I like your approach here. It is methodical and offers some better alternatives to chemical adjustments. Great stuff Frederick! Thanks for taking the time to explain it so thoroughly...
Charles
Hi Pp
Just saw this one. Only grapes contain Tartaric acid. So, unless the maker intentionally adds it to an otherwise non-tartaric wine, it is not a consideration at all. Most all acids can be reduced chemically using carbonates. But (big but)........Chemical reactions take time. Some are fast and some are slow(er). Tartaric happens to react faster than the other common acids found in wine. In doing so it tends to "use up" the available carbonates before the other (slower) reactions have a chance to take place. And, in an inclosed environment, when the carbonates are gone, there is non left to react with the other acids. Thus the "preference for tartaric" statements that we hear.
Not a very technical explaination, but one that a layman might understand. HTH
Your observation is right, Joe. Acid tests do not work on meads. Honey is a great buffer which hides the response to our acid tests and corrections. This is one of the main differences in making mead. You cannot adjust acid until after it is made and then you do it with your tounge. It is a tough job but someone has to do it.
Ray
I'll second that. I have made two meads (melomels) in the last year and the pH is about
3.2 but it sure does not taste that acidic.
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I'll bet that is why mead keeps forever. No one thinks Grolsh bottles are good for long therm storage but my first mead was bottled in 4 of those. We just had the last one, it was close to 10 years old. It did not suffer, it was great.
Joe
Hi Joe
OT - Sorry folks. Saw this mentioned in a TV movie (of all places). They gave it as one part sugar disolved in 3 parts alcohol and poured over lemon zest. When the flavor was judged to be right it was strained and bottled. Seems to me that straight alcohol would make an awful "hot" drink. Since cheap vodka is about 60% water, your method sounds a lot more "user friendly" !!
When I was young (and dumb) we used to make a lot of flavored vodkas using everything from snow cone syrups to "fizzies" (remember those ??). The fizzies were gawd awful but some of the snow cone syrups worked pretty well. Long story short, the use of snow cone (type) syrups carried over into my winemaking. Mostly as a way to "dress up" wines that had turned out to be less than wonderful. Just no end to the things that can be done in this hobby !! ;o)
I sometimes wonder if the high priced "flavorings" they sell in hobby shops are nothing more than repackaged snow cone syrups..........
Regards,
Frederick
I feel for you Joe-
The first batch of mead I lowered my pH to 3.8 with Tartaric acid- and it dropped like a rock. The second one I lowered it to 4.5... and it STILL dropped to under 3.0. The third was to 5.6, and finally the last was to 6.5. I started taking pH measurements 2x a day to watch the acid drop- can't remember if I correlated it with SG or not, but (without my data) I remember that, regardless, the >5.0 ph starts all came to align around 3.4- where the yeast really wanted to be.
So I don't mess with pH at all anymore, except to give it just a little bit of acid in the beginning. I figure it'll all crystallize out of the bottle anyway.
Jason
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