question for the experienced wine makers

[WayneChristie]

and why cant I spell anymore????
decided to do it right this time, for my second foray into homemade hooch. Did a 5 gallon batch of mead, (go big or go back to the liquor store) and it turned out so smooth its like honey flavoured water, seriously. thought it was no good til I had about a quarter glass of it. still cant feel my toes! also did a 5 gallon batch of rhubarb-strawberry and another of rhubarb-raspberry. did a first filtering today with a medium filter, and going to do it again with the fine filters sometime this week after it rests a few days. I tried a couple mixes, 1/3 mead to 2/3 of the others, since rhubarb tends to be very dry and strong flavoured. Oh boy Oh boy, the rhubarb-strawberry is like absolutely amazing, the rhubarb-rasperrry is also awesome but a lot dryer. My question is after I filter them with the fine filters what would be the best way to do the blending, since I plan on making maybe 10 bottles of each blend? love to do them all but good mead is around 25 bucks a bottle so i want to save some unmixed for at least a while. (maybe) advice?

[omega50]

Originally Posted by WayneChristie

and why cant I spell anymore????
decided to do it right this time, for my second foray into homemade hooch. Did a 5 gallon batch of mead, (go big or go back to the liquor store) and it turned out so smooth its like honey flavoured water, seriously. thought it was no good til I had about a quarter glass of it. still cant feel my toes! also did a 5 gallon batch of rhubarb-strawberry and another of rhubarb-raspberry. did a first filtering today with a medium filter, and going to do it again with the fine filters sometime this week after it rests a few days. I tried a couple mixes, 1/3 mead to 2/3 of the others, since rhubarb tends to be very dry and strong flavoured. Oh boy Oh boy, the rhubarb-strawberry is like absolutely amazing, the rhubarb-rasperrry is also awesome but a lot dryer. My question is after I filter them with the fine filters what would be the best way to do the blending, since I plan on making maybe 10 bottles of each blend? love to do them all but good mead is around 25 bucks a bottle so i want to save some unmixed for at least a while. (maybe) advice?

Wow- Good problem to have.

If my mead turned out as good as yours, not sure I would be blending too much of it away.

Maybe in the Strawberry rhubarb.Because adding mead made it amazing.
But because the Raspberry Rhubarb is still dry after blending, I would save the mead and condition the Raspberry Rhubarb wine with sugar syrup.
Even after fine filtering it could referment on the added sugars so make sure you have some sorbate added.

If the fine filtering does not clear it to your liking- it could be a bit of residual pectin haze. I usually dose any of my high pectin fruit wines with about 3.5 grams of pectic enzyme for 5 gallons.

Right now, I only have one wine on the go. A crabapple wine I wanted to keep natural with no added sugars so I only have 3 gallons on the go with a starting SG of 1.045.

Should be ready for first racking out of the primary tomorrow.

[joshcat]

If you want some nice sparkling wine. (as a beekeeper I have modified this recipie to suit my tastes) I use a high tolerant champagne yeast. I ferment some strawberries and whatever else in about 10lbs of honey in 5 gallons of distilled water. I assume you have the basics on wine making. makes a good strong sparkling mead. I always filter before I bottle. Let it sit for about 6 months. Caution when opening and use a champagne cork so you do not have timebombs in your wine room.(although it is funny when that cork hits the door in the middle of the night and scares the crap out of everyone)

[MadMarty911]

So you made a melomel, sounds tasty! If its too dry for you, try back sweetening. For clearing have you tried bentonite, sparkalloid or gelatin?

Would you mind listing your recipe? How many pounds of each rheubarb/strawberry? I'm always curious about others work!
As for blending I'm assume you mean the two different meads being put in the same bottle? If so, I personally would add (to your taste) amounts from both to a bottling bucket or whatever you have on hand and do a slow stir (I'm assuming you have good sterilization techniques). Then bottle from there.

I have a 1 gallon batch of simple mead (honey/water) at 2.5lbs honey to make a semi sweet using safale s-04 beer yeast Been sitting for a month so far

Also have a 2 week old 5 gallon batch of again simple mead at 3lbs honey per gallon of water using a lalvin champagne yeast. With this one I definitely have to degas pretty regularly. Can't wait to try this in a few more months.

Soon I'm hoping to try my hand at a bochet (burnt honey mead).

Keep us updated!

[omega50]

Racked the crabapple today and upped the Malic- will be ready for mid-late hardwater season