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FINGERS CROSSED MEAD (sima?)

BILLY BREW

Grandmaster Brewer
Joined
Dec 25, 2006
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Location
CHICAGOLAND AREA
Sima;
15lbs white honey

3 large lemons

WLP099 high gravity yeast

Peel the outer rind off the lemons and leave in long slices
peel away the pith from the lemon fruit and discard the pith
thinly slice the lemons.

Put the lemon parts in vodka to sterilize for @ 20 minutes.
Drain off the vodka and crush the fruit and peel, leaving it all intact for removal at the end of the process.

"Burn" 5 lbs honey until thick and brown. This gives the honey a rich caramel flavor.

Add 5 gallons of water and 10lbs of honey, stirring vigorously.
stabilize heat to 185.

Add Lemon and stir like crazy aerating the mix as much as possible for @30 minutes.

Reduce heat as quickly as possible and pour directly into carboy using the rinds and fruit as filter.

The fruit will have dissolved, leaving the shells behind. Now you can throw them away, but I found that they really tasted good.
Set them aside to g nosh on.

Separate peels and put them in the carboy using something sterile to move them...Hemostats work nicely

When mixture gets to @70 degrees, take a reading. Should be around 1.225 (yeah baby!)

Add lemon peels and yeast. Shake that baby up.

CROSS YOUR FINGERS ::)

I'll let you know how it turned out in a month.
 
This is an interesting idea to be sure, but I have to point out the following.  I've heard bad things about what yeast turn raw citrus fruit into.  I can't remember exactly what it makes, but I remember that it doesn't taste very good.  It's why the peel is usually used, but not the pith or fruit.  I think it's on this site someplace.

http://www.themadfermentationist.com/

Using cirtusy hop varieties as a whirlpool steep might get you the same flavors, without the bad stuff that yeast does to citrus fruits.

 
Scott, I have to disagree pretty hard on this one.  Nothing personal, but citrus fruits can and do make some wonderful meads and beer as well.  There's a recent thread on another board where they are saying it ferments into vomit.  Pretty harsh.  And very untrue.  Because someone didn't manage it right and had bad luck and posts about it does not make it universal.  A nano just opened in our town after winning a ton of awards for his fruit beers.  He doesn't make a single beer without loads of local citrus.  I totally agree on excluding the pith.  I use the juice a lot, but stopped zesting at all cause I find it overpowering even in the smallest doses.
 
KernelCrush said:
Scott, I have to disagree pretty hard on this one.  Nothing personal, but citrus fruits can and do make some wonderful meads and beer as well.  There's a recent thread on another board where they are saying it ferments into vomit.  Pretty harsh.  And very untrue.  Because someone didn't manage it right and had bad luck and posts about it does not make it universal.  A nano just opened in our town after winning a ton of awards for his fruit beers.  He doesn't make a single beer without loads of local citrus.  I totally agree on excluding the pith.  I use the juice a lot, but stopped zesting at all cause I find it overpowering even in the smallest doses.

That is why my reply was full of "maybes" and "mights".  I also stated that I read it.  I probably should have also pointed out that I had no first hand experience with using the juice myself.  I do remember that the article did mention that it worked well in the keg, after fermentation, but his experience was not good when the juice went through primary fermentation.
 
A lot of the up front flavor from juice and peeled fruit will ferment away in primary, and is retained more by late additions, depends what you are after.  I use peeled whole citrus fruit and juice in primary, secondary, and later in meads.  It all good, just different profiles at different stages.  It helps to live in one of the best citrus growing areas in the country.  Given a choice I'd rather have your hops.

Billy,  Almost looks like you are going for a bochet.  You've pulled together some ingredients and methods from different approaches to mead, please post how it turns out. I hadn't heard of Sima till a wiki read a few minutes ago.
 
thanks for the input gents.
To date there is absolutely no activity with the yeast. All is calm in the carboy...
If I don't see anything by the end of the day, I think I may boil up some cane sugar and put it in as a yeast energizer and see if that does anything.
I has cleared up nicely, though and will be a nice amber.
Scott, I had heard the same thing you read, but indications were that it was because there were contaminants in the rind. That is why I put it int some vodka and let it sit there a while...(Plus it added a nice lemon taste to the vodka)
Hell boys, if we don't screw around with stuff, then we are just Germans, right?
I'll let you know how this turns out. :eek:
 
You need a good amount of yeast nutrient to get a mead to work especially a high gravity one.
Fruit and citrus do just fine in meads as long as they are not boiled which you did not do.
I would say you need to wait at least a year for this to be drinkable. It will not be good after a month.
I am not sure how the WLP099 will work out - my guess is that it will be too attentive and completely dry it out. Honey is highly fermentable and it is hard not to get the yeast from eating it all. I have had a mead turn out so dry it was almost undrinkable - solved that problem by mixing with a bit of fruit juice in the glass (I try not to dump anything).
 
That is one of the reasons I caramelized some of the honey. It tends not to ferment and leaves a buttery sweet taste.
Figured a year for the final, I have some mead that I made back in 2000 that is awesome. Starting to run low so I wanted to make more...As you can see, I have patience when it comes to drinking it.
Thanks for the input. I had thought to put some energizer in, but hoped it would kick start on it's own with the WLP. However it is still just sitting there. So it's off to the home brew shop.
 
A member of my homebrew club gave my wife a bottle of caramel apple mead.  He carmelized half of the honey, just as you are caramelizing yours.  He then put it on a boatload of apples.  It tasted just like a caramel apple you'd get at the county fair.  Delicious.
 
So, mine will taste like Caramel lemons? Oh boy.... That'll be unique, to say the least...But nothing ventured...
 
probably very low carb, just enough to give it a little fizzle on the tongue...But right now I have to throw in some energizer...It's not noticeably fermenting. If the energizer doesn't work, then it is on to another blast of yeast. Last time this happened, the first yeast took off after the introduction of the second and it was like a rocket!
 
Pulled the mead off the primary and put it into a secondary with as much of the yeast as possible. My intent was to get the peels off the wort.
Took a sample tasting....I'm taking bids on the bottles...starting at a million bucks a bottle! This is going to be reall good stuff.
No off flavors, or any indication of a bad bug getting in there.
Pulled gravity was 1.190 still has a long way to go, but it is slowly bubbling away.
More later.
 
Super Bowl Sunday! Gravity at test is at 1.010 Still bubbling away, though a bit slower.
Tried a sample....CRAP FIRE! Awesome. A bit like a lemon cordial with a honey background and a real warm after burn.
Not sure whether I want to let this continue to ferment or bottle it now, afraid it may blow bottles.
There are no off flavors, thank god. But it is a very heavy flavor for a refreshment drink.
I was thinking of doing a dry mead and mixing the two...
Next batch I will reduce to 1 or two lemons.
Course, it is only a month old...Attached for your enjoyment, or snicker, as the case may be! GO PATS!
 

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Update;
Getting nervous...Still fermenting...Gravity down to 1.006. Still tastes great, though a bit heavy on the lemon...If anyone is going to try this, I would suggest 1 lemon instead of 3.
Transferred to a tertiary. Put 5 gallons in carboy and another gallon into a gallon jug with 10oz of fresh frozen blueberries.
Will let it sit for another month then combine and bottle, unless it still keeps fermenting.
 
I would advise caution before adding the potentially tainted blueberry mix back into the rest. I hope you treated the berries with Campden tablets first.  Be triple sure the contents of the gallon jug aren't contaminated. As far as fermentation time goes, you're making wine not beer. Assume three to six months to fully ferment, then most of a year to age.  The patience will pay off. Also, I wouldn't try to bottle condition the stuff. It's got a high enough gravity that I doubt the yeast can produce bubbles.  I'd bottle it like wine. I did that with some blackberry wine I made a couple years ago. Got the bottles from the local redemption center; corks, a corker and some sleeves at the LHBS; and used my wife's hairdryer to shrink the sleeves. It's made for some great gifts.
 
UPDATE
Pulled off 1 gallon and added 11 oz of frozen blueberries to it, just to see what it would do.
I bottled everything last night. Final gravity...1.003, hee hee hee. Flavor is awesome. Lemon comes through a bit strong, but after it sits a while it should calm down. The carmel in the honey came trough as a nice rich smooth mouthfeel.
I am really going to enjoy this one when the weather warms up!
 
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