Another honey acquisition from our recent trip to Colorado: we picked up some raspberry honey, which is very sweet and does in fact taste like rather tart raspberries. After primary fermentation is done, there's going to be some peppers going into the carboy after primary fermentation slows. It's another BOMM-based mead, and so I'm going to call this Raspberry Hand Grenade.

Ingredients in this batch

  • 1 lb., 8 oz. raspberry varietal honey from Copoco's Honey, Fort Collins, Colorado.
  • 1 lb. clover honey from Bee Squared Apiaries, Berthoud, Colorado.
  • ⅖ tsp. Fermaid K
  • ⅔ tsp. Fermaid O
  • ¼ tsp. potassium carbonate
  • Niagra™ purified (reverse osmosis) water to 1 gal.
  • filtered tap water to just over one gallon
  • First nutrient addition, 27 July 2017 (SG ~1.060):
  • Second nutrient addition, 4 August 2017 (SG ~1.030):

Sanitized everything, then poured the honey in through a funnel. Followed this with the Fermaid O, Fermaid K, and the K₂CO₃. Poured in water to total about two-thirds of a gallon in the carboy. Agitated for five minutes to oxygenate. Pitched the starter, then pulled off enough to take a hydrometer reading, taking it down to almost exactly a gallon. Popped in a fermentation lock and filled it to the line with vodka. Set the carboy in the swamp cooler's cooling bath in the kitchen.

Brew date: 19 June 2017.
Original gravity: 1.085. Bottling date: 17 October 2017
Final gravity: 0.998.
Estimated ABV: Approx. 11.5%.

Yield:

  • 2 x 22 oz. bottles
  • 2 x 500 mL bottles
  • 4 x 12 oz. bottles
  • a hydrometer tube's worth of mead

Total: 125 fl. oz., or not quite one gallon.

Observations

  • 2017-07-24T15:11: There's bubbling from the carboy.
  • 2017-07-27T22:21: First nutrient addition.
  • 2017-08-04T18:12: Second nutrient addition.
  • 2017-10-17T21:55: Bottled, yielding not quite a gallon at not quite 12% ABV.