Mead at home is a recipe for making a hoppy drink from natural honey, you can perform it using an authentic old technology or using ideas adapted to modern conditions. The result will be alcoholic drinks of different strengths with subtle honey notes.

Mead - benefits and harms

Which is due to the bee honey used for its preparation, when consumed in moderation will have a beneficial effect on the basic systems of the body and improve health.

How to make mead?

Homemade classic mead is low-alcoholic and has a strength of 7-10%. It is preferable to use honey with a rich taste, aroma, exclusively natural and high quality to create a drink. The composition of the spices can be adjusted to taste, or just leave hop cones altogether.

Ingredients:

• honey - 1 kg;
• water - 7 l;
• pressed yeast - 75 g;
• hop cones - 15 g;
• cinnamon and nutmeg - 3 pinches each.

Preparation

1. Mix water with honey and heat with stirring to a boil, skimming off the foam.
2. After 1.5 hours of boiling, add hops and spices to the well-fed, boil for 10 minutes, remove the container from the heat.
3. After cooling down, the diluted yeast is mixed in to 28 degrees, left for 2 days in a warm place, after which it is poured into a container under a water seal.
4. At the end of fermentation, the mead is filtered, bottled.

Homemade mead carbonation

Homemade mead is a cooking recipe that may additionally include such a stage as carbonation. Through its implementation, it will be possible to fill the honey drink with gas bubbles, due to which it will become similar to champagne or other similar alcoholic carbonated drink.

1. For carbonation, add a tablespoon of honey to each bottle with strained fermented mead. The containers are sealed and left for 5 days.
2. The finished drink can be carbonized with the wort selected before fermentation (10% of the total amount). It is poured into the finished mead, after which the drink is poured into bottles, sealed, and a day later removed into the cold.
3. The carbonation of the mead can be accomplished by adding fructose or dextrose to the finished beverage, after which the sealed bottles are left for 3-5 days.

Homemade mead - a simple recipe

Mead, the recipe of which will be presented below, does not require long boiling, it is simply prepared, it turns out to be soft in taste with pleasant honey notes. The yeast must first be diluted in a small volume of warm liquid, and then added to the well-fed, cooled down under the lid to 30-40 degrees.

Ingredients:

• honey - 350 g;
• water - 2 l;
• yeast - 1 tsp;
• hop cones - 5 g;
• cinnamon and nutmeg - pinch each.

Preparation

1. Mead production begins with boiling purified water.
2. Add honey and stir the contents of the pan until the product is completely dissolved in boiling water.
3. After 5 minutes of boiling, put spices and hops, cover the container with a lid, turn off the heat and leave the container until the contents cool.
4. Diluted yeast is added, the base is poured into a fermentation tank under a water seal for 5-7 days.
5. Ready mead is bottled.

How to make mead from old honey?

Another proven popular recipe for mead made from honey at home will allow you to get an unusual sweet and sour alcoholic drink with honey notes. In this case, freshly squeezed cranberry juice is added to the traditional components, and old or fermented honey is used.

Ingredients:

• old honey - 1 kg;
• water - 5 l;
• cranberry juice - 5 l;
• yeast - 100 g;
• cinnamon, cloves and cardamom - pinch each.

Preparation

1. Dissolve honey in water, boil for 15 minutes, cool to 30 degrees.
2. Add cranberry juice, spices, yeast, stir and leave to ferment for 3 days in a warm place.
3. The container is taken out to a cool, dark place for 3 weeks, after which the drink is poured into bottles.

Homemade mead recipe without yeast

Self-made mead at home without yeast, the recipe for which will be presented next, will have a pleasant carbonated consistency. On the surface of unwashed raisins there is wild yeast, which will become an activator of the fermentation process, therefore, in this case, you cannot rinse the component.

Ingredients:

• honey - 1 kg;
• spring water - 10 l;
• raisins - 500 g.

Preparation

1. Dissolve honey in water.
2. Raisins are placed in honey water, left in a warm, dark place until the end of fermentation.
3. The overplayed one is poured into dark bottles, sealed and placed in a cool place for 3-4 months.

Non-alcoholic mead - recipe

The traditional Russian drink mead is characterized by an alcoholic degree, which does not allow those who, for one reason or another, do not drink alcohol, cannot taste the drink. The following recipe will allow you to get a non-alcoholic version of the drink containing no more than 1% alcohol. The technology for its creation is simple, unpretentious, but long-lasting.

Ingredients:

• honey - 2 kg;
• spring water - 1 l;
• fresh cherries - 4 kg.

Preparation

1. Water is mixed with honey, letting it completely dissolve.
2. Unwashed fresh cherries are added, after removing the seeds from them, the mixture is left to ferment in a dark place, covered with gauze.
3. Further, non-alcoholic mead is bottled, hermetically sealed and left in a cool place for 3-4 months.

Strong mead - recipe

If you need the right recipe for mead at home to get a drink of increased strength, the option presented below is perfect for the implementation of the venture. Together with honey, granulated sugar is added to the composition, which, when interacting with yeast, will fill the drink with an additional degree.

Ingredients:

• honey and sugar - 1.5 kg each;
• water - 10 l;
• hops and spices to taste;
• yeast - 100 g

Preparation

1. Honey is completely dissolved in warm water, then sugar.
2. Dissolve yeast in a small amount of liquid, stir in honey sweet water.
3. Leave the container with the fermentation mixture in a dark place for fermentation for 7-10 days.
4. The drink is poured into bottles, placed in the cold for aging for another 2-3 months.

Spicy mead

Preparing mead according to the following ancient recipe will provide an opportunity to taste an exquisite spicy drink with notes of ginger, clove and citrus. Traditional additions include cinnamon, hops, and nutmeg. The use of wine yeast will get rid of the unpleasant aftertaste obtained after fermentation with a bakery additive.

Ingredients:

• honey - 2.5 kg;
• water - 7 l;
• hops - 12 g;
• nutmeg and cinnamon - 1 teaspoon each;
• allspice - 12 pcs.;
• cloves - 8 pcs.;
• ginger root - 40 g;
• citrus zest - 2 handfuls;
• wine yeast - 2 tsp.

Preparation

1. Honey is mixed with water, boiled for 2 hours, stirring.
2. Replenish the volume of water to the original, add spices and hops, boil for 40 minutes.
3. The wort is cooled to 30 degrees, diluted yeast is mixed in, poured into a fermentation vessel with a water seal and left for 2 weeks.
4. The drink is drained from the sediment, put on additional fermentation.
5. The mead is poured into bottles, placed in the cold to ripen for at least a month.

Mead on vodka - recipe

It is elementary to prepare mead on vodka, without requiring long fermentation and aging. Honey is mixed with alcohol, infused for a week. For additional taste, citrus juice, spices, fresh or dry aromatic herbs are added to the drink. At the same time, it is important to choose an alcoholic drink of exceptionally high quality.

Ingredients:

• honey - 300 g;
• vodka - 0.5 l;
• mint - 3-5 leaves;
• lemon - 1 pc.

Preparation

1. Add honey, lemon juice, mint leaves to vodka, stir thoroughly.
2. Leave the mixture in a tightly closed glass container for 5-7 days, shaking from time to time.
3. The finished drink is filtered, filtered, poured into clean bottles and stored in a cool place.

Mead for alcohol

Making mead at home according to any recipe can be completed by adding alcohol, giving the drink the desired strength. The latter will depend on the amount of additive diluted with pre-boiled water in a 1: 1 ratio. The composition can be supplemented with any other spices of your choice.

Ingredients:

• honey - 400 g;
• water - 2 l;
• wine alcohol - 150-250 ml;
• yeast - 1 tsp;
• hop cones - 10 pcs.;
• spices.

Preparation

1. Dissolve honey in warm water, boil for 30 minutes, removing the foam.
2. Cool the brew, add hops and yeast, leave to ferment for 3 days.
3. Spices are laid and wait for the end of fermentation for about 5-7 days.
4. The drink is filtered, bottled and left to ripen for a month.
5. Before serving, bring the mead to the desired strength with alcohol.

What do they drink mead with?

Having prepared delicious homemade mead with your own hand, it's time to familiarize yourself with the rules for serving the drink and the traditions of its use.

1. It is preferable to serve mead as an aperitif before a hearty and hearty meal in order to increase appetite, increase the secretion of gastric juice and thereby speed up the digestive processes.
2. An ideal snack for mead is pickled apples, cranberries, cloudberries, lingonberries, salted watermelons, sauerkraut and other pickles.
3. In addition to pickles, jerky, smoked or salted meat, all kinds of fresh vegetables, sweet and sour fruits and berries are served with the drink.
4. An appropriate snack would be pastries with meat, cheese and cottage cheese (sweet and snack).
5. It is not recommended to serve fish and seafood with mead, which are considered to be completely inappropriate to the taste characteristics of such a drink.

How much mead is stored?

As mentioned above, mead should be consumed in small portions, which obliges to provide the prepared drink with proper storage conditions.

1. Bottles, jars and jars made of glass are ideal containers for the preservation of intoxicated honey drinks. In Russia, the drink was stored in oak barrels, which only improved its taste.
2. Hermetically sealed containers are placed in a basement, cellar or cool pantry without access to light.
3. The shelf life of mead can vary depending on the method of its preparation, and on average is 5-7 years for yeast versions and 15-20 years for yeast-free versions.

Modern mead, which can be heated and fermented with ordinary yeast (as opposed to the one that was kept for 15-30 years in barrels), can be prepared independently at home without much difficulty and skills. Unless you just need to know some of the subtleties and secrets of its preparation. We'll talk about them and how to make a fragrant mead at home.

To deliver mead, we need the main ingredient - honey and some auxiliary components: water, yeast, all kinds of additives.

Choosing honey

Different types of honey with different flavors can give the mead individual taste in each case. And a novice mead brewer is probably worried about the question of what quality and what sort of honey should be used in the preparation of mead. After all, it is quite reasonable to assume that the taste and aroma of a drink made from honey directly depend on these parameters. And if the product used turns out to be of poor quality, then during the fermentation process, the drink may acquire an unpleasant taste and smell.

It is believed that light types of honey such as lime, acacia, clover or rapeseed honey are most suitable for making mead. The drink made from these varieties is light and transparent. However, buckwheat or angelica honey, which is dark, fragrant with a peculiar bitterness, may well compete with lighter varieties. A drink made with these honeys turns out to be tart and rich.

If you are not a beekeeper, honey for making mead, of course, needs to be bought. When doing this, pay attention to its consistency. If in the spring you are offered non-candied liquid honey, you should think about it, because at this time honey can become liquid only if the seller makes it so, for example, by heating it in a water bath. Or you are offered a fake - a sugar surrogate. Although, in fairness, it should be said that there are some varieties of honey that are not sugared and are always liquid. For example, honey from white acacia, heather.

Natural honey - fragrant (almost all types of honey). But the smell is absent if it is fake honey (for example, made with added sugar, which kills all odors).

Good honey should not foam. If it foams by itself, this is evidence of either poor quality and loss of its bactericidal properties by the product due to heating or dilution with water, or that the honey has fermented.

The question may arise: what's the difference, because in the process of making mead, the bactericidal properties of honey are still destroyed. And yet, despite the fermentation, sour, fermented honey is not the best product for making high-quality mead (although if there are no other options, you can use such honey as well), because sour honey already contains honey vinegar, which will remain in some quantity and in the future drink after the fermentation process.

Mead is an alcoholic drink made from honey. Russia is considered the birthplace of an intoxicating cocktail. Over time, the recipe has undergone changes, now you do not need to spend a lot of time to create a pleasure drink, it is enough to limit yourself to yeast and boiling.

It is known that the technology of making mead was depicted in Ancient Egypt (more than 3 millennia BC) on the walls of tombs with a detailed description of the honey rivers of the afterlife. At the same time, in Russia, an ethyl cocktail was considered a must when holding festive events. Mead was drunk at the wedding for the sweet happy life of the newlyweds. The life-giving drink was aged in oak barrels for up to 15 years. It was considered a universal remedy for all diseases.

Currently, mead has not lost its popularity, but, on the contrary, has received a second revival during the formation of Soviet power. As a result, the homemade drink gradually began to be produced industrially (in the city of Suzdal) as a tonic, immunostimulating, antibacterial agent.

Classification

Types and varieties of mead:

1. By alcohol concentration: light (less than 14 degrees) and strong (more than 14 degrees).
2. By composition: fruit (contains fruit juice) and natural (without fruit concentrate).
3. By color: light and dark.
4. By sweetness: sweet, semi-sweet, semi-dry (the sugar content starts from 1%) and dry (the amount of sugars does not exceed 1%).
5. By the shelf life: put (obtained by means of fermentation of honey waste, 3 years) and boiled (prepared by cooking, based on honey and herbs, 10 years).
6. By the amount of carbon dioxide: effervescent (with a high CO2 content) and regular (with a low percentage of carbon dioxide).

Depending on the production technology, the honey drink is prepared with or without the addition of ethyl alcohol.

Chemical composition

Mead is a high-calorie product. 100 ml of the drink contains 93.93 calories. It is produced exclusively from natural ingredients, therefore it contains a supply of useful mineral compounds and vitamins necessary for the full functioning of the body.

If you adhere to the standards of preparation, use exclusively high-quality products, observe moderation in use, the drink will bring boundless benefits to the human body, minimal harm.

Remember, real mead made from natural bee honey with the addition of spices, herbs and fruits is a symbiosis of vitamins and minerals.

Like an alcoholic medicine

In moderate quantities (100 ml per day) mead is a healing drink that has absorbed useful substances from herbs, spices and honey.

The use of mead is possible provided that the drink is taken within reasonable limits (no more than 100 ml per day). With alcohol abuse, dependence develops, intoxication of the body, a hangover occurs. As a result, instead of improving health, there is a deterioration in health.

Useful properties of a drink infused with honey without adding yeast:

• kills pathological bacteria;
• strengthens the heart, blood vessels;
• has an antipyretic effect;
• heals colds, viruses;
• removes accumulated mucus from the lungs.

When mixing mead with red wine, you can get rid of constipation, provided that there are no diseases of the gastrointestinal tract (ulcers, gastritis, colitis). Otherwise, the combustible mixture will irritate the mucous membrane of the stomach and intestines, which will ultimately lead to an exacerbation of the pathological process.

Folk recipes

1. To normalize the work of the cardiovascular system. Doctors recommend daily use 1 time per day before meals an invigorating mixture of dry red wine (30 g) and mead (70 g).
2. To eliminate chronic fatigue, lethargy and fight against spring vitamin deficiency. Take a “soothing” cocktail of Cahors (50 ml) and mead (50 ml) once a day.
3. To restore healthy sleep and nervous system. Take 200 ml of mead with mint at night.
4. To combat constipation or diarrhea (intestinal infections). Dilute sweet red wine with mead, observing the ratio of alcoholic beverages 1: 1, consume once a day.

Potential harm

Mead contains alcohol and should be taken with extreme caution in moderation.

Contraindications:

• diabetes;
• stomach ulcer;
• children, pregnant women and nursing mothers;
• individual intolerance;
• tendency to allergies;
• alcohol addiction.

Cooking method

First of all, a strong type of drink is made, without fermentation, into which vodka or alcohol is introduced. With an accurate calculation of the components, the mead can have 75 turns.

The quality of the drink directly depends on the correctness of the calculation and the freshness of the components.

Interestingly, the fermentation method was first practiced by beekeepers who had a lot of honey left. To avoid spoilage of the product, baker's yeast was used for processing.

Honey remains the main ingredient, while other ingredients depend on the recipe. To improve the taste, add to the mead: dried apricots, cardamom, anise, cinnamon, ginger, raisins. The classic recipe uses hop cones, water and yeast.

Sourdough for simple mead

The inoculum ensures the fermentation of the wort.

The sequence of the processes of preparation of the starter culture:

1. Dissolve honey in water.
2. Boil the mixture for 10 minutes over low heat. In the process of boiling down the leaven, get rid of the foam, make sure that no more than 1/3 of it boils away.
3. Cool to 40 degrees.
4. Add yeast at the rate of 5 g per 10 l of the mixture. Then add hops and spices.
5. Insist for at least 1 week, preferably longer. Only in this case will the mead be of high quality, aromatic and tasty. To check the readiness of the leaven, pay attention to its hissing. It should stop emitting carbon dioxide.

To prevent the drink from turning sour, cover it carefully during fermentation. When the mead is ready, pour it into glass bottles and leave. The longer the aging, the tastier the drink.

Cooking recipes

How to make mead at home?

1. Pour 2 liters of water into an enamel pot. Add 400 g of natural honey.
2. Put the contents on the stove, cook for 5 minutes over low heat, stirring constantly and skimming.
3. Add nutmeg and ground cinnamon (on the tip of a knife), hop cones (5 g).
4. Dissolve 5 g of yeast in 100 ml of water. Insist 1 hour.
5. Add the leavening yeast to the sweet water.
6. Prepare the odor trap, let the drink ferment.
7. Mead is considered ready if the match does not go out after being brought to the container. This indicates that the fermentation process is complete. Otherwise, you still need to wait.

Recipe number 1 "Old spicy mead"

Ingredients:

• water - 2 l;
• honey - 800 g;
• spices (ginger, pepper, cardamom, cinnamon) - 20 g;
• yeast - 30g;
• rye dough.

Cooking principle:

• bring water with honey to a boil, add spices;
• cool the drink;
• add rye dough, leave in a warm place for 12 hours to ferment;
• pour into bottles, which are placed in a cool place for ripening.

After six months, the drink is ready to drink. The fermentation process in the recipe is started with rye dough. As a result, the mead is aromatic due to the added spices, weak and sweet.

Recipe No. 2 "Fast Classic Mead"

Ingredients:

• raisins - 200 g;
• lemon - 3 pcs;
• yeast - 25 g;
• water - 1.5 l;
• flour - 15 g;
• honey - 500 g.

Cooking method:

1. Rinse the lemon, chop it, put it in an enamel pan, pour boiling water over it, stir and cool.
2. Add the rest of the ingredients to the resulting mass, insist in warmth for three days.

Recipe number 3 "Hot mead"

Prepare the drink as usual. A distinctive feature of hot mead is the sharp, rich taste and aroma that pepper gives. In addition, coriander, oregano, basil, ginger, St. John's wort and nutmeg are added to the wort before fermentation.

To prepare an intoxicating cocktail, you will need 10 liters of water and 4 kg of honey. To start the fermentation process, a little yeast is added to the mixture, the container is not closed. Leave the leaven in a warm place for 5 days, then put it in the refrigerator or cellar for 1 month.

Recipe number 4 "Mead without yeast"

This method of making a pleasure drink is long-term, it takes up to 4 months. Instead of yeast, dried grapes (raisins) or cherries, raspberries are used. The output is practically alcohol-free mead with characteristic fruity notes.

Ingredients:

• cold water - 1l;
• cherry berries (pitted) - 4 kg;
• honey - 2 kg.

Cooking technology:

1. Dissolve honey in cold water.
2. Add cherries to the solution.
3. Tie the saucepan with the mixture with gauze, put in a warm place until signs of fermentation appear.
4. Filter out.
5. Pour into glass bottles, close.
6. Place the mead in a cool place for 4 months to ripen.
7. Conduct a tasting. The finished drink should taste like kvass - it should be slightly carbonated, with a slight sourness. Alcohol shouldn't be felt.

Cooking rules

Choose the right honey

To get a high-quality, tasty and aromatic drink, the product must be natural. For the production of mead, preference is given to buckwheat or linden honey. It can be candied or liquid (in spring). In any case, the main thing is not to purchase a surrogate - sugar syrup, since mead will not work from this product.

Pre-dissolve honey in water

The liquid is poured into an enamel pan, boiled. Then honey is gradually added. At the moment, you need to intensively stir the water with a spoon, otherwise the risk increases that the product will stick to the bottom and burn. In the process of cooking, remove the white foam from the surface. Stir regularly, make sure that the honey does not burn.

Add spices after skimming

To obtain an original taste, cinnamon, nutmeg, hops are added to sweet water, then the pan is removed from the heat.

Prepare for the fermentation reaction

Cool the mixture to 35 degrees, add yeast. If you add them to hot water, they will deteriorate, and fermentation will not occur. Then the container with honey wort is left in a room with room temperature (25 degrees). Gauze will help protect against flies. In no case should the pan be hermetically closed, since the yeast needs oxygen to reproduce. After fermentation (after 2 days), replace the foam. When it appears, the solution will begin to pour into a special can.

Fermentation process

The duration of this stage reaches 1 week. The absence of hiss and bubbles coming out with the help of a water seal indicates that the leaven is ready.

Spill and filtration

Pour the drink carefully into the storage container. No sediment should get into it! Then the mead is filtered. Glass bottles, which are tightly closed and placed in a cold place, are best suited. Insist for at least a month.

Note:

1. Melon, fried sausages, pears, bananas, sauerkraut, lemon, cheese and porcini mushroom dishes are suitable as an appetizer for mead.
2. Don't just drink the prepared drink. The taste of fresh mead is not perfect and will not bring pleasure. Leave it to ripen. After a while (1-4 months, depending on the recipe), it will acquire a rich, pleasant aroma and taste, it will become no worse than a noble wine.
3. Mead is drunk both cool and slightly warmed up.
4. It is recommended to store the drink in glass bottles or oak barrels at a temperature of 5-10 degrees above zero. For example, in the basement, cellar, refrigerator. The main condition is that the container with mead should not be exposed to freezing, contact with sunlight or metal. Subject to these conditions, an alcoholic drink can be drinkable without loss of quality within 2-3 years.
5. In the process of making mead, you cannot improvise, strictly follow the recipe.
6. To increase the alcohol percentage, add alcohol, vodka, or high-quality moonshine to your homemade mead without other flavors. This is done before corking the drink into bottles (at the last stage). At the same time, it is important to correctly calculate the degree of the resulting honey cocktail, so as not to overdo it.

Output

Mead is an alcoholic cocktail made from water, honey, yeast, various flavors. Has pronounced anti-inflammatory, antibacterial, antiseptic, cleansing, antiallergic, tonic, stimulating, immunostimulating properties.

With moderate use of mead (up to 100 ml per day), the state of the nervous system improves. The mood rises, the person becomes calm, the signs of depression disappear. In addition, the drink saturates the body with useful nutrients, which leaves an imprint on the condition of the dermis, hair and nails. The skin of the face becomes even, age spots, oily sheen disappear. Hair increases in volume, begins to grow faster. Nails stop flaking, crumbling, becoming stronger.

To taste the honey drink and get the most out of it, drink it in small sips (chilled in summer and slightly warmed up in winter). The classic snack of an alcoholic drink is sour, sauerkraut, apples, soaked mountain ash, lemon, fried sausages, cheese.

Despite the beneficial properties, the intoxicating cocktail has age restrictions and is contraindicated for children, pregnant and lactating women, people with diseases of the digestive system.

Along with the flourishing of beekeeping in Russia, people began to learn how to make mead. This drink is very old. He changed the recipe and cooking technology many times. Some ingredients disappeared, and new ones took their place, and only two components remained unchanged - water and honey.

Previously, the drink was low-alcoholic, since it was created only to give vigor and freshness - they did not intoxicate themselves. But lovers of strong drinks found a way out: to add alcohol to the finished mead. The result was over 70% vol. However, such recipes will not be considered in this article.

Homemade mead without yeast

Attention! This method is a modern analogue of how this drink was prepared in Russia, so it is suitable only for patient people.

Ingredients:

• distilled water - 1000 ml;
• heather honey (necessarily natural) - 350 g;
• raisins - 500 g.

Cooking process:

1. Pour water into a saucepan, place on high heat and simmer for two minutes.
2. Reduce the heating of the container, add honey to the liquid. Stir vigorously until smooth.
3. Remove from heat.
4. Pour the raisins into a container for the fermentation of the future mead - it will replace the yeast. Pour the contents of the pan (it is important that it does not cool down).
5. A water seal is not needed, it is enough to close the neck of the container with a gauze bandage.
6. Take the container to a warm place (you can put it near the battery, but not too close).
7. The drink wanders for two days. Then the mixture must be passed through a cotton filter to avoid sediment and bottled for further storage.
8. Place the containers with mead in the refrigerator for three months. You shouldn't try the drink before - the taste will be extremely unpleasant.

Homemade mead recipe with spices

Proportions (components):

• linden honey - 1000 g;
• distilled water - 3000 ml;
• hops - 7 g;
• nutmeg - 5 g;
• fresh ginger - 11 g;
• dry wine yeast - 6 g.

How to do:

1. Prepare the base - I'm full. To do this, melt the honey in a steam bath and add to slightly warmed water (up to about 30 degrees). Stir the ingredients thoroughly.
2. Use a spoon to measure the level of the liquid in the container and place over low heat. Wait until it boils, periodically shaking the contents of the container to avoid burning the honey.
3. It is imperative to remove the foam that forms on the surface until it ceases to appear on its own. The higher quality raw materials were used, the less scale will be released.
4. After an hour, pour in the spices. For convenience (so as not to catch the spices from the liquid at the end of cooking), pour the seasoning into a gauze napkin, wrap it up and throw the resulting bag into the water.
5. Measure the amount of liquid after boiling and add more water to the level that was fixed at the beginning of the preparation of the drink. Keep on low heat for 35 minutes.
6. Remove the feed from the stove, leave to cool at room temperature up to 30 degrees.
7. Scoop up a glass of future mead, dilute wine yeast in it. They are more suitable for creating homemade alcoholic beverages - this way the mash turns out to be of better quality.
8. Pour the liquid into bottles, add the yeast diluted in feed. Install a water seal on the container and take the container to a warm place.
9. When the fermentation process is over (about 14-30 days), the mead should be passed through a cotton filter to get rid of the turbidity and sediment.
10. The drink is ready. If necessary, its sweetness is adjusted by adding fructose. Its amount is calculated based on the taste preferences of the taster.

How to make honeycomb mead?

The cooking process for this recipe is very simple, but it also requires a long aging of the finished product. Not suitable for "special cases", because if the result is unsuccessful, it will be a pity for the time spent.

Would need:

• honeycomb - 0.5 kg;
• bee bee - 0.3 kg;
• spring water (distilled or melted) - 2050 ml.

How to do:

1. Prepare a clean container for storing the drink during fermentation. Pour distilled water into it. It is better to use just such (or key), because without a boiling procedure, the melt liquid collected in the city is not a very pure product.
2. Place honeycombs and bee bread in the same container, mix thoroughly until the maximum possible homogeneous consistency is obtained.
3. Due to the difficulties associated with boiling the wax, the ingredients are not heat-treated. When heated, they begin to stick to a warm surface, which can easily lead to the loss of dishes. Therefore, immediately after stirring, the bottle is equipped with a water seal and carried away to ferment in a suitable room.
4. The recipe does not include the use of yeast, so the process will take at least 1.5 months. It is recommended to stir the liquid periodically.
5. At the end of fermentation, pass the mead through two filters made of three- and two-layer gauze: to remove wax and cloudy sediment. Pieces of honeycomb, however, will quickly clog it, so it is more logical to use cotton wool.
6. Pour the strained drink into glass bottles. Close them hermetically and transfer to a dark, cool place. A cellar or basement is ideal, but a refrigerator and a balcony are not the best storage options, since light on the mead will spoil its taste.
7. The product is ready after about 4 months of aging. If done correctly, the drink will be light and refreshing.

The mead is too sweet - what to do?

Making such a drink at home is a painstaking business and not everyone can handle. From the first time, only a few can accomplish this task with dignity. Even adherence to the recipe is not a guarantee of good taste, because the criteria for evaluating alcohol are always different. And it’s not surprising if, in the end, the homemade mead didn’t live up to expectations.

The drink is often bitter, sour, or cloying. The latter is the last thing people complain about, since too much sugar gives such an effect. That is, the next time you prepare honey, you will need to put a little less.

In addition, homemade alcohol ferments less well if the sugar concentration is too high. Therefore, overdoing it with the main ingredient is definitely not worth it, especially since nothing can be done with the ready-made mead. Is that diluted with another drink or even distilled into moonshine.

What if the drink tastes bitter?

This kind of trouble happens in two situations:

• a recipe with a high hop content in the ingredients was taken as a basis;
• the drink was fermented, as a result of which the percentage of strength increased.

Fortunately, this problem is solvable. It is enough to add honey, diluted with water (calculate the amount to taste). But it is important not to forget that this substance is first boiled for half an hour and only then poured into homemade alcohol, leaving it to ripen.

Why is mead sour?

It is not the recipe that is to blame for such a mistake, but the negligence of the person who took up the preparation. At the same time, there can be a lot of shortcomings:

• leaky container;
• too fast fermentation;
• inconsistent addition of ingredients;
• insufficient cooking time;
• using unsuitable yeast.

To properly make mead at home, you should get a water seal, take only high-quality components and spare your time.

Having learned how to prepare this drink, you can start creating your own recipe. But for the best result, it will still be nice to adhere to some recommendations:

1. Choosing honey. Aromatic varieties should be preferred: heather, linden, acacia or buckwheat. For those who are poorly versed in raw materials, it is advisable to buy it from autumn to spring (November-April). This will significantly reduce the chances of running into an unsuccessful fake.
2. Spice. Nothing will raise the taste of the drink as much as they do. Here you can give yourself almost complete freedom of choice. Thyme, cinnamon, peppermint, coriander - everything your heart desires! It is allowed to add them to mead in any proportions and combinations, the main thing is to like the taste and aroma of the finished alcohol. In short, experimentation is encouraged.
3. Water. It is not worth taking liquid from the tap. Where key is better, or at least distilled.
4. Yeast. They should be bought specifically for mead (available in online stores) or replaced with other products altogether. For example, fresh berries or raisins.
5. The purity of the liquid. A home-made drink often turns out to be cloudy, which spoils the aesthetic component. To get rid of unpleasant sediment, alcohol is decanted through a cotton filter.
6. Water seal. You cannot do without it when creating a fermentation product, otherwise the container will simply explode. If you do not want to spend money, you can use homemade designs. For example, wrap a medical glove with tape around the neck of a bottle or tightly insert a thin rubber tube into the cap, the free end of which should be placed in a container with water. Or, as a last resort, keep alcohol in a saucepan.

In general, this is almost everything you need to know about cooking - the rest is covered in the recipes. But in addition, it should be reminded of the dangers of frequent use of boiled honey. Some people believe that this contributes to the secretion of carcinogens that damage the liver. Therefore, the raw materials are either heated to 50 degrees, after which they are removed from the fire, or the dose of daily consumption is reduced.