Prickly Mead

"What has Jayme been up to with his various fermentable projects?" one may ask. Well, I may tell one. I just bottled up the last of my prickly pear mead, that which has been aging in the 2.5 gallon fermentation vessel for what seems like forever. That long wait wasn't intentional--I bottled up the other portion of this batch, which had been in the 1.5 gallon vessel six week or so back. But I didn't have enough bottles to finish up, hence the delay. Here's what the finished product looks like (note that I didn't trot out all of the bottles. Like I have that much time):



I'm happy that the mead came out very clear. I'm puzzled by the rich amber color, though. The must had started out a beautiful dark rose color, due to the deep maroon prickly pear fruit I used. Oddly, the color lightened as it aged, which I didn't expect. I'd intended to oak the must, but never got around to it. I tried to get a good acid balance, since I'd used a lot of honey here and the potential for sweetness was strong. I also added some tannins to give it more complexity, but I have to admit I chose to err on the light side, since heavy tannin content is a turn off for me in wine and I wasn't sure how my experimentation would turn out.

Once the dozen or so bottles were safely corked, I opened up one half-bottle from the earlier bottling six weeks earlier that I'd placed in the fridge to chill. Mead can be horribly wretched to drink when it hasn't aged, and describing the taste as harsh and medicinal wouldn't be inaccurate. So I prepared for the worst--the only reason I was opening this one is because the oxygen in the bottle left it unsuitable for long-term storage. I was pleasantly surprised. Yes, it's still got that rough edge I expected, but that bite was muted. There was not much residual sweetness at all. This wine wasn't dry, but it wasn't sugary. Semi-dry is the official term, I suppose, but the sweetness was almost neutral. The acid balance was almost perfect, and although I couldn't actually taste any of the tannins I'd added, I could tell there was more depth to the flavor than in the previous meads I'd attempted. This makes me happy. It reminded me more than anything else of a decent, not-too-sweet riesling (although the alcohol content is much higher). One big surprise was the aftertaste--I couldn't taste any of the fruit initially, but a light, refreshing flavor lingered quite a while after swallowing. It was fruity, but hard-to-place and almost delicate, which makes sense since prickly pear fruit isn't a flavor that immediately comes to mind, even to someone like me who's had it before. A year from now, this has the potential to be some Very Good Stuff indeed.

I still have a gallon of mint and a gallon of jalapeno mead aging in glass carboys. I've racked them a couple of times, but neither has cleared to my satisfaction, so I'll be employing clarifying agents soon. But those two were just experiments--the prickly pear mead was my big project, and it appears (knock wood) to be a success.

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