Mead: Encyclopedia II - Mead - Varieties of mead

Mead - Varieties of mead

Mead can have a wide range of flavors, depending on the source of the honey, additives called "adjuncts" or "gruit" (including fruit and spices), yeast employed during fermentation, and aging procedure. Mead can be difficult to find commercially, though some producers have been successful marketing it.

Some meads retain some measure of the sweetness of the original honey, and some can even be considered as dessert wines. Drier meads are also available, and some producers offer sparkling meads, which (like champagne) can make for a delightful celebratory toast. There are a number of faux-meads, which are actually cheap wines with large amounts of honey added, to produce a cloyingly sweet liqueur. It has been said that "a mead that tastes of honey is as good as a wine that still tastes of grape".

Historically, meads would have been fermented by wild yeasts residing on the skins of the fruit or within the honey itself. Wild yeasts generally result in a high alcohol content and some interesting by-flavors. As commercial brewing interests 'tamed' the yeasts into the strains we recognize now, certain strains became associated with certain styles of mead. Mostly, these are strains that are also used in beer or wine production. Several commercial labs, such as White Labs, WYeast, Vierka, and others have gone so far as to develop strains specifically for mead.

Mead can also be distilled to a brandy or liqueur strength. Krupnik is a sweet Polish liqueur made through just such a process.

Different types of mead include, but are not limited to:

Cyser - Cyser is a combination of honey and apple cider.

Pyment - Pyment blends honey and grapes.

Melomel - Melomel is made from honey and any fruit other than grapes or apples.

Metheglin - Metheglin starts with traditional mead but has herbs and spices added.

Hippocras - Hippocras is a combination of Pyment and spices.

Braggot - Braggot (also called bracket or brackett) marks the invention of Ale. Originally brewed with honey and hops, later with honey and malt - with or without hops added.

Adapted from the Wikipedia article "Varieties of mead", under the G.N U Free Docmentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki