Complete Mead Making Starter Package - To Make 5 Litres / 6 Bottles

Use this Mead Making Starter Package to make your own mead at home from honey, fruit, herbs, flowers, grapes and more.

This kit contains the main equipment, yeast and nutrients to make fantastic mead at home.  Once used, clean and it's ready to be used again.  Well kept, this kit can be used to make mead many many times and will be the start of a new hobby.

Use this kit to make plain mead, or try elderflower mead, blackberry mead, banana mead, blackcurrant, redcurrant, raspberry, sloe, haw, rosehip, parsnip, tea, plum, peach or elderberry mead, the possibilities are endless.

In the Complete Mead Making Starter Package kit...

10L fermenting bucket

5L Demi-John

Siphon

Hydrometer & Trial Jar

Thermometer

Muslin Bags

All Purpose Mead Yeast

Yeast Nutrient

Pectolase

Campden Tablets

Bubbler Airlock

What you need to add (which you probably have at home)...

Jug for measuring

Spoon for stirring

Honey

Fruits, herbs, flowers

6 Empty Wine Bottles

Basic Instructions and Recipe for Making Mead at home...

Mead Recipe

Mead is very easy to make and you can use pretty much any wine recipe and substitute the sugar for honey.

You can find lots of recipe ideas on our website https://www.brewbitz.com/pages/home-brew-recipes

You can also find recipes on our YouTube Channel www.youtube.com/brewbitz

There are enough ingredients supplied to make 2 batches. Read the labels on the packets for their instructions.

Due to the high sugars in some fruit, this can produce a mead up to 17% ABV, so you may wish to use the lower amount of honey to get a lower abv.

Ingredients

1kg-1.5kg Ripe Fruit

1.5kg-1.85kg honey

8 Pints Boiling Water

Campden Tablet

Pectic Enzyme

Yeast Nutrient

Mead Yeast

Fermentation Stopper

Finings

You will also need basic brewing equipment:

Brewing Bucket

Demi-John with Air-Lock

Siphon

Muslin / Straining Bag

Steriliser

Hydrometer

Thermometer

Bottles

Method for making mead:

Prepare the bucket by stretching the muslin bag over the bucket.

Clean the fruit & and put in muslin bag in the bucket. If you fruit has stones (like cherries & plums) remove the stones.

Squish the fruit with your hands or a potato masher.

Tie up the muslin bag with a knot, so the fruit is enclosed in the bag.

Pour on the boiling water.

Pour in the honey and stir until all the honey is dissolved.

Leave to cool to 20°C

Add the pectic enzyme and 1 crushed campden tablet and stir.

Pop the lid on, put the airlock in the lid and fill ½ way up the first bubble with water. Now leave for 24 hours at 20°C

Take a sample of the juice in the trial jar and with the hydrometer take a Specific Gravity reading and keep the reading safe.

Add the yeast nutrient & yeast and stir.

Pop the lid on, with the airlock, and ferment for 7 days. Do not lift the lid.

After 7 days have passed, remove the lid. Lift the muslin bag of fruit and gently massage it to extract as much juice from the fruit in the bag.

Using the syphon, syphon the mead from the bucket into the demi-john, trying to avoid sucking up the sediment at the bottom of the bucket.

Fit the airlock, again with water ½ way up the first bubble.

Leave for 2 more weeks at 20°C to finish fermenting.

Check the mead with a hydrometer to make sure the specific gravity is below 1.000 (ideally 0.996). If not leave for another couple of weeks.

Syphon the mead off the sediment into the cleaned bucket.

Clean out the demi-john, then syphon the mead from the bucket back into the demi-john. Put the airlock in.

Swirl the mead for 1 minute. This will knock out any CO2 dissolved in the mead. You are not trying to mix air in, so make sure you do not create a vortex or splash the mead. The gas should escape through the airlock.

Swirl the mead around again for 3 more times leaving 5 mins in between each swirling.

Leave for 2 days giving 3 x 1 minute swirls each day.

After 2 days, put the demi-john somewhere cool to start the clearing process.

Leave to clear. Depending on the fruit used, it can take anywhere from 2 weeks to 2 months for the mead to clear. But it will clear. You can speed the process up using finings, which is available to purchase on our website.

Once clear rack the mead off the sediment into the bucket and then bottle.

Store for 3 months in the bottles to condition.

Happy brewing.

For more in depth instructions, check out our videos on YouTube – www.youtube.com/brewbitz

Home brewed mead can be very strong, so remember to drink responsibly.

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Making mead is easy.  You can follow our basic wine recipes and just swap the sugar for honey to give extra flavour and body to the wine. When swapping the sugar for honey, you'll need to use 1.25kg of honey for every kg of sugar. Of if its in pounds (lb), you'll need 1.25lb of honey for each 1lb of sugar.

For recipe ideas, see our recipes page