Applenoon Delight: The Journey Begins

In my previous post, I have mentioned that I have not brewed anything in about 3 years. However, of everything that I have brewed, I am the most proud of this mead, which I named Applenoon Delight. It is a Cyser mead. By the way, I was watching Arrested Development, where a particular episode inspired the name of this mead. Anyway, let's start off with the ingredients, and my beginning processes.

Ingredients:
Red Delicious Apples
Golden Apples
Fuji Apples
I only had enough apples to make 1 1/2 gallons of juice.
4 gallons of fresh pressed apple juice (store bought, but not made from concentrate)
9 pounds of Orange Blossom Honey
WLP 775 English Cider Yeast
Yeast Nutrients
Yeast Energizer
Light Dry Malt Extract (DME)

About 2 days before the main event, I create a starter yeast. I follow Ken Schramm's directions on this. Boil 6 cups of water with 1/4 teaspoon yeast energizer and yeast nutrient, and 1 tablespoon of DME for 5 minutes. Afterward, I add about 1/2 cup of honey. I always use the same style of honey so the yeast can acclimate better to the process. Quick chemistry lesson: yeast converts glucose (a sugar) into carbon dixoide and ethanol (alcohol). Honey, unlike beer does not have enough nutrients for yeast to florish as well, so nutrients are a big part of meadcrafting.

The yeast nutrient that I use contains food grade urea and ammonium phosphate. The yeast energizer contains diammonium phosphate (DAP), yeast hulls (Biotin), magnesium sulphate, and vitamin B comlex. I will discuss a little more on the nutrients later when I talk about the fermentation.

Before I began my process, everything is cleaned and sanitized. My girlfriend told me that she wished I cleaned everything as well as I do my brewing equipment. I responded that if everything provided such a delectable drink I would clean better. I think she won that argument. I clean with 5 Star PBW powder, and finish with iodine to sanitize. I'm pretty anal about this because I create a no heat must. A new word, cheers. Must is the concoction of honey and water before pitching the yeast and fermentation starts. In beer brewing this is referred to as the wort (pronounced wert).The yeast essentially eats the must to create mead. Who knew you would learn so much in one sitting? I'm sure you are retaining every piece of morsel-knowledge that I am providing.

I did not weigh the amount of apples I picked up. I knew I would not have enough to create the whole batch, but wanted some fresh pressed apples. You can see the number of apples I cut up at the top because I do not have an apple presser; rather, I used a juicer, which failed in the ability to "juice" a large number of apples. I tend to stay away from concentrate juice not because you can't use them, but it is a preference on my part. The fresher the better. One day, I hope to have an apple presser and create 5 gallons of all fresh apple juice.

I did create 5 1/2 gallons of juice before I added the honey. I have 60 lbs of Orange Blossom Honey, which you can see next to the carboy. I went all glass when I was a strictly brewing beer.

The main reason is that my buckets were ruined during one of the hurricanes of 2005. However, I wish that I had a bucket on this day because I made a "whoops." First, I used 9 lbs of honey, and poured it in through a cleaned/sanitized funnel. I do not create a hot must, which is where you heat water and add the honey to ensure to mix it together because I believe you cook away some of the honey flavor and aroma. Others believe that helping to rid of foreign or bad bacteria supersedes full integrity of the honey. I have never had a contaminated mead, so I'm sticking with anal retentive cleaning and no-heat must. Also, you have to cool down the mead, which has the possibility of becoming contaminated. Did I mention that the creation of the must and the first few days of fermentation are the most vulnerable? Well, now you know. Why is it the most vulnerable? The yeast has not created the alcohol yet to fight off bad bacteria.

Anyway, the reason that I wish I had a bucket is because of the picture below.
I forgot that the reason buckets are good for no-heat must is because I can use a cleaned/sanitized spoon to stir the water (or in this case apple juice) together with the honey. I tried as best I could to mix it but found it too difficult. You can clearly see the majority of the honey sitting at the bottom. Another mistake was that I forgot to take a reading on the OG before adding the yeast with my hydrometer. OG stands for original gravity before yeast is added to the must. The hydrometer tells me how much sugar is dissolved in the solution. Needless to say, but I have a need to say it, my reading wouldn't have been as accurate because of that bottom feeding of honey. This seems like a good place to stop for now. So we have our must ready for the roaring colony of yeast ready to take that sugar and make alcohol out of it.