Mead Making Process
With your mead finished fermenting, it’s likely cloudy, and there’s also likely a layer of sediment at the bottom of the vessel. Don’t worry, both of these things are totally normal!
A young mead has a lot of yeast and protein left over from the ferment. A very cloudy mead can have some yeasty and muddy flavors which most find undesirable. A clear mead will have cleaner flavors as well as look more desirable in the glass.
Speeding up Clearing
Time clears all meads. This is a fact. As time goes on, the yeasts and proteins will naturally drop out of the mead, accumulating at the bottom of the vessel in a layer of sediment. We can, however, use a few different techniques to speed up this clearing process.
Cold Crashing
Cold crashing is exactly as it sounds: using cold temperatures to make yeast fall out of solution or “crash” out. The process is very simple, but it does require a large amount of refrigerator space.
Simply place your mead in a refrigerator once you have confirmed the fermentation has finished. Leave your mead in the refrigerator until it is clear. This process can take anywhere between 24 hours and 4 weeks.
Fining Agents
Fining agents are ingredients added to a mead that accelerate the clearing process. There are many fining agents available that produce varying results.
We don’t personally use fining agents in our meads. The objective of the fining agent is to remove particles from the mead. While they can do an excellent job at stripping out particles that haze a mead, they can also strip out components that add color, flavor, and aroma to a mead.
Filtering
Filtering is the process of pumping mead through a membrane to achieve a clear mead. Filtering is usually done multiple times, getting progressively smaller in the size of the particle being filtered until the desired clarity is achieved.
For homebrewers, filtration units are expensive and often unnecessary. One filtration system we can recommend for homebrewers is the Buon Vino Mini Jet.
Coffee and water filters are not appropriate for filtering a mead. These filters will heavily oxidize your mead, leading to wet-cardboard flavors.