Daniel S. McConnell and Kenneth D. Schramm*
Technical Director,
G.W.Kent and President, The Yeast Culture Kit Company
*Director, The Mazer Cup Mead Competition
From the bonny bells of heather,
They brewed a drink long-syne,
Was sweeter far than honey,
Was stronger far than wine.
They brewed it and they drank it,
And lay in blessed swound
For days and days together
In their dwellings underground.
R.L. Stevenson
Heather Ale
For the purposes of brevity, when we discuss the values of honey, those values are based on averages determined in an analysis of 490 samples of honey conducted by the Honey Investigations Unit of the Plant Products Laboratory of the U.S.D.A. This information was collected and published by Dr. Jonathan W. White[1,2], who was the chief of the Plant Products Lab, and to whom we owe credit for most of the information here. Certain floral varieties of honey may differ markedly from these averages, and we will make an effort to note when those differences should have noticeably good or bad effects on your mead making efforts.
The vast majority of beekeepers fall into the hobbyist/part time beekeeper category, with fewer than 25 hives. These apiarists account for 50% of the colonies in the country, and about 40% of domestic production. The average colony produces just under 70 pounds of honey per year. An estimated 3.2 million colonies produced roughly 250 million pounds of honey with a value of about $124 million.[3] Others, and probably more important when one wishes to obtain a single source honey, are professional pollenators. These are individuals who provide a valuable service to fruit growers by bringing their bees which pollinate their trees and plants. A by-product of this pollenation is a single source honey.
Honey is quality graded into four classes which are based on a combination of flavor, clarity, absence of defects and moisture content. For our purposes, we would recommend using only Grade A (Fancy) or Grade B (Choice). This will be expanded on this later.
Honey is color graded into seven categories by the U.S.D.A., and these do not have any bearing on quality. Honey should not be judged on the basis of color, as some of the most distinctively and strongly flavored honeys, such as basswood, are very light, while very mild and pleasant honeys such as tulip poplar can be quite dark. Honey color is based on the Pfund Scale in millimeters; the common names for the range of standards from lightest to darkest are: Water White, Extra White, White, Amber, Amber, and Dark Amber. Honey has an average specific gravity of 1.41, which gives it a weight of about 11 pounds, l2 ounces to the gallon. Although the sugars in honey have more sweetening power, due to moisture content, honey matches the sweetening power of sucrose (table sugar) pound for pound.
The reason that the moisture content of honey is important is that all unpasteurized honey contains wild yeasts. Due to the high sugar concentration, these yeasts will pose little risk in low moisture honey because osmosis will draw sufficient water from the yeast to force them into dormancy. In honey that has a higher proportion of water, the yeast may survive and cause fermentation to begin in storage.
Table 1. Average Sugar content of Honey
Levulose (d-fructose)3 8.2% Dextrose (d-glucose)e 31.3% Sucrose (table sugar) 1.3% Maltose (& other disaccharide) 7.3% Other higher sugars 1.5%
The "other higher sugars" which have been identified in honey are considered to be the by-products of enzymatic activity. Since enzymatic activity begins at collection and continues from the sealing of the comb through the extraction and storage process, these sugars will inevitably be present to some degree. They include erlose, kojibiose, maltotriose, isomaltose and a host of others. Virtually all of the sugars found in honey are fermentable.
The primary acid in honey is gluconic acid, and acids account for 0.57% of honey. Other acids include citric, malic, succinic, formic, acetic, butyric, lactic, pyroglutanic, and various amino acids. Acid content and variety in honey is very important to its flavor profile.
Additionally, the range of mineral content is equally wide. While there are exceptions to the rule, the higher mineral contents are paired with darker color and higher pH readings. The mineral content may actually provide valuable nutrients for the yeast during its activity. In general darker honey has been described as being stronger in flavor, and this may be the result of that higher mineral content. Sulfur, for example has been shown to exceed aroma thresholds in dark honey. To further compound the situation, sodium (a flavor enhancer) has been shown to reach 400 ppm in the darker honeys, and to be greater than 4-fold higher than that of lighter honey. The averages for potassium are more than 8-fold higher in dark honey than in light.
Other potentially influential flavor components would include the acids and their ratios, tannins, and glycoside or alkaloid compounds contributed to the mix by the floral source. Another known and recognized flavor contributor is 5- hydroxymethylfurfural, or HMF. It is a by-product of the decomposition of sugars in the presence of acids. and is a detrimental to honey flavor at higher concentrations. HMF should be below 40 ppm.
The information on aroma substances is far more complex . It leans toward the phenyl alcohols and carbonyls. ten Hoopen[9] isolated dinitropenylhydrazones by chromatography, including formaldehyde, acetaldehyde, acetone, isobutyraldehyde and diacetyl. Cremer and Riedmann[10] identified phenylethyl alcohol, propionaldehyde and acetone, and later n-pentanol, benzyl alcohol and 3-methyl-1-butanol. These compounds were present in all of the honeys which they found to be organoleptically recognizable as honey. Phenylethyl alcohol oxidizes down to phenylacetic acid, and nearly all phenylacetic esters have been described as having a honey taste and odor.
Other aroma constituents identified include the carbonyls butyraldehyde, Isovaleraldehyde, methacrolein, and methyl ethyl ketone. Alcohols include isopropanol, 2-butanol, ethanol and beta methylallyl alcohol. Esters identified were methyl and ethyl formate.
The compounds dominating the list are phenolic in nature, and could account for some of the phenolic character attributed to meads, particularly young meads. Most of these compounds have boiling points below 180 F, and would be subject to rapid blow-off during boiling. It would also stand to reason that the character which these compounds create would also be bound to the colloidal substances held in suspension in unheated and unfiltered honey.
Total acids are expressed as millequivalent/kilogram; it reflects amount of cationic charge produced by the acids in the solution. The average for the 490 samples was 29.12; we have weighted our assessment of each honey's acidity against that value.
Table 2. Honey constituents by variety expressed as a percentage
Citrus Clover Fireweed Mesquite Rasp. Sage
T.Pop Tupelo
Moisture 16.5 17.7 16.0 15.5 17.4
16.0 17.6 18.2
Levulose 30.9 37.9 39. 3 40.4 34. 5
40.4 34.6 43.3
Dextrose 32.0 31.0 30.7 36.9 28.5
20.2 25.9 26.0
Sucrose 2.8 1.4 1.3 0.95 0.5 1.1 0.7 1.2
Maltose 7.2 7.7 7.1 5.4 5.7 7.4 11.6 0.0
High.Sug. 1.4 1.4 2.1 0.35 3.6 2.4 3.0 1.1
pH 3.84 3.77 3.03 4.20 4.04 3.51 4.45 3.87
Total acid 30.34 26.53 26.77 16.33
39.19 29.10 42.99 36.59
Ash 0.073 0.071 0.108 0.129 0.471 0.108
0.460 0.128
Nitrogen 0.014 0.039 0.032 0.012 0.076
0.037 0.076 0.046
Beyond that, however, there are other methods of securing fresh varietal honey in bulk at reasonable prices. Farmers' markets generally have at least one quality honey provider; Detroit's Eastern Market has four. If you develop a relationship with a packager, he will frequently be more than happy to keep you up-to-date on what is fresh, and which honeys are particularly attractive at which time of the year. Many beekeepers will have a first extraction of water white premium honey during the spring, and we have found this to be an excellent source of brewing stock.
Local suppliers are unlikely to provide a full range of floral varieties, and for that you will need to contact a good packer.
The National Honey Board has a Honey Suppliers Directory which provides tremendous information. Good bulk suppliers would be the Bees Knees Honey Factory in Portland, Oregon or the Glorybee Sweetener Company in Eugene; Dutch Gold Honey in Lancaster, Pennsylvania; Sandt's Honey in Easton, Pennsylvania; McClure's Honey and Maple products in Littleton, New Hampshire; Highs Hill Honey in Crossville, Tennessee, and Drapers Super Bee Apiaries in Middleton Pennsylvania. We are sure there are others, but all of these companies list good selections of varietal honey.
We also suggest you check out the WORLD HONEY JAR, which is the American Head Association's publication on high quality varietal honey sources. The A.M.A. is reachable at PO. Box 17511, Boulder, CO 80308.
From the time the honey is produced by the bee, its constitution is in a constant state of change. Invertase is continually working on the sucrose content to convert it to levulose. There is additional evidence to indicate that as much as 9% of the dextrose may be converted to more complex sugars, thus changing the balance of levulose to dextrose.[1] Additionally, gluconic acid is a primary by-product of the invertase conversion process, and other acids may be added to the blend as the result of additional enzymatic activity. Some honeys have an appreciable increase in acid content during storage. Diastase, due to its own instability, will tend to decrease in storage, and color in virtually all honey stored at room temperature will darken.
Perhaps the most hazardous of all storage problems is granulation or crystallization. Honey granulates by building up dextrose around a "crystal nucleus" of a dextrose crystal, dust particle or pollen grain, and will crystallize most rapidly when stored at temperatures between 50 F and 60 F, (the optimal temperature for initialization of crystallization is 41 F to 45 F). Crystallization is particularly hazardous to unpasteurized honey because the concentration of solids around the crystal creates a higher moisture content (above asthe critical 18 - 19% level) in the residual uncrystallized honey. This in turn promotes fermentation, resulting in alcohol and, in the presence of oxygen, the alcohol will break down to acetic acid and water. If crystallization is present, and a distinct separation of solids and liquids is apparent, your honey is at distinct risk of fermentation. The end result is honey which is sour and definitely not conducive to premium mead creation. The moral of the story is, don't buy your honey in August, put it in the basement at 55 degrees for months, and then haul it and brew with it when its old and crystallized. Unless it's there and the only option is tossing it.
All of these problems can be avoided through immediate use of fresh honey, or through proper storage of your honey. The ideal temperature for long term storage is 0 F or below, as honey kept at very low temperatures, even for prolonged periods, shows little or no degradation of flavor, color, aroma or its other physical properties. If freezing is not an option, short term storage between 61 F and 80 F is the best option, and storage above 80 F will cause particularly rapid deterioration of color, flavor and enzyme content.
On the other side of the debate is "super-heating," which is generally agreed to be effective if done to the 190 F range for 10 to 20 minutes. I have used this method with good results, however there is evidence to indicate that the wisdom regarding superheating may not be correct. Initially, I would state that the hygroscopicity, low pH and hydrogen peroxide content make honey a poor candidate for bacterial infection. Therefore the biggest danger of infection comes from the wild yeasts which are present in honey, especially that honey extracted from combs which spent a long period of time unsealed or stored in the hive, such as honey from the previous growing season. Yeast counts can range from 0.1/gram to 100,000/gram, making yeast control a major consideration.
The drawback of this process, by our subjective analysis, is that some and perhaps many of the distinctive and appealing honey characteristics are also removed. Granted these meads are smooth and pleasant in a very short period of time, but some of the character seems scrubbed out. True, Dr. Kime did win Best-of-Show in the First Mazer Cup, but the winner was a pyment of Vignoles grapes, which was very pleasant and vinous, but not dominated by honey character. This would lend credence to the argument that the colloidal content of the honey has dramatic and important effects on flavor and aroma. We believe that Dr. Kime's offerings certainly have commercial potential, but in much the same way that most commercial wines have established markets in the U.S.
All About Mead, Andrews,S.W.
Making Mead, Acton,B & Duncan,P.
Making Wines Like Those You Buy, Acton,B.
Zymurgy
American Mead Association
Mead Lovers Digest
The subtle nature of honey allows a great deal of latitude in additives designed to enhance the character and complexity of mead. We have experienced a great number of fruits, vegetables, herb and spices added to a basic mead with both overt and subtle results. Thus the addition of various materials leads to a subset categorical divisions. Show mead is defined as a beverage produced by the fermentation of honey alone. Nutrients and additive are allowed, but no additional spices, fruits or herbs. In traditional mead small amounts of fruits, spices and herbs are allowed, but they must never overpower the honey flavor and aroma. These additives are to play a supportive role at or below the taste threshold. Pyments, Cysers and Melomels are meads which include the addition of grapes, apples and other fruits respectively. Metheglin is a mead to which spices have been added. Hippocras refers to a spiced pyment, and finally Braggot is a concoction consisting of honey and malt sugars. Clearly there can be many subclasses of these categories, and therein lies the challenge in judging a mead competition. For instance, how and in what category should one judge a cherry braggot,or who determines the threshold levels of a spice?
The history of honey and the making of mead is a long and rich one, but unfortunately outside of the scope of this article. An excellent source by Gayre[14] has been recently published and is highly recommended reading.
Many authors have advocated boiling the must. While this technique does possess some distinct advantages as far as coagulation and subsequent protein removal is concerned, resulting in a more rapid clarification, there are valuable losses of aroma components that are driven off in the boil. A technique in which the must is briefly boiled, just long enough for the coagulated protein to be removed then rapidly chilled, offers a good compromise. This method is simple and straight forward and the authors continue to recommend it to beginning mead makers with good success.
The use of Sodium metabisulfite or Campden tablets offers the distinct advantages of no heating and thus no aroma volatilization. This method is also the most rapid in that the honey may be simply mixed with water and then sulfated. Yeast may be pitched the following day. Major disadvantages are that some people are sensitive to these compounds, proper adjustment of addition requires both an accurate scale and an accurate pH meter and these compounds tend to bleach fruit. Another disadvantage is that the proteins are not removed and the meads may require fining to clarify.
The pH of the must effects the amount of free SO2 present, thus must be taken into account. Table 2 shows the recommended levels of SO2 to treat white wine and these values may be directly substituted in a mead. Although these values represent the optimal levels of sulfite, the authors tend to err on the short side of the equation, adding at most 1 Campden tablet/gallon. Each Campden tablet contains 0.44 grams of sulfite, so for those that have an accurate balance the weight in grams of sodium or potassium metabisulfite may be calculated from the table.
Table 2. pH effect on sulfite additions[16]
pH of must ppm SO2 tablets/gallon 3.0 40 2/3 3.2 60 1 1/3 3.4 70 1 1/2 3.6 80 1 2/3 3.8 120 2 1/2Pasteurization is the method recommended by the authors. It is safer, more rapid and less equipment dependent than other methods and offers a compromise between sanitization and loss of aroma compounds. A disadvantage is that the proteins are not removed and the meads may require fining to clarify. For the experimental batches made in preparation for this article we simply brought the water to a boil and added the honey, allowing the temperature to settle at approximately 160F. In retrospect, this may have been somewhat higher than needed as data from White3 suggests that as little as 22 minutes at 140F is sufficient to kill wild yeasts.
The single most significant factor effecting the rate of mead fermentation is yeast health. This may be ensured by providing adequate nutrients in the form of yeast energizer and yeast nutrients well as careful monitoring of the pH throughout the fermentation. Most of the required nutrients are available in the commercial preparations, but other additional nutrients that may be helpful such as biotin, pyridoxine and peptone. Morse[17] found that the most rapid fermentations were achieved when a balanced salt, buffer and nutrient additive was used. They report fermentations to 12% alcohol in less then 2 weeks by using 6.75 g/L of formula 1 and 0.25 g/L of formula 2 as shown below on Table 3.
Table 3. Nutrient Mixtures for Mead Fermentations.
Formula 1 Formula 2
Component Weight/gr. Component Weight/mg
ammonium
sulfate 1.0 biotin 0.05
K3PO4 0.5 pyridoxine 1.0
MgCl2 0.2 mesoinositol 7.5
NaHSO4 0.05 Calcium
pantothenate 10.0
citric acid 2.53 thiamin 20.00
sodium citrate 2.47 peptone 100.0
ammonium
sulfate 861.45
The pH of honey is naturally low and since it is poorly
buffered, upon fermentation the pH
may drop to a point at which the yeast is unable to ferment
efficiently. The addition of a
basic buffer helps greatly by holding the pH to 3.7-4.0
throughout the course of the
fermentation. The authors have had success fermenting a mead
to completion in 2 weeks
simply by providing adequate nutrition (yeast energizer),
oxygen saturation of the cooled
must and the addition of calcium carbonate to hold the pH
above 3.7. Other salts that may
be used include potassium carbonate and potassium
carbonate.[18] Care must be exercised
because all of these salts can add a bitter/salty flavor if
overused and therefore minimum
use of these compounds is recommended.
Since meads generally start out with high sugar content (on the order of 20%) it is prudent to pitch a large volume of yeast, we recommend pitching the slurry from a starter prepared that is 10% of the volume of the main fermentation.
Here is an outline of the project:
# gal Honey Variety Yeast 1 5 Clover Yeast Lab M61-dry mead 2 5 Clover Yeast Lab M62-sweet mead 3 5 Clover Yeast Culture Kit Co.-Riesling 4 5 Clover Yeast Culture Kit Co.-Epernay 5 5 Clover Yeast Culture Kit Co.-Prisse de Mousse 6 5 Clover Yeast Culture Kit Co.-Tokay 7 5 Wildflower Yeast Lab M61-dry mead 8 7.5 Fireweed Yeast Lab M61-dry mead 9 5 Orange blossom Yeast Lab M61-dry mead 10 5 Snowberry Yeast Lab M61-dry mead 11 5 Wild Raspberry Yeast Lab M61-dry mead 12 5 Starthistle Yeast Lab M61-dry mead 13 7.5 Blended Yeast Lab M61-dry meadWe used four 15.5 gal stainless steel kettles equipped with either propane or natural gas burners. Crystallized honey proved to be difficult to work with on the 60 lb scale. The only other minor problem aside from slight confusion during visitation by neighbors (what ARE you doing?), friends (so what is the OG, TG, TOH, style of beer, of this batch?), daughters (Daddy PLAY with me), wives (explicative deleted) and occasional hungry hornets (Yikes), was a live ant that was fished out of the cooled honey must. After a short dinner break at 8PM (we barbecued chicken at the same time), we had everything washed by 9PM. All carboys were carried down into the basement and the yeast cultures pitched at 9:30. Arranging and re-arranging the carboys on the floor so they sat on an insulation of Styrofoam, produced a pleasing array of hues that ranged from almost water-white (starthistle) to amber (wild flower). After pausing to ponder and admire the magnitude of our work, we parted, very tired but very satisfied.
Fermentations were all active within 12 hours and were allowed to proceed at ambient temperatures until the following Spring. The ambient temperature ranged from 50 to 70F depending on the season and was complete by the end of the summer. We made no attempt to achieve a rapid fermentation in this experiment. Two of the batches spontaneously cleared at 7 months: those clover meads fermented with Eperney and Prisse de Mousse yeast. All were treated with Bentonite and racked to secondary the following winter. No further clarification was seen, therefore Sparkeloid was added to all of the carboys. Absolute clarity was observed within 4 days in all batches.
The individual batches were racked to a kegs, blanketed with CO2 and allowed to condition at cellar temperatures. We have done some taste tests on the finished meads and will share the analysis and the meads at the 1994 AHA National Conference.