The recipe for this is incredibly simple with only 5 ingredients, and hopefully, will come out as well as my previous two attempts.
The blackberry’s have come from the supermarket, and are frozen. This has the effect of exploding the cell walls of the fruit and and allowing more of the flavour to be released from the fruit intro the Mead!
As always I will include the recipe and I will be discussing this one as it matures over the next few months.
Blackberry Mead
Equipment
- Demijohn and Airlock
- Large Funnel
- Large Pot
- Sanitizer
- Auto Siphon
- Bottling Wand
- Bottles
Ingredients
- Water Non-chlorinated or filtered, enough to top up the demijohn
- 2-3 Pounds Honey Depending on how sweet you want the mead to be
- 1 cup Blackberries Fresh or frozen, personally I prefer frozen
- 1/2 pack Mead or Champaign yeast I use Mangrove Jacks M05 mead yeast
Instructions
- Sanitize everything that will be used in the brewing process.
- Heat about 1 Litre of non chlorinated water in the pot on medium heat. Once it's warm, but not boiling, add the honey and stir it so it all dissolves. Turn off the heat.
- Put the blackberries into the one gallon jug.
- Carefully pour the honey water mixture into the jug using a funnel.
- Top off the jug with cold (preferably filtered) water, leaving at least 2 inches of head space on top. Put the lid on the jug and gently mix everything around a bit.
- Make sure that the temperature of the must is below 90°F 32°C, then add 1/2 packet of champagne yeast. Put the lid back on tightly and this time shake the jug for a minute or two to distribute the yeast.
- Put a little sanitizer in the airlock to the line, then put the rubber stopper end into the jug. Put the jug in a dark place. It should start bubbling within 12-24 hours.
- After about 3 weeks of fermenting, or once the bubbling has completely stopped, the mead can be racked.
- After a further 3 weeks the mead can be bottled and aged.
Notes
The point of course to racking is so that the liquid in the demijohn has a better chance of clearing and giving you a better clearer brew when you get round to bottling the drink.
So out came the box of brewing kit, the two demijohns of by now pretty still and none fermenting mead and prepared to crack on with the racking process.
After sanitizing all the kit, including the new demijohns and the syphon, I decided to take a SG reading and compare it to what the previous reading was.
I am producing two different meads this time. The first being a traditional mead made with some Spanish forest honey from Asda. The initial SG when I first made the must was 1.086, after measuring this time the SG came out to 1.006. I punched these numbers into the Brewers friend ABV calculator it came in at a very nice 10.5% ABV!
As for the Raspberry mead that has come out nearer to 12 % and I am well stoked that I appear to have two great brews on my hands.
(yes it looks like mud, this picture is from when the batch was first made!)
After testing the SG, I decided to rack both Demijohns off into another set of demijohns, and so began an hour of syphoning and getting the liquids ready for transfer. Full bottle on table, empty bottle on floor, insert tube and pump auto syphon to get liquid flowing.
After getting the liquid out with hardly any of the lees being transferred, I estimated I had lost approximately about 500ml of the mead due to the amount of lees and other floating contaminants in the liquid.
During the testing of the SG we had a taste of both of the meads, and this is what I could taste. The traditional Mead had quite a stringent flavour profile with the alcohol profile tasting very young. I am of the opinion that the longer this is kept to bottle condition the better.
The Raspberry Mead tasted a lot better there was some nice notes from the raspberries, this was made with local honey, and the flavour was more noticeable than the store bought honey. I also found the alcohol didn’t taste as young though both meads were started on the same day!
I will be testing them again in the next few days, and I will make a decision whether to bottle or do a second racking. I promise I will try and get more images.
Till next time
Toodle pip!
]]>Having managed to source a decent supply of Honey from a local bee keeper and bought myself some brewing kit consisting of 3 demijohns, some airlocks and bungs, a couple of funnels and some other brewing kit, I made my first batch.
There are so many recipes on line but one of the most famous is JAOM (or Joe’s Ancient Orange Mead) and has been one of the most frequently used recipes for new brewers. However I decided to go with a variation of City Steadings Brews basic Mead recipe. I had 2 different honeys, approx. 3 pounds of each. One being a local honey and the other a commercial supermarket honey.
For the Raspberry mead I used the same ingredients but used a lighter local Dorset honey and added about a cup of frozen raspberries. This has left a very light red looking liquor which I am looking forward to try after the first racking!
Beginners Mead
Equipment
- Sanitizer
- Large Pot
- Funnel
- One Gallon Demijohn With Airlock
- Thermometer
- Bottling Wand
- Bottles
- Auto Siphon
- Bottling Wand
Ingredients
- Water Non-Chlorinated or Filtered, to top up the Must
- 2-3 Pounds Honey Depending on sweetness requirement
- 1/2 Orange Peel
- 2 Ounces Raisins
- 1/2 Packet mead yeast I Use Mangrove Jacks M05 Mead Yeast
- 1 Cup Black Tea Well steeped
Instructions
- Make sure all your equipment has been sterilised.
- Cut up your raisins and add to the demijohn along with the orange citrus peel.
- Make a mug of tea and leave to steep.
- Place your honey bottles into a bowl of warm (not boiling) water to loosen the contents of the jar
- Place 2 litres of filtered water into a large container then add all your honey to it. stir and make sure that the honey dissolves. This is your basic Must.
- Add the Must to the demijohn along with the well steeped cup of tea and top the whole lot of with filtered water, to the shoulder of the demijohn. This will give your brew some head space and allow it to degas easier.
- Place a bung in the top of your demijohn and shake to make sure everything is mixed well.
- At this point I take a sample of the mixture and measure the SG (Specific Gravity) to see what the possible alcohol content is going to be like
- Pitch your Yeast, I personally just added my yeast to the must, straight into the mix but you should follow the manufacturers recommendations.
- Put a stopper in the top of the demijohn and shake like you have never shaken anything before. if you feel that you have done enough then shake for another 2 minutes!
- Fill an airlock to the marked lines with sanitizing fluid and fit on to the demijohn.
- Place the demijohn into a dark place and wait for the magic to happen. Hopefully within 12 to 24 hours you should see bubbles coming up out of the airlock. This means that all is well with the brew and that the yeast is doing what it does best and produce alcohol!
- Once the mead has stopped producing gas (there are no more bubbles coming up the airlock), you can rack off the content into another demijohn and give a chance for the mead to degas. Don't forget to take a second measure of the SG at this stage to see whether the yeast has finished its work.
- Leave for another week and again measure the SG. If 2 readings a week apart stay the same, then its time to bottle.
- Fill 750 Ml bottles to the base of the neck and cap. place in a dark cool place in the house and leave for at least 6 months to age in the bottles.Once the time has expired try your brew!
That’s all for now, I shall report back after the first racking to let you know how its going!
]]>This means that I have been married for over half my life. It also means that next year, some 365 days hence forth, or 1 complete orbit around the sun I will be half a century old!
It also means that some internal assessment of my life is due and needs to be looked at “pretty sharpish”. And I don’t mean looking back at whats happened in my life, but looking forward at what the next few years will have to offer.
Perhaps it will involve me leaving my job and heading out into the big wide yonder, and attempt to get something new in a different industry. Maybe The Wife and I will head out on a new adventure away from the coast we currently live on and do something Boaty inland!
The future isn’t written, we write it ourselves.
In this year 2020 we didn’t expect a pandemic, but the bastard turned up to say hello anyway. This ruined plans for the Wife and I that we had put into motion back in January.
We had attempted to get most of the people who were invited to our wedding back in 1995 to come and celebrate our 25th anniversary
But we all know how that has turned out!
So this weekend is going to result in me and the Wife heading out and visiting outlaws and friends and saying thanks (from a safe distance), and just general celebration with people we love and care for.
To be fair there was a lot of people who said we would be lucky to make 5 years, I guess we have shown them!
Hopefully my next post wont be so long in arriving, and thus will bid you adieu from the great ship boozehound. I may need some new kidneys before then!
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I have started to film some of these rides, and this one is one of my first. Its the return trip (West Bay to Weymouth) and my first attempt at editing.
Whats your Favourite ride route?
]]>The Rainbow Garage Cafe is a great biker hangout who also run a bike night every other Friday.
The Rainbow Garage Cafe – https://www.facebook.com/RainbowGarageCafe/
If You like what you see then please subscribe
]]>My first filmed ride on my new bike.
The second rider is the owner of the Tex/Mex restaurant Loco Lobo seen at the end of the video. visit their site at https://www.locolobotexmex.com/
The ride was 17.5 miles distance and completed bang on the google estimate at 38 minutes.
My bike is a Suzuki Intruder 800 C, Iain is riding a Yamaha VN1100
Filmed on a SJ4000 at 1080p 60FPS
]]>So what did I get?This Beauty
My New Bike
Its a Suzuki Intruder VL800C 2013 model with some 4785 miles on the clock. To say im stoked is an understatement, my wife keeps telling me to shut up about it!!!
I chose this bike because I wanted a cruiser style bike, it suits my frame and I suspect I wont be cramped on it its got a large enough engine that I wont (hopefully) kill myself with, but big enough to take me and the wife and not struggle to much on steep hills.
At this point, I have to say a big thank you to Steve at Hawk motorcycles ltd who bent over backwards to help me check out some other bikes to see what would suit me. Hawk specialise in Cruiser style bikes, but they have a selection of other styles as well.
At the time of writing this I have managed to ride it for all of 5 miles, to fill it up, and because it was so wet. 
Tank and Dash detail
However the weather looks set to improve for next week, and I am hoping to visit 3 bike nights and a bikers day out from Wednesday through Saturday. Luckily I live in Dorset and I have a huge amount of choice for bike nights.
Weekdays I can take my choice from Poole, Weymouth, Poundbury and Yeovil (yes I know its Somerset). On the Weekends there are several dedicated biker days which I can ride to.
So the plan for next week is Poundbury Bike night on Wednesday, Weymouth Bike Night on Thursday and Friday visit the Rainbow Garage Cafe bike night.
Non standard exhaust 
The weekend will consist of going up to the Calne Biker meet on Saturday.
This will be the longest trip I will have done on any bike (including the 125), and it may be a very interesting day, and I have heard great things about this event.
Sunday I may have a day off and relax! or if the riding has got in the blood then I am going to take a quick trip down to West Bay.
If that isn’t getting enough experience on my new bike then I don’t know what to do!
We have already planned next weeks trip 
I will try to get some video from all of these trips and you will get to hear the bike in all its glory!
Until next time.
Ride safe my friends
]]>37 bikes set out from Lodmoor car park after the military vehicles, and proceeded down over Greenhills and down the Esplanade to the old ferry port car park. 36 Bikes arrived!
This was my first parade as a rider, though I have done the ride as a pillion before.
My bike is a 2016 Keeway TX125M
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