Missed you guys! New job and depression has had me out of the mead-making-game since January, and it's terrifying how much I've forgotten! So glad to be able to make my way through all the new videos with you guys! Keep rocking, glad yall are around. 🤙
I have had a similar expirence to yours with EC1118. I tried it once to kick-start a stuck brew and while it did work eventually, it was not the explosion of fermentation I have seen others describe. I usually use Lalvin D47 for my meads. Esp when brewing towards the higher end of ABVs. That way by leaving the the mead to ferment fully on the lees, it doesn't pick up any odd flavours and actually gets a little fruity note. Then once it is completely done fermenting (after about 2 months) I rack to a new bottle to let it clear and everything. Then after another couple months, it goes completely crystal clear. It takes a little longer than most people I have seen say that it takes, but it finishes with such a nice, mellow, well rounded mead that has allowed time for the flavours to meld that it is worth it imo.
Love this kind of content! Fantastic. I've got lots of ideas for testing different variables. Personally i'd prefer to see experiments in fruit wines rather than mead. Check this out: 1. Test the difference that step feeding the sugar makes. 2. I've read that a slower fermentation brings about a better final product, test this by having one brew in a slightly warmer location. 3. I've read that adding raisins to wine must improves the mouth feel of the finished wine. You could test this, with different quantities of raisins. 4. Same as above but with over-ripe banana. 5. I've heard that freezing fruit makes the juice easier to extract. I'd like to know if freezing the fruit affects the flavour of the finished wine. 6. Some wine recipes call for adding hot water, or even cooking the fruit to extract the juice/flavour/colour. I suspect that heating the fruit damages the flavour. But you could test it. 7. Other variations on wine recipe ingredients. I've read that mixed fruit wines are usually better than single fruit. Does Blackberry wine taste better or worse than say blackberry and raspberry, or blackberry and apple? OR is there a difference in some other factor like mouth feel? 8. Back to temperature variations. You could test the impact of temperature fluctuations. Make 2 brews and wrap one in a blanket to insulate it and maintain a more constant temperature - especially during maturation. 9. Yeast makes a big difference on flavour. Make the same recipe but use different strains of yeast to see which you prefer. 10. Can't think of a 10th idea but i'm sure someone else can help me...
EC1118 is pretty much all I use! But my local homebrew supply store recommends it for my environment, and brewing in the basement for a more controlled temp around 60° F year round, and I purposely exclude anything to kickstart the fermentation (here we have local made version of fermaid o, which is sold as yeast energizer and yeast nutrients, I use the nutrients but exclude the energizer normally) it brews slow but I have never had a stall and my most recent mead finished at 18% and super dry. I've also tried bread yeast thanks to you two and in a similar environment I had it get to 15-16% by brewing at a controlled low temp and leaving it to brew for a long time! the EC1118 really prefers it low and slow which is good for us brewers up north ❤
Hi guys, thanks for the video. I liked that you tried to see if you could replicate the results by backsweetening with the honey. For an even better comparison, you could try the following: 1. Mix 1 gallon of the lower ABV mead (all ingredients, flavours, yeasts, nutrients). 2. After mixing thoroughly, split it into the two half-gallon fermenters. 3. Option A: Ferment a week and add enough fermentable sugars to reach desired higher ABV in one (fructose is closest to honey), OR 3. Option B: Add fermentable sugars AND THEN ferment, OR 3. Option C: mix 1.5 gallons and do both 3A and 3B tests. 4. Taste test and see if the flavour profiles are comparable. 5. Post video. 6. Profit. Apart from the joke, that would be a great way to see if the additional flavour or complexity is a result of the additional feed or the alcohol. I suggested the step feed in 3A because of what you mentioned with the fermentation in the higher ABV mead. Fun fact - in university I looked into yeast for a bio-reactor for my final year project. I was looking at a different strain to produce a different product that we were tasked to design, but in one paper I came across an interesting phenomenon with yeasts - they are both sensitive to product and reagent rate limitations, meaning that more product (alcohol in fermentation) slows the rate of reaction and more reagent (sugar in fermentation) slows the rate of reaction as well! As additional tests, you could vary the type of sugar used (fructose for similarity to honey, glucose for easy fermenting, or sucrose for a balance) to see if that has an impact on the flavours or complexity. The biggest recommendation that I would make for any future videos similar to this would be to do as you did in the "Cider 4 Ways - Hard Cider Finishing Methods" and "How to Flavor Your Hard Cider 4 Ways" videos - make everything together until you need to change something. So, if varying a specific ingredient for a recipe, double the recipe and split when the new ingredient needs to be added, or, like in the cider video, make a batch and separate the end fermentations for treatment. This would eliminate issues with concentrations or slight variations in the recipe from influencing the results. Something I would like to test but will only be able to test in 6 months time - the impact of wood shavings vs a block of wood for tannin extraction in conditioning fermentations. More surface area should mean faster extraction, but it may also increase the rate of undesirables entering the product and negatively impacting the flavour. I like the videos you guys post and even tried a variation of your cider and basic mead recipes and enjoyed them (although I botched a lot of the cider because I was impatient and ended up with a lot of detritus in the cider which hurt the flavour). I am looking forward to trying even more variations and testing to see what I like and what my friends like.
17:50 @CitySteadingBrews i always laugh when you say the calculator teacher said I'd never have on me because my 60yrs old maths teacher use to tell me the same thing in 2000 grade 8.. ie "when will you ever have a calculator on you.. you have to learn to calculate in your head" or the scientific calculator we used in class 😂🤣 if only he knew 😂
I've been doing this for only less than a year now but that ec1118 has, thus far, come to be my favorite yeast. I love what it does for my fruit wines! After watching this I'd like to try it in a mead as well.
I have fermented a few mead with Safcider AS2 yeast and it is so nice. It leaves a little residual sugar. Oh and kveik in the summer has been good but it does seem to stall if it doesn’t have a lot of nutrients.
EC 1118 is my go to yeast. It makes good wine, it makes good cider, it makes good IPAs,, it makes good mead! Works in my home in the summer and winter, 68-82 deg. It's my go to yeast that I try to never run out of. It's my "beast"... Lol
I really love the testing based content and I always think of it in terms of cooking, in that when you are doing a test and showing your results, you aren’t teaching us how to cook a dish (like a regular brew video, which are still great) but showing us a new cooking technique or how to use a specific spice. Then we are able to take that into consideration for all recipes going forward and not just the single dish we just learned. And, I do think it would be very interesting to see how they balance out after a year. Also, there might be an interesting test in relation to your carbonation rig (unrelated to this video, besides it being a test). On my last batch of cider, I placed all of my capped bottles in plastic totes on the floor and then kept the test bottle with the pressure rig on the counter so I could monitor it. The test rig on the counter was at 30 psi within a day and a half to two days and I thought this was a little quick so I opened it and one of the capped bottles that was on the floor only to find that the capped bottle wasn’t remotely close to the same amount of carbonation in the glass. I then emptied and drank the original contents of the test bottle and poured the contents of the capped bottle into the test bottle, resealed it, and placed it next to the plastic totes on the floor, where it took another 2 1/2 days to come back up to a pressure close to where it was before. After which the test bottle and a new capped bottle had a very similar carbonation experience in the glass. The only difference I could figure between the two was that the air temperature on the countertop was slightly higher than the air temperature at ground level, causing faster fermentation within the test bottle. I’d be curious to see if you have experienced, or would experience, the same thing if tested. Also, testing if agitating the bottles while bottle carbonating would or does have an effect on the process/result? As always, thank you so much for what you both do! You are the reason I got back into brewing and continue to be a source of inspiration and knowledge with every video you create!
Truly interesting! I would definitely be interested seeing the one year test to find out what the mellowing with the honey would do! Perhaps also interesting to "test" what happens if you water the hi🙂 down to the same abv as the l😒 one and how they'd compare then. Thanks for the great video!
Yes, please do the one year test. Not sure if you have enough, but one bottle of each as is and one that was back sweetened of the low and then one bottle of the high both pasteurized would be interesting.
When making beer I once made tge same veer twice, and on the second batch I fermented on top of the trub from the first. It caused the fermentation to take off the very same day and be done in about 3 days. Normally I wait at least 2 weeks for my fermentation. I've read beer makers post about how it's better to start with more yeast for high gravity beer. I think it definitely helps the yeast to get to a final gravity of 1.000 or lower in a shorter span of time. I think you should have started with double or triple the yeast for the higher alcohol mead in order for them to both finish completely.
It may start more quickly but yeast multiply hundreds of times over what is added. It wouldn't be that drastic a change and would have made the test have less meaning.
Hi Brian and Derica! So I am in the process of making my first mead thanks to your videos (I'm excited). I'm trying to make a Creamsicle mead to be ready for initial tasting by end of summer, and to be fully matured by my birthday (June) My mead fermented down to 0.996 so I'm done there. I used freezedried orange peel and it worked amazing. I racked it into a new carboy and added in the vanilla. Over the next week to two I'll be tasting the mead almost daily to see where the vanilla is as I know vanilla can quickly overpower the drink. My question is I have a significant amount of head (1 gallon carboy and about 3 inches from the bottom of the handle to the surface of the mead) which I know can turn the mead bad, however is it ok to keep it in its current carboy while I'm flavoring it and move it to a smaller carboy later once im happy with the vanilla?
1st to answer your question yes please to aging this, 2nd I love this hobby and trying different things, there is never going to be an exact answer when it involves personal taste buds so good job on giving this a go, I love watching you guys try different things and this brings me to a suggestion it might be too hard or even too costly to do but I live in New Zealand so I am kind of curious to see what different honeys around the world would taste like.
This was super interesting on a ton of levels! Thought 1: would a alternate comparison of ONLY gravity (same amount of honey, but then more simple sugar for gravity) be useful, as the honey has more than just potential alcohol, it has flavors and aromas? 2) I fired up a simple grocery store cherry cider last night. Used what I had on hand-happened to be ec1118. Woke up to a near blow out with foam and activity! Never had that before. I’m In the midwest, house is low 70’s. Super interesting!
Exactly my thought. Adding the extra honey legit adds what gives mead it's flavor characteristics. A neutral sugar addition on HI would make more sense. Higher ethanol will increase body tho
@@petewermecke9313 I also found myself wondering today if, with their 2 brews as is, they added neutral grain spirit to the LO to have equal abv how that would compare. A diff experiment altogether but would compare the effect of extra honey+extra fermentation of the yeast BUT at an equivalent alcohol level. Oh look I’ve gone cross-eyed
Great video and some useful information. Would it benefit the yeast to add some of the honey upfront, and then add more as it approaches the end of primary? Say 1.5lb per gallon at the start and then a further 1.5lb at the 60% sugar depletion mark? Have you ever tried this? Would that boost the yeast's performance, do you think?
I love seeing experiments with brewing. Question: I have seen a lot of ads on these videos about flash brewing, a beer kit that has no boiling. I was wondering if you guys have seen or heard of these ads.
Yes I feel this deserves more of an effort in matching sugars. I made a fall flowers honey that finished at 1.028 (bread yeast). it was still really cloudy when I bottled it at 2 months old. Other meads I made using your recipes and regular honey cleared super fast. I think there is for sure a difference when a mead finished sweet then when you backsweeten. Also in smart too
Super interesting and it might explain why I've never been able to make a proper hydromel...or so I thought - maybe I just don't like them. Also I live in a cold climate and whenever I use EC-1118 my meads finish at around 0.990, regardless of the starting gravity (I never start ridiculously high tho) but I don't particularly like that yeast. My favorite for meads is hands down Mangrove Jack's M-05 which basically has the same tolerance. That one has produced meads up to 18.5% and they're still so good. Yes, please do the 1 year test with this!
very cool experiment. I would think true test may be same amount of honey and stop one of the jars at 1.010 and let the other go to 1.000. ❤ love yalls content
For next time you do a traditional, I'd love for you to add FT Blanc tannins in primary. Then let us know how it is different from not using them at all. I love using them in every mead, but I really like the effect they have in primary. In secondary, they seem to take way too long to work the same way (they do, but we're talking about five or more extra weeks to get the same effect).
This was pretty interesting, the way the yeast behaves in your environment, the way sweetening could bring the taste close but just adding honey to the low ABV brew couldn’t make up for the qualities the fermentation gave to the high ABV brew.
I think an interesting experiment would be to have 1 batch starting with 1 lb 4 oz honey at the start and one batch with 10 oz to start and step feed it 10 oz after the first has fermented out and see if those two batches are different, if they end at the same FG or not and how different they taste.
I would like to learn what aging does to these. I always finish my meads at 10+% because, right or wrong, I believe that they’ll age better/last longer. I’d be very interested to learn if ABV actually impacts flavor.
I would like to see a one taste test. Maybe bottle one bottle from each, as is now. Then pasteurize and back sweeten and bottle the rest. Curious to see how they all tasted in one year. Cheers!
Great test, I think you should leave it a yr and see what comes out. I used EC1118 in my fruit cake mead, it blew up, twice! thankfully it was just the figs getting stuck in the airlock to blow it out, should of left more headspace! 2 clean-ups later - it finished fermenting, extremely dry! Dunno if my figures are correct but looks like 22-24%! highest I've ever had. SG 1.162 FG .992 and SG 1.155 FG .990, Brewing in the north east uk.
I think that this kind of test could go on for numerous different batches. The 'What If's' that keep popping up will constantly change the testing parameters you originally laid out. Part of testing is doing a very specific set of ideas, and not wavering from those due to the results that appear. So with this batch, I would continue to take it to the 1 year mark, but adjust the low ABV batch to match the specific gravity of the high ABV (=/- .02?), pasteurize as in any other brew, and see what the results are after the 1 year, or even a 6 month mark.
For the one year tasting I would like to see a 3 bottle comparison. One from each fermenter like they are. One of the low ABV that is sweetened and pasteurized.
Im new here so I have not seen all of your videos yet. I would be interested to see more tests like this. Something you may be able to add on to this is sweeting with honey as normal Vs. sweetening with the cooked or Bochet honey. I would be interested to know the differences there.
Only four minutes into the video, but had some thoughts: These two variations will not only have different ABV, but the flavor should be slightly different since the honey content was different from the start too... right? I wonder how the different it would be if both batches had the same honey content, but one was "spiked" with white sugar to raise the ABV instead... Oh well, back to watching! I love these videos! 😄
I have a question. You were mixing the honey in with a small metalic object. Ive seen similar ones but this one was quite small. What do you call that metalic object this isnt usually something I see, especially in that size. What I am getting out is the name wasnt mentioned.
Very interesting test...I wonder if the lower pressure on the yeast allowed it to blow through the lower abv version faster and strip away since it the honey flavors?
Please do the 1 year test. This is the kind of testing that is hard to do for someone like me who only makes a gallon or two a month (of wine, mead, etc combined) but would love to see the affect. Just makes an extra step of refinement of process that means I have less to consider when making the best product I can.
Hi, just made my first meed … I think I put to much yeast in it .. I used bull dog and it was 8 grams.. made a mistake by putting it all in … it has finished in 10 day … what do you think… Nick
Try the same experiment, but make the high ABV one by adding sugar on top of the honey quantity used for the the low ABV one, to avoid adding taste while adding more fermentables. My guess is the high one will have less flavor in the end as it's been bubbling more flavor away by means of CO2 bubbles.
It would be interesting to see a similar test step feeding the honey into the higher abv, starting with the same amount, then 50% of the added honey at 10 and 20 days. Cheers!
@CitySteadingBrews I am very interested in the difference between starting with juice from the store, jam, canned concentrate, starting with fruit+water, and anything else I'm probably missing. Thank you for the reply, have a great day.
This is an interesting experiment, tells me that if I ever wanted a high abv beverage the best way would be to step feed. In turn should be less possible time to final product.
@CitySteadingBrews that could also be another experiment! Make a 16% or higher beverage one by step feeding and one normal. This is getting to the point of stressing yeast and almost guaranteeing a stall especially if you re use ec1118 that doesn't work well for you guys already.
@CitySteadingBrews the test would be if one was to want to create a higher abv beverage what the best way with the least amount of issues would be to get to the final result and also would the time be a factor ad well. Just like in this video time was a factor but was time only due to the higher fermentables between the two. I've also experienced that if I make a 6% it could take 2 weeks but a 14% could take close to 2 months with similar clarity.
I use ec 1118 all the time on my end and I've found d you are correct about the amount of fermenables but at the same time adding a bit more yeast helps with that as they have more of them to work with the higher sugar levels in the brew
It may help start up faster but the amount you add isn't much compared to the colony built which is hundreds of times more yeast than you add, they multiply quickly.
I think a follow-up would be interesting, but, if you want to be more rigorous, I'd suggest keeping a bottle of each of the following: High-ABV Low-ABV Low-ABV (Sweetened) Low-ABV (Fortified to match high ABV) High-ABV (Diluted to match low ABV) But I do appreciate it might be a bit unwieldly to actually taste all of them in a video 😂
I'm in the UK? And EC-1118 does seem to like the lower temps here, I get no problems. To back sweeten at the very end? In the glass? Or back sweeten once fermentation has completed (1 or 2 months) and then let it age? Sorry both but yeah, that's a worthy question. I'm thinking the alcohol, over the year, must have an effect on the honey. Surely. But, er, does it? Only one way to find out...
I have to say EC1118 is a good yeast but it is having the HARDEST time with Ambrosia Colorady CO honey. Stable PH with 1.11 starting gravity and only at 1.06 on the third week with a half tsp of fermaid-o.
Hey guys! I enjoy your videos, tests and recipes but I'm a bit unsure where to start in the world of mead as a first recipe (i brew beers regularly). Do you have a more talking head video that compares the contribution of each element in a recipe? Like, for choosing a starting honey, is diluting it in water and tasting it going to be a good basis for the product's final taste or is the backsweeting honey going to contribute much more to the flavor and mouthfeel? If I don't like the velvety mouthfeel of some meads, can I minimise that by not adding tannins or by backsweetning with suguar/fructose/other? It would be nice to have a kind of ''tasting wheel'' that goes through the different elements and that kind of details the contribution each bring to the final product and which steps can hide/overpower flavors that were previously introduced. Thank you for sharing your knowledge!
Ok, much of what you're asking can be really subjective, but here's a try: I'd taste the honey, not dilute it. It will give an idea of the final mead, but of course it will taste different. Small subtleties and such come through during fermentation, and others are lost, just like with making beer. As for what you would or would not like... hard for me to say really as there is a HUGE variety of mead recipes available and methods to make them. Mead covers a very wide range of flavors and styles. In general, the things we look for are balance of sweetness, tannin, and acid. Those three things form a base to build from. If something is too sweet, sometimes adding acid or tannin can help, but it's best to not oversweeten to begin with. While you can backsweeten with whatever you like, we tend to sweeten meads with honey, as that's the character we look for in a mead, but ymmv. As for a video on all these aspects... it's a wide wide world out there and I'm afraid we couldn't possibly cover even a fraction of what can be done in even a series of videos, as each component reacts differently in different brews and different palates like and dislike different things. My best suggestion is, do you know if you like dry or sweet wines? Then follow one of our beginner friendly recipes for that. Most of our recipes ferment to dry and we sweeten to taste if needed, so that gets you into the ballpark. I'd start with something simple, a traditional perhaps, so you get a feel for what mead is like without all the additions and flavors.
@@CitySteadingBrews Thank you for the detailed answer, I get how it can be a hard thing to comment on. I guess like anything, trying it out for myself is the best way to go. I have some wild honey from a beekeeper friend, I'll try something with that and experiment from there! Have a great day!
Wondering if a more accurate test would be with equal parts honey, then one with a “neutral” white sugar added to make the higher abv. Just because white sugar has less flavour than honey.
It would be fascinating to see an experiment in which you add different flavoring agents like fruits, spices, or herbs at various stages of fermentation. Perhaps just in primary vs. just in secondary, vs Primary and secondary! Suggestion number two; How about a comparison of identical mead batches made using different water sources? Using distilled, spring, and tap water, etc, could reveal how the mineral content and purity impact the fermentation process and the final product.
@@CitySteadingBrews Tyvm! I'm a new subscriber and haven't seen this episode. Very informative and highly entertaining too. I appreciate you guys sharing the knowledge and the laughs!!
I think I am gonna do a Stonefruit Low ABV mead at some point, I have found I am liking 11-12.5% more and more, I think the flavor of fruit shine a bit more in the lower abv meads and take much less time to be amazing, at least for me. I know the higher ABV will tend to age better and for longer but I really am loving that 11-12% sweet spot lol. I want to do a 7-8% mead but I just haven't pulled the trigger yet
Yes please on the one year test. Also I think I was less surprised than you guys with similarity after the added honey. I was remembering an awesome video where a couple of legends did a comparison of flavour/flavor influence between adding ingredients before and after fermentation. They have a youtube channel like yours... exactly like yours. 🤪 Same name and all. 😁 Nobody can say wasn't paying attention in class. 🤣😂🤣 Question 2. Does oaking during fermentation work? 🤔
That's barrel aging and done in large quantities over several years. It requires seasonal temps changes to make it work. Not the same as tossing some wood into a few gallons of wine or mead.
Thank you for curing my curiosity and sweetening the lower abv mead. I would deeply appreciate it if you would compare the higher abv to both a bottle of the lower abv as is, and sweetened to the same specific gravity as the higher one. This is so interesting! I love it when you guys get nerdy 🥸🥳
Interesting about the EC1118. I wonder if the yeast has experienced a “drift” in attributes and is no longer a champagne yeast? I imagine that yeast sellers run genetic tests but what about characteristics? If 50 years ago 71 B was observed to provide floral, fruity, earth notes does it continue today? Running tests like this could provide great info.
As you are in that Southern state, where I have twice lived, your water likely varies wildly from what I get here in the middle of the country. I am troubled by dissolved Iron and Calcium. In your area, the problem was Sulfur in the water with a Calcium backstop. I have no way to avail myself of better water except to buy it from Walmart and I no longer have a car. With most water suppliers simply bottling whatever they use to flush toilets with, I have no idea of how to clear up my water's taste and it's effects om my wines. Any thoughts on this?
Adding the same amount of honey to both jars and topping the high one with sugar wouldt be a better test i guess. Scince adding honey also means to add flavour where as adding sugar just raises the abv. One year tase test wouldt be nice👍
This teaches me that I should add more fermentable *during* versus all of it upfront (Keeping the yeast always wanting more) to make a more efficient fermentation. I mistakenly thought step feeding meant nutrients, not sugars - maybe yall do a test/explain that method...
I'm not saying I'll leave you channel if you choose not to keep them.. it's a great learning tool, and your channel has helped me explain it to my kids who now enjoy their fermented juices...
If they are the same taste 2 Questions 1. Would the lower abv below out quicker . If you retest would you add small amount of taking to low one and bring the Final sugar content to the same point
I think you should split both batches into 1) Hi no touch. 2) Hi pasteurized. 3) Lo back sweeten to 1.000 and pasteurized. 4) Lo no touch, sweeten at tasting. Review in a year.
I would love to see more tests like this. Yes, please do the 1 year test!
I love them as well :)
The suggested test sounds quite interesting IMO
Science is the method, your method is good. You got what you wanted from the process and know more for it. Cheers!
Thanks.
Missed you guys! New job and depression has had me out of the mead-making-game since January, and it's terrifying how much I've forgotten! So glad to be able to make my way through all the new videos with you guys! Keep rocking, glad yall are around. 🤙
Yes please. I’d love to see the year test.
I have had a similar expirence to yours with EC1118. I tried it once to kick-start a stuck brew and while it did work eventually, it was not the explosion of fermentation I have seen others describe. I usually use Lalvin D47 for my meads. Esp when brewing towards the higher end of ABVs. That way by leaving the the mead to ferment fully on the lees, it doesn't pick up any odd flavours and actually gets a little fruity note. Then once it is completely done fermenting (after about 2 months) I rack to a new bottle to let it clear and everything. Then after another couple months, it goes completely crystal clear. It takes a little longer than most people I have seen say that it takes, but it finishes with such a nice, mellow, well rounded mead that has allowed time for the flavours to meld that it is worth it imo.
Love this kind of content! Fantastic. I've got lots of ideas for testing different variables. Personally i'd prefer to see experiments in fruit wines rather than mead. Check this out:
1. Test the difference that step feeding the sugar makes.
2. I've read that a slower fermentation brings about a better final product, test this by having one brew in a slightly warmer location.
3. I've read that adding raisins to wine must improves the mouth feel of the finished wine. You could test this, with different quantities of raisins.
4. Same as above but with over-ripe banana.
5. I've heard that freezing fruit makes the juice easier to extract. I'd like to know if freezing the fruit affects the flavour of the finished wine.
6. Some wine recipes call for adding hot water, or even cooking the fruit to extract the juice/flavour/colour. I suspect that heating the fruit damages the flavour. But you could test it.
7. Other variations on wine recipe ingredients. I've read that mixed fruit wines are usually better than single fruit. Does Blackberry wine taste better or worse than say blackberry and raspberry, or blackberry and apple? OR is there a difference in some other factor like mouth feel?
8. Back to temperature variations. You could test the impact of temperature fluctuations. Make 2 brews and wrap one in a blanket to insulate it and maintain a more constant temperature - especially during maturation.
9. Yeast makes a big difference on flavour. Make the same recipe but use different strains of yeast to see which you prefer.
10. Can't think of a 10th idea but i'm sure someone else can help me...
EC1118 is pretty much all I use! But my local homebrew supply store recommends it for my environment, and brewing in the basement for a more controlled temp around 60° F year round, and I purposely exclude anything to kickstart the fermentation (here we have local made version of fermaid o, which is sold as yeast energizer and yeast nutrients, I use the nutrients but exclude the energizer normally) it brews slow but I have never had a stall and my most recent mead finished at 18% and super dry. I've also tried bread yeast thanks to you two and in a similar environment I had it get to 15-16% by brewing at a controlled low temp and leaving it to brew for a long time! the EC1118 really prefers it low and slow which is good for us brewers up north ❤
My first brew is a bubblin! You short of new brewers watching the bubbles? Nailed it.
Hi guys, thanks for the video. I liked that you tried to see if you could replicate the results by backsweetening with the honey. For an even better comparison, you could try the following:
1. Mix 1 gallon of the lower ABV mead (all ingredients, flavours, yeasts, nutrients).
2. After mixing thoroughly, split it into the two half-gallon fermenters.
3. Option A: Ferment a week and add enough fermentable sugars to reach desired higher ABV in one (fructose is closest to honey), OR
3. Option B: Add fermentable sugars AND THEN ferment, OR
3. Option C: mix 1.5 gallons and do both 3A and 3B tests.
4. Taste test and see if the flavour profiles are comparable.
5. Post video.
6. Profit.
Apart from the joke, that would be a great way to see if the additional flavour or complexity is a result of the additional feed or the alcohol.
I suggested the step feed in 3A because of what you mentioned with the fermentation in the higher ABV mead. Fun fact - in university I looked into yeast for a bio-reactor for my final year project. I was looking at a different strain to produce a different product that we were tasked to design, but in one paper I came across an interesting phenomenon with yeasts - they are both sensitive to product and reagent rate limitations, meaning that more product (alcohol in fermentation) slows the rate of reaction and more reagent (sugar in fermentation) slows the rate of reaction as well!
As additional tests, you could vary the type of sugar used (fructose for similarity to honey, glucose for easy fermenting, or sucrose for a balance) to see if that has an impact on the flavours or complexity.
The biggest recommendation that I would make for any future videos similar to this would be to do as you did in the "Cider 4 Ways - Hard Cider Finishing Methods" and "How to Flavor Your Hard Cider 4 Ways" videos - make everything together until you need to change something. So, if varying a specific ingredient for a recipe, double the recipe and split when the new ingredient needs to be added, or, like in the cider video, make a batch and separate the end fermentations for treatment. This would eliminate issues with concentrations or slight variations in the recipe from influencing the results.
Something I would like to test but will only be able to test in 6 months time - the impact of wood shavings vs a block of wood for tannin extraction in conditioning fermentations. More surface area should mean faster extraction, but it may also increase the rate of undesirables entering the product and negatively impacting the flavour.
I like the videos you guys post and even tried a variation of your cider and basic mead recipes and enjoyed them (although I botched a lot of the cider because I was impatient and ended up with a lot of detritus in the cider which hurt the flavour). I am looking forward to trying even more variations and testing to see what I like and what my friends like.
Great show, it's because of you guys that I've taken up this hobby.
I would like to see the matched and aged test please.
17:50 @CitySteadingBrews i always laugh when you say the calculator teacher said I'd never have on me because my 60yrs old maths teacher use to tell me the same thing in 2000 grade 8.. ie "when will you ever have a calculator on you.. you have to learn to calculate in your head" or the scientific calculator we used in class 😂🤣 if only he knew 😂
I've been doing this for only less than a year now but that ec1118 has, thus far, come to be my favorite yeast. I love what it does for my fruit wines! After watching this I'd like to try it in a mead as well.
Yes please do a 1 year mellowing test. I love this content.
I have fermented a few mead with Safcider AS2 yeast and it is so nice. It leaves a little residual sugar. Oh and kveik in the summer has been good but it does seem to stall if it doesn’t have a lot of nutrients.
EC 1118 is my go to yeast. It makes good wine, it makes good cider, it makes good IPAs,, it makes good mead! Works in my home in the summer and winter, 68-82 deg.
It's my go to yeast that I try to never run out of. It's my "beast"... Lol
I really love the testing based content and I always think of it in terms of cooking, in that when you are doing a test and showing your results, you aren’t teaching us how to cook a dish (like a regular brew video, which are still great) but showing us a new cooking technique or how to use a specific spice. Then we are able to take that into consideration for all recipes going forward and not just the single dish we just learned. And, I do think it would be very interesting to see how they balance out after a year.
Also, there might be an interesting test in relation to your carbonation rig (unrelated to this video, besides it being a test). On my last batch of cider, I placed all of my capped bottles in plastic totes on the floor and then kept the test bottle with the pressure rig on the counter so I could monitor it. The test rig on the counter was at 30 psi within a day and a half to two days and I thought this was a little quick so I opened it and one of the capped bottles that was on the floor only to find that the capped bottle wasn’t remotely close to the same amount of carbonation in the glass. I then emptied and drank the original contents of the test bottle and poured the contents of the capped bottle into the test bottle, resealed it, and placed it next to the plastic totes on the floor, where it took another 2 1/2 days to come back up to a pressure close to where it was before. After which the test bottle and a new capped bottle had a very similar carbonation experience in the glass. The only difference I could figure between the two was that the air temperature on the countertop was slightly higher than the air temperature at ground level, causing faster fermentation within the test bottle. I’d be curious to see if you have experienced, or would experience, the same thing if tested.
Also, testing if agitating the bottles while bottle carbonating would or does have an effect on the process/result?
As always, thank you so much for what you both do! You are the reason I got back into brewing and continue to be a source of inspiration and knowledge with every video you create!
Truly interesting! I would definitely be interested seeing the one year test to find out what the mellowing with the honey would do!
Perhaps also interesting to "test" what happens if you water the hi🙂 down to the same abv as the l😒 one and how they'd compare then.
Thanks for the great video!
Yes, I love watching you work through your experiments. It's for science, as you say😊.
Yes, please do the one year test. Not sure if you have enough, but one bottle of each as is and one that was back sweetened of the low and then one bottle of the high both pasteurized would be interesting.
Great one thank you guys
Go for it. It'll be another video I enjoy watching.
When making beer I once made tge same veer twice, and on the second batch I fermented on top of the trub from the first. It caused the fermentation to take off the very same day and be done in about 3 days. Normally I wait at least 2 weeks for my fermentation. I've read beer makers post about how it's better to start with more yeast for high gravity beer. I think it definitely helps the yeast to get to a final gravity of 1.000 or lower in a shorter span of time. I think you should have started with double or triple the yeast for the higher alcohol mead in order for them to both finish completely.
It may start more quickly but yeast multiply hundreds of times over what is added. It wouldn't be that drastic a change and would have made the test have less meaning.
Hi Brian and Derica! So I am in the process of making my first mead thanks to your videos (I'm excited). I'm trying to make a Creamsicle mead to be ready for initial tasting by end of summer, and to be fully matured by my birthday (June) My mead fermented down to 0.996 so I'm done there. I used freezedried orange peel and it worked amazing. I racked it into a new carboy and added in the vanilla. Over the next week to two I'll be tasting the mead almost daily to see where the vanilla is as I know vanilla can quickly overpower the drink.
My question is I have a significant amount of head (1 gallon carboy and about 3 inches from the bottom of the handle to the surface of the mead) which I know can turn the mead bad, however is it ok to keep it in its current carboy while I'm flavoring it and move it to a smaller carboy later once im happy with the vanilla?
That is a lot of headspace. I wouldn't keep it in there very long.
1st to answer your question yes please to aging this, 2nd I love this hobby and trying different things, there is never going to be an exact answer when it involves personal taste buds so good job on giving this a go, I love watching you guys try different things and this brings me to a suggestion it might be too hard or even too costly to do but I live in New Zealand so I am kind of curious to see what different honeys around the world would taste like.
Well... you could spend a fortune just trying one type like... clover from different places as each area and each season produce different flavors!
This was super interesting on a ton of levels!
Thought 1: would a alternate comparison of ONLY gravity (same amount of honey, but then more simple sugar for gravity) be useful, as the honey has more than just potential alcohol, it has flavors and aromas?
2) I fired up a simple grocery store cherry cider last night. Used what I had on hand-happened to be ec1118. Woke up to a near blow out with foam and activity! Never had that before. I’m In the midwest, house is low 70’s. Super interesting!
Exactly my thought. Adding the extra honey legit adds what gives mead it's flavor characteristics. A neutral sugar addition on HI would make more sense. Higher ethanol will increase body tho
@@petewermecke9313 I also found myself wondering today if, with their 2 brews as is, they added neutral grain spirit to the LO to have equal abv how that would compare. A diff experiment altogether but would compare the effect of extra honey+extra fermentation of the yeast BUT at an equivalent alcohol level.
Oh look I’ve gone cross-eyed
Great video and some useful information. Would it benefit the yeast to add some of the honey upfront, and then add more as it approaches the end of primary? Say 1.5lb per gallon at the start and then a further 1.5lb at the 60% sugar depletion mark? Have you ever tried this? Would that boost the yeast's performance, do you think?
It's called step feeding and maybe we need to test it...
id love to see how time plays out on them side by side, id also be interesting to do a blind testing and try and figure out which is which
I love seeing experiments with brewing. Question: I have seen a lot of ads on these videos about flash brewing, a beer kit that has no boiling. I was wondering if you guys have seen or heard of these ads.
I have not seen them.
Yes, please. Can you do the test? Thank you.
Yes I feel this deserves more of an effort in matching sugars.
I made a fall flowers honey that finished at 1.028 (bread yeast). it was still really cloudy when I bottled it at 2 months old. Other meads I made using your recipes and regular honey cleared super fast.
I think there is for sure a difference when a mead finished sweet then when you backsweeten. Also in smart too
Yep do the sweetning. Makes sense. Over a year adding equal botanicals might give you a more disserneable or distinct comparison.
Today on Meadbusters! yes please
Super interesting and it might explain why I've never been able to make a proper hydromel...or so I thought - maybe I just don't like them.
Also I live in a cold climate and whenever I use EC-1118 my meads finish at around 0.990, regardless of the starting gravity (I never start ridiculously high tho) but I don't particularly like that yeast. My favorite for meads is hands down Mangrove Jack's M-05 which basically has the same tolerance. That one has produced meads up to 18.5% and they're still so good.
Yes, please do the 1 year test with this!
very cool experiment. I would think true test may be same amount of honey and stop one of the jars at 1.010 and let the other go to 1.000. ❤ love yalls content
For next time you do a traditional, I'd love for you to add FT Blanc tannins in primary. Then let us know how it is different from not using them at all. I love using them in every mead, but I really like the effect they have in primary. In secondary, they seem to take way too long to work the same way (they do, but we're talking about five or more extra weeks to get the same effect).
I would love more tests. A step feed test would be quite interesting to me. Say 3.5 pounds of honey vs 2 pounds + 3 .5 pound additions.
This was pretty interesting, the way the yeast behaves in your environment, the way sweetening could bring the taste close but just adding honey to the low ABV brew couldn’t make up for the qualities the fermentation gave to the high ABV brew.
Yeah, lots more info came out of it than expected!
I think an interesting experiment would be to have 1 batch starting with 1 lb 4 oz honey at the start and one batch with 10 oz to start and step feed it 10 oz after the first has fermented out and see if those two batches are different, if they end at the same FG or not and how different they taste.
I would like to learn what aging does to these. I always finish my meads at 10+% because, right or wrong, I believe that they’ll age better/last longer. I’d be very interested to learn if ABV actually impacts flavor.
I would like to see a one taste test. Maybe bottle one bottle from each, as is now. Then pasteurize and back sweeten and bottle the rest. Curious to see how they all tasted in one year. Cheers!
Great test, I think you should leave it a yr and see what comes out. I used EC1118 in my fruit cake mead, it blew up, twice! thankfully it was just the figs getting stuck in the airlock to blow it out, should of left more headspace! 2 clean-ups later - it finished fermenting, extremely dry! Dunno if my figures are correct but looks like 22-24%! highest I've ever had. SG 1.162 FG .992 and SG 1.155 FG .990, Brewing in the north east uk.
Impressive. Never seen fermentation go that high.
I think that this kind of test could go on for numerous different batches. The 'What If's' that keep popping up will constantly change the testing parameters you originally laid out. Part of testing is doing a very specific set of ideas, and not wavering from those due to the results that appear. So with this batch, I would continue to take it to the 1 year mark, but adjust the low ABV batch to match the specific gravity of the high ABV (=/- .02?), pasteurize as in any other brew, and see what the results are after the 1 year, or even a 6 month mark.
For the one year tasting I would like to see a 3 bottle comparison. One from each fermenter like they are. One of the low ABV that is sweetened and pasteurized.
Im new here so I have not seen all of your videos yet. I would be interested to see more tests like this. Something you may be able to add on to this is sweeting with honey as normal Vs. sweetening with the cooked or Bochet honey. I would be interested to know the differences there.
Only four minutes into the video, but had some thoughts: These two variations will not only have different ABV, but the flavor should be slightly different since the honey content was different from the start too... right? I wonder how the different it would be if both batches had the same honey content, but one was "spiked" with white sugar to raise the ABV instead...
Oh well, back to watching! I love these videos! 😄
The point was how different mead is with different abv's 👍
I have a question. You were mixing the honey in with a small metalic object. Ive seen similar ones but this one was quite small. What do you call that metalic object this isnt usually something I see, especially in that size. What I am getting out is the name wasnt mentioned.
Very interesting test...I wonder if the lower pressure on the yeast allowed it to blow through the lower abv version faster and strip away since it the honey flavors?
Lower sg makes it easier on yeast.
Hey❤🐢been making ciders wines and meads 1 year now thank you.
Happy to help!
Yes that one year test would be very interesting 🤔
I do like these AB type tests
I use EC -1118 yeast and had good results, however I've never went above 12%. This was very interesting🤠👍🏽
Please do the 1 year test. This is the kind of testing that is hard to do for someone like me who only makes a gallon or two a month (of wine, mead, etc combined) but would love to see the affect. Just makes an extra step of refinement of process that means I have less to consider when making the best product I can.
Hi, just made my first meed … I think I put to much yeast in it .. I used bull dog and it was 8 grams.. made a mistake by putting it all in … it has finished in 10 day … what do you think… Nick
More than needed but not so much to be a problem.
@@CitySteadingBrews thanks … brilliant site.. nick from UK
Try the same experiment, but make the high ABV one by adding sugar on top of the honey quantity used for the the low ABV one, to avoid adding taste while adding more fermentables. My guess is the high one will have less flavor in the end as it's been bubbling more flavor away by means of CO2 bubbles.
Very interesting video. Thanks
You're welcome.
It would be interesting to see a similar test step feeding the honey into the higher abv, starting with the same amount, then 50% of the added honey at 10 and 20 days. Cheers!
We can work on a step feeding video, but it's a whole other test.
Could you do a similar test with various honeys or fruit starters?
Maybe, but not something we have planned.
@CitySteadingBrews I am very interested in the difference between starting with juice from the store, jam, canned concentrate, starting with fruit+water, and anything else I'm probably missing.
Thank you for the reply, have a great day.
We have done videos on all of those along the way!
This is an interesting experiment, tells me that if I ever wanted a high abv beverage the best way would be to step feed. In turn should be less possible time to final product.
Step feeding actually takes a lot longer, but it's sort of aging at the same time too, lol.
@CitySteadingBrews that could also be another experiment! Make a 16% or higher beverage one by step feeding and one normal. This is getting to the point of stressing yeast and almost guaranteeing a stall especially if you re use ec1118 that doesn't work well for you guys already.
Maybe? Not sure what the test is though.
@CitySteadingBrews the test would be if one was to want to create a higher abv beverage what the best way with the least amount of issues would be to get to the final result and also would the time be a factor ad well. Just like in this video time was a factor but was time only due to the higher fermentables between the two. I've also experienced that if I make a 6% it could take 2 weeks but a 14% could take close to 2 months with similar clarity.
Step feeding is more effective. I can tell you right off 😀
I use ec 1118 all the time on my end and I've found d you are correct about the amount of fermenables but at the same time adding a bit more yeast helps with that as they have more of them to work with the higher sugar levels in the brew
It may help start up faster but the amount you add isn't much compared to the colony built which is hundreds of times more yeast than you add, they multiply quickly.
I think the year test would be interesting.
Yes. Please sweeten the Low and pasteurize both.
You guys are awesome I did a good cherry wine my question is not the abv but I would rather not have it hurt
I honestly cannot say that any of our brews have hurt... except Lava Mead... that one kinda did!
great experiment!...
I think a follow-up would be interesting, but, if you want to be more rigorous, I'd suggest keeping a bottle of each of the following:
High-ABV
Low-ABV
Low-ABV (Sweetened)
Low-ABV (Fortified to match high ABV)
High-ABV (Diluted to match low ABV)
But I do appreciate it might be a bit unwieldly to actually taste all of them in a video 😂
would be cool with a timelaps on the fermentation... (also showing a clock so we get the real time feeling)
I would be interested in what time and pasteurizing has on the taste.
I'm in the UK? And EC-1118 does seem to like the lower temps here, I get no problems. To back sweeten at the very end? In the glass? Or back sweeten once fermentation has completed (1 or 2 months) and then let it age? Sorry both but yeah, that's a worthy question. I'm thinking the alcohol, over the year, must have an effect on the honey. Surely. But, er, does it? Only one way to find out...
I'd be curious to see how the gravity readings compare between the two once the low ABV mead is back-sweetened.
We would be making them match.
I also would like to see the 1 year test with the same gravity.
I wonder if the yeast in High had trouble due to a lower Ph (from the extra honey).
Maybe? But it wasn't that much honey anyway.
I have to say EC1118 is a good yeast but it is having the HARDEST time with Ambrosia Colorady CO honey. Stable PH with 1.11 starting gravity and only at 1.06 on the third week with a half tsp of fermaid-o.
I only used half a packet to be fair. Time to dump the whole darn thing and FLACK YOUR PACKET
Please continue with the test!
Hey guys! I enjoy your videos, tests and recipes but I'm a bit unsure where to start in the world of mead as a first recipe (i brew beers regularly). Do you have a more talking head video that compares the contribution of each element in a recipe? Like, for choosing a starting honey, is diluting it in water and tasting it going to be a good basis for the product's final taste or is the backsweeting honey going to contribute much more to the flavor and mouthfeel? If I don't like the velvety mouthfeel of some meads, can I minimise that by not adding tannins or by backsweetning with suguar/fructose/other? It would be nice to have a kind of ''tasting wheel'' that goes through the different elements and that kind of details the contribution each bring to the final product and which steps can hide/overpower flavors that were previously introduced. Thank you for sharing your knowledge!
Ok, much of what you're asking can be really subjective, but here's a try:
I'd taste the honey, not dilute it. It will give an idea of the final mead, but of course it will taste different. Small subtleties and such come through during fermentation, and others are lost, just like with making beer. As for what you would or would not like... hard for me to say really as there is a HUGE variety of mead recipes available and methods to make them. Mead covers a very wide range of flavors and styles. In general, the things we look for are balance of sweetness, tannin, and acid. Those three things form a base to build from. If something is too sweet, sometimes adding acid or tannin can help, but it's best to not oversweeten to begin with.
While you can backsweeten with whatever you like, we tend to sweeten meads with honey, as that's the character we look for in a mead, but ymmv.
As for a video on all these aspects... it's a wide wide world out there and I'm afraid we couldn't possibly cover even a fraction of what can be done in even a series of videos, as each component reacts differently in different brews and different palates like and dislike different things.
My best suggestion is, do you know if you like dry or sweet wines? Then follow one of our beginner friendly recipes for that. Most of our recipes ferment to dry and we sweeten to taste if needed, so that gets you into the ballpark. I'd start with something simple, a traditional perhaps, so you get a feel for what mead is like without all the additions and flavors.
@@CitySteadingBrews Thank you for the detailed answer, I get how it can be a hard thing to comment on. I guess like anything, trying it out for myself is the best way to go. I have some wild honey from a beekeeper friend, I'll try something with that and experiment from there! Have a great day!
Wondering if a more accurate test would be with equal parts honey, then one with a “neutral” white sugar added to make the higher abv.
Just because white sugar has less flavour than honey.
Do the test . Liked the video thanks!!
It would be fascinating to see an experiment in which you add different flavoring agents like fruits, spices, or herbs at various stages of fermentation. Perhaps just in primary vs. just in secondary, vs Primary and secondary! Suggestion number two; How about a comparison of identical mead batches made using different water sources? Using distilled, spring, and tap water, etc, could reveal how the mineral content and purity impact the fermentation process and the final product.
ua-cam.com/video/EzaMkTp5B_0/v-deo.htmlsi=f-8MY2Y9yzoYmgmj
The water would be more subtle depending recipe.
@@CitySteadingBrews Tyvm! I'm a new subscriber and haven't seen this episode. Very informative and highly entertaining too. I appreciate you guys sharing the knowledge and the laughs!!
I would love to see the test results in a year. I think that would make us more I formed brewers. ❤
I would like to see the one year test.
One year test could be fun. Tame that rocket fuel some
I think I am gonna do a Stonefruit Low ABV mead at some point, I have found I am liking 11-12.5% more and more, I think the flavor of fruit shine a bit more in the lower abv meads and take much less time to be amazing, at least for me. I know the higher ABV will tend to age better and for longer but I really am loving that 11-12% sweet spot lol. I want to do a 7-8% mead but I just haven't pulled the trigger yet
Yes please on the one year test. Also I think I was less surprised than you guys with similarity after the added honey. I was remembering an awesome video where a couple of legends did a comparison of flavour/flavor influence between adding ingredients before and after fermentation. They have a youtube channel like yours... exactly like yours. 🤪 Same name and all. 😁 Nobody can say wasn't paying attention in class. 🤣😂🤣 Question 2. Does oaking during fermentation work? 🤔
I have oaked during fermentation. Not sure I would recommend it but you can.
@@CitySteadingBrews yeah, I suppose the alcohol in and out of the oak would be what makes it.
That's barrel aging and done in large quantities over several years. It requires seasonal temps changes to make it work. Not the same as tossing some wood into a few gallons of wine or mead.
Yes, please on year test.
Thank you for curing my curiosity and sweetening the lower abv mead. I would deeply appreciate it if you would compare the higher abv to both a bottle of the lower abv as is, and sweetened to the same specific gravity as the higher one. This is so interesting! I love it when you guys get nerdy 🥸🥳
When you bottle, could you bottle a 50/50 mix of the low and high as well to see what happens with that after a year as well?
There's not a lot to bottle so, maybe?
Interesting about the EC1118. I wonder if the yeast has experienced a “drift” in attributes and is no longer a champagne yeast? I imagine that yeast sellers run genetic tests but what about characteristics? If 50 years ago 71 B was observed to provide floral, fruity, earth notes does it continue today? Running tests like this could provide great info.
I would imagine the labs they are made in have quality controls in place.
As you are in that Southern state, where I have twice lived, your water likely varies wildly from what I get here in the middle of the country. I am troubled by dissolved Iron and Calcium. In your area, the problem was Sulfur in the water with a Calcium backstop. I have no way to avail myself of better water except to buy it from Walmart and I no longer have a car. With most water suppliers simply bottling whatever they use to flush toilets with, I have no idea of how to clear up my water's taste and it's effects om my wines. Any thoughts on this?
Get a filtering system?
How about another test using the high abv mead, but "boiling out" the alcohol from the test batch?
You really can't boil out alcohol very easily. What is this testing for?
Possible to do a test with the same amount of honey for both but pasteurize (pre-fermentation) one and not the other?
Why? As in, what is the test about?
@@CitySteadingBrews natural bacteria and such in the honey. Will heating up the honey before fermenting cause the batches to be different?
@jakattah that's hard to really test... some honey will, some won't. 👍
Plit the half gallon in 2 sweeten one, pasturize everything. Taste the 3 versions in a year (or half a year)
Adding the same amount of honey to both jars and topping the high one with sugar wouldt be a better test i guess. Scince adding honey also means to add flavour where as adding sugar just raises the abv.
One year tase test wouldt be nice👍
This teaches me that I should add more fermentable *during* versus all of it upfront (Keeping the yeast always wanting more) to make a more efficient fermentation. I mistakenly thought step feeding meant nutrients, not sugars - maybe yall do a test/explain that method...
We have shown step feeding in several videos 😀
Yes, please compare in 1 year.
I have a question have you ever used LalBrew Nottingham Brewing Ale Yeast for mead?
Not in a long time. Early on we did. Seemed fine as I recall.
Yes!
I'll stick around to see this test.. If you're willing to go through with it..
I'm not saying I'll leave you channel if you choose not to keep them.. it's a great learning tool, and your channel has helped me explain it to my kids who now enjoy their fermented juices...
I would hope not 😆
If they are the same taste 2 Questions
1. Would the lower abv below out quicker .
If you retest would you add small amount of taking to low one and bring the Final sugar content to the same point
They don't taste the same. Mixing them would nullify the test completely.
Should I use potassium sorbate/potassium metabisulfite if I’m goin to use carbonation drops for a cider?
We have never used those things but carbonation drops are just sugar. If you stabilize it won't carbonate.
I think you should split both batches into 1) Hi no touch. 2) Hi pasteurized. 3) Lo back sweeten to 1.000 and pasteurized. 4) Lo no touch, sweeten at tasting. Review in a year.
It would be interesting to compare a berry jam wine/mead to a wine/mead made from the berry itself.
I don't think there would be much difference if they were the same sweetness level 😀