
0
Ok so It's been now over 4 weeks and there is no sign of clearing after backsweetening with honey, while it was perfectly clear before. I've read few posts of ppl with the same issue and they said they added fining agents and it literally cleared in 36 hours but they didn't mention which. This is what I plan to do at this point. Which fining agent would you recommend in this case? Does it matter or should I just grab any fining agent? I know betonine was already mentioned would you say betonine will work best with mead? Or is there something better?
 

leyus

NewBee
Registered Member
Jan 25, 2020
19
0
0
I like Bentonite. That is what I usually start with - 0.5-1 g/l.
I like Sparkolloid too.
The others also work, so I will use whatever I have available.

If you let it sit in a cold place, it will eventually drop clear.

Thank you for your help. I don't have anything, so I will just buy whichever of those 2 is cheaper in UK.

I keep it in a kitchen it is cold at night but warm during the day. Either way 4 weeks is reasonable time, before it arrives now its probably week, before it can be used it's 72 hours (covid-19 things shouldn't be really touched for 72 hours unless they can be disinfected, better safe than sorry), so if at 6 weeks it won't be clear I will just use fining and bottle it shortly after. I prefer to have clear nice product than wait longer and longer, and with my first mead I've made mistake of bottling it hazy it is very hard to get it out of bottle and i'm wasting a lot when I try to remove it from the top.
 
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