Since batch 115 was so incredibly delicious, we're brewing another, similar cherry mead. This uses that good Bennett's cactus honey for rich body, plus the last of the east-coast orange blossom honey we picked up this spring in Wisconsin. As with many of the brews we're handling during the plague, I'm naming this batch after a line from Warren Zevon's song Splendid Isolation: this is Never Go Down in the Street.

Ingredients in this batch

  • 15 oz. orange blossom varietal honey from Honey Acres.
  • 4 lb., 9.5 oz. cactus honey from Bennett's Honey Farm, Fillmore, California.
  • 4 qt. RW Knudsen Just Black Cherry juice.
  • 4 qt. Simple Truth tart red cherry juice.
  • 3½ qt. Simple Truth black cherry juice.
  • ½ tsp. Wyeast beer nutrient.
    • Note: No SNA planned for this batch: hopefully, the fruit juice and fruit have enough nutrients for the fermentation to complete just fine.
  • 1 packet Cellar Science ICV-D21 wine yeast, rehydrated in ¼ cup untreated tap water at 100℉.
  • 2 lb. Kirkland wildflower honey, added to the carboy on 25 February 2020.
  • Volume-building addition of 3 May 2020:
    • 6 lb., 8 oz. Kirkland wildflower honey.
    • 3 qt. Simple Truth tart cherry juice (at 28g sugar/cup).
    • 5 qt. Simple Truth black cherry juice (at 50g sugar/cup).
  • Additions of 2 August 2020:
    • 4 lb. Earthbound Farm triple cherry blend (frozen tart/sweet blend)
    • 2 lb. Kroger Private Selection Mixed Variety Cherries (frozen tart/sweet blend)

Procedure

Poured some of the cherry juice out of the first bottle. Poured in some honey, agitated until it was mixed, and repeated, mixing honey into juice and pouring it into a three-gallon carboy. Added yeast nutrient, then added rehydrated yeast, which had been rehydrating during the procedure. Popped on a fermentation lock.

Brew date: 15 December 2019.
(Measured) original gravity: 1.127.
(Calculated) as-if original gravity: 1.174 (after step-feeding and volume-building additions).
Bottling date: 26 October 2020
Final gravity: 1.030.
Estimated ABV: Approx. 23% (!!!).

Yield:

  • 17 x 500mL wine bottles
  • 3 x 750mL wine bottles
  • 1 x 1 qt. beer bottle
  • 2 x 375mL wine bottles
  • 2 x 22 oz. beer bottles
  • 1 x 750mL beer bottle
  • 2 x 500mL beer bottle
  • 1 x 375mL beer bottle
  • 9 x 12 oz. beer bottles
  • 6 x 187mL beer bottles

Total: Approx. 680 fl. oz., or 5⅓ gallons.

Observations

  • 2019-12-16T02:21: There's already plenty of bubbling in the carboy.
  • 2019-12-16T11:17: Swapped out the airlock for a blowoff hose.
  • 2020-02-25: Added more honey to sweeten the brew.
  • 2020-05-03: Added two gallons of cherry juice, plus six and a half pounds of honey, to build volume. (The gravity of a 2:1 black:tart mix, which is not quite what the actual mixture was, was 1.077.) Racked into a new bucket, then poured as much of the yeast sludge in as possible to help encourage further fermentation. Covered hole in bucket lid with a paper towel held down with a measuring cup to allow some oxygen to permeate for the first day or two, for the same reason.
  • 2020-08-02: Added six frozen pounds of mixed tart/sweet cherries to the bucket.
  • 2020-10-26: Bottled, using wine bottles and beer bottles with red caps.