Maple Mead Recipe

For posterity, here's the maple mead recipe for the mead I started on 4/2/2011

1. Sanitize
• Carboy
• Airlocks
• Stoppers
• Funnels
• Measuring cups
• Yeast delivery thing
• thermometer
2. Prepare
• 4 cups maple syrup (equals 3.32 cups honey)
• 0.68 - 0.75 cups honey
• If desired, heat the must, stirring gently, to no more than 140 deg for about 5-7 minutes. This is my second batch, and I decided to do that for this batch.
3. Fill up to about 4/5 with water. Don't completely fill the carboy! Remember that it's easier to shake the carboy to oxygenate when there's a bit of air available at the top.
4. Add 1 tsp yeast nutrient and 1 tsp yeast energizer (I max these out when doing the maple because of concerns for mold)
5. Heat 2oz of water to 100 deg F for yeast. I use a small glass cup for this.
6. Add 1/4 teaspoon of the yeast to the water. I'm using Red Star Pasteur Yeast.
7. Let sit for 15 minutes. Don't touch it!
8. After 15 minutes, stir the yeast gently.
9. Pitch yeast.
10. Oxygenate for 5 minutes vigorously
11. Add more water to fill to handle
12. Measure brix: Should be 23-24%
13. Place airlock and complete

After about 12 hours, it should be fermenting pretty intensely. Mine was bubbling at a little under twice a second near the beginning.

Now, if (what appears to be) green mold appears around the inside edge of the carboy, right above the level of the must, you should be fine. What I've done is use a cotton swab soaked in a mixture of chlorine and water (very little chlorine) and wiped that off, then put the stopper back in and allowed it to continue fermenting.  FYI, this only happened on my first batch, and didn't happen this time that I've heated the must.  Probably should heat the must from then on.  Unfortunate.

I'm not very sure if it's mold though. It may simply be maple syrup that vaporized off the top and then reformed around the edges.

I'll update this blog as the mead continues. It's still fermenting right now.

Below is a video of the mead after about 8 days of fermenting.  This is useful to compare rates of fermentation.  I think mine has been an extremely good fermentation so far.  I've tasted the mead and it's exceptionally clean - doesn't seem like the yeast struggled at all.