Mead made with wild yeast

[MK1]

Re: Mead made with wild yeast

A famous homebrewer Denny Conn lives in apple country (Oregon) and he is noted for his creativity and empiricism. He says he went to great effort a few times to select varieties for his cider. It made little difference. What makes the difference is the fermentation. Proper temp is a must. My batch from last year is very good. I use Potassium metabisulfite to kill the wild yeast, let it sit for 24 hours (winemakers use this) and it chemically changes into some regular compound and then I add the sweet mead yeast, White Labs WLP720. I don't do it any favors. I try to impede it a little by pitching less yeast than would be proper by beer or wine standards. I want it to ferment a little slow and incompletely leaving some sugars behind.

Mark

[david s]

Re: Mead made with wild yeast

I read somewhere that cider is improved by using a few varieties of apples rather than one only. This was part of my reason for adding the honey. The other reason was to boost the alcohol content. The honey imparts a very nice aftertaste.

[Mitchamus]

Re: Mead made with wild yeast

perhaps I need to surround my oven with a cider orchard??

I definitely want to do that!... one day...

I think they take 3-5 years to bear fruit though...

[sarah h]

Re: Mead made with wild yeast

Interesting tips - those OzTops sound like they make the smaller, quicker versions dead easy and those reasons for never using a secondary are good to know. I think I'm gearing up to give cider a go since apple season is approaching and I can likely find an orchard nearby to get fresh-pressed, untreated juice. The problem, though, as I understand it, is that there are specific cider apples, very different from the eating & baking apples sold everywhere, and not readily available on this side of the pond. I've heard though that North American home cider makers compensate for this by using a minor percentage of crabapple juice - or perhaps I need to surround my oven with a cider orchard??

[MK1]

Re: Mead made with wild yeast

I'll throw in my 2 cents, since I am an award winning zymurgist. I entered one contest 3 years ago took a first and a second place, very small obscure contest with maybe only 3 entries but I didn't get a third!
Conventional wisdom in brewing circles is that you can achieve great results with wild yeast on occasion. Most experienced brewers (cheap) don't care to risk valuable ingredients to a hit or miss process. I make cider every year in the fall. I use White Labs sweet mead yeast as it does not attenuate to highly. The sugars in honey and cider are very fermentable and result in a too dry a beverage thus the need to back sweeten.
My cider needs about 4-6 months to smooth out and compares quite well to some of the English ciders like Strongbow. Never add water to any fermenting beverage. Never use a secondary unless you enjoy oxidation and an incomplete fermentation. Let it stay on the yeast until final gravity is achieved. This allows the yeast to clean up undesirable compounds. Never start the ferment at high temps. This produces fusel alcohol (hot tasting) and headaches.
Sorry for the rant, but I think most here want more than a good pizza or decent bread. If we're going to expend the time and effort we want to achieve the best we possibly can.

Mark

[david s]

Re: Mead made with wild yeast

I brew cider at least once a week using a product called OZTOPS (google it) It is so easy. I buy 3L of apple juice and add about 1/2 cup of local honey (to supercharge it) then about 1/4 tsp of all purpose wine yeast put the top on and forget about it for a week. When the fermentation has settled and most of the sweetness has gone simply refrigerate the bottle which tells the yeast to go to sleep and you have a delightful, sparkling alcoholic drink. Better still no bottle washing when its finished use the top again for the next brew.

[sarah h]

Re: Mead made with wild yeast

Mitch, do give it some time - it may turn out just fine.

I recently uncorked a bottle of now year-old mead, which was a first effort and it is way better now than it was when first made. I still prefer wine or cider but it beats beer in my books! Mine was a honey-orange beginner's recipe that called for bread yeast. It has a nice honey nose to it but I'd prefer not to have citrus in the taste even though it's fairly subdued. Not sure if it's time to tackle a different mead recipe or try making cider instead - neither would work well with pizza but either would be just fine with bread.

[Mitchamus]

Re: Mead made with wild yeast

I made some mead about 2 months ago... and it tastes like ****!!!
I think this is may be due to the clearing agents I put in it, but it does have a very yeasty taste. I used a dry wine yeast, It was all my local home brew shop had. I wanted to use a sherry yeast to punch up the sweetness (and alcohol content).. but hey.. I'm impatient.. what can I say!


I'm going to keep it, just in case in 6 months time it tastes better.

personally, I won't make anything with wild yeasts.. why go to all that bother and expense prepping everything, only to get a foul tasting product from a bad yeast strain!.. I mean what a waste!

my preferred source of natural yeast is sultanas,
I use sultana's in my fresh ginger beer, they work great without having to add commercial yeast, I wouldn't waste good ingredients on airborne yeasts, but hey.. that's me.. I guess it adds a certain mystery to it...

My next meade experiment will be a blackberry Melomel, just waiting for summer to come around so I can pick the blackberries!!!

[egalecki]

Re: Mead made with wild yeast

Well, I guess we won't evict y'all for the yeast just yet.

I use both sourdough and yeast in my breads, depends on the type!

I better not let my husband see this thread- he's just about to send his first batch of stout from the primary to the secondary! And he picked up a friend's unused beer-making supplies this evening- two carboys, a bucket with a spigot, a whole bunch of bottles and other assorted toys. So if he were to decide to do mead, I could be up to my ears in fermenting things!

[Frances]

Re: Mead made with wild yeast

same with bread - I, as it happens, actually prefer yeast bread to sourdough, but don't tell the others here

Sarah!!! Well, I really don't know what to say... I have never been so shocked in all my life!


Actually it turns out than my family's new favourite bread is a very complicated recipe with regular yeast, which I call "left-over-pizza-dough".... and I end up making plenty of that - so who am I to talk?

[sarah h]

Re: Mead made with wild yeast

Hi Dave!
It IS nice that you've resurrected this thread - I have just now placed one of my nearly year-old bottles in the fridge as it's been about six months since last taste-tested; will give it another go tonight.

As for the no-yeast mead, although there's a certain appeal, it's like Frances said - too easy to get the bad bacteria growing along with it. I had wanted to do that too but eventually came to the conclusion that what really matters in the end is not so much whether it's natural yeast (actually, all yeasts are) and unpasteurized honey but whether the end product is pleasing to your palate (same with bread - I, as it happens, actually prefer yeast bread to sourdough, but don't tell the others here ).

I'd start with a yeast mead and work up to the wild yeast one if you still feel the urge later. Whatever you do, let up know how it works out!

Sarah

[Frances]

Re: Mead made with wild yeast

Hi Dave, welcome to the forum!

Is nice you've resurected this thread - I've been meaning to continue mead experiments, but somehow haven't got round to it (to be quite honest what's keeping me back is that I'd have to figure out how my nice not-so-new-anymore fermenation barrel actually works).

As you can see from reading the thread, I'm not exacly what you would call knowledgable at mead making. We did drink some of the one bottle of mead made with wild yeast the other day (after the cork was either removed by my kids or forced off by pressure build up - and I just wish I knew which...!). It is actually very nice, great smell of honey, but needs some added honey to back-sweeten it to my taste, as it turned out very dry. And rather potent I'd say, must be quite a lot stronger than wine! If I could be sure it would work every time, I'd be making mead that way on a regular basis.

The thing is, I never made anymore after several larger batches went bad - you just end up wasting so much honey. There was another recipe I found on a German web site for mead without added yeast - you just wait for the ambient yeast in the air to take hold, like you do when you're starting a new sourdough culture. I'm sure I could find you the link if you're interested (how's your German? ). Thing is, besides the yeast there are lots of other things in the air, also waiting to get in there...

So basically, from my limited experience, I'd suggest you keep your batches small to begin with and just try out different recipes. I like the one on the link you posted, it'd be really cool to use a 17th century recipe. I do think your success rate will probably be bigger with added yeast - but it is possible to use a wild yeast starter rather than commercial yeast. I thought of it as giving the ambient yeast a head start.

I hope all that helps a bit... I'm still very interested in this topic, so if you do experiment and/or come up with more info, I'd love to read about it!

[phatdave]

Re: Mead made with wild yeast

i know this is very old, but i stumbled upon this thread (and joined) because i was curious as to if anyone was actually successful in making mead without added yeast? I couldn't work it out.

I really want to try making a mead really old fashioned, without yeast AND without boiling/heating. I get delicious raw honey and would loove to keep it that way!

Am new to this forum, so hope it is ok to ask a question about something so old!

David, uk

ps not sure if this is possible? But i did find this.....

How to Make Mead From an Ancient 17th Century Recipe

Thanks!

[sarah h]

Re: Mead made with wild yeast

That's a pretty amazing result, and so soon after starting up!
I liked the cheese and honey idea they mentioned too - I'll have to try that with some parmesan or some good local artisan cheese.
Perhaps there's even a pizza lurking within that idea ... hmmmm ....

[Alfredo]

Re: Mead made with wild yeast

A few months back we had a conversation about beekeeping going in this topic, and specifically about doing so in cities. Looks like the last chapter (for this season) on my contribution has been written, so I figured I'd post it here: Oh-so sweet! Rooftop honey scores silver at Royal Agricultural Winter Fair - The Appetizer.

Be sure to check out the link in that article to the bees atop the opera house in Paris. You just never know!