Ale Mead

[pennstatepitt]

The mead that I've had I never really liked. I've heard about Ale Mead and I love a good beer, so I thought I'd try this. Does anyone have any experiences/recipes/thoughts?

[Ben Brewcat]

Mead and beer are very different beverages; much of beer's sweet/malt character comes from unfermentable sugars from the mash process, while honey ferments out completely in beers. "Honey beer"s usually get their honey character from a special malt, called honey malt, which gives a honeylike aroma to the finished beer. Honey can be used in brewing beers, though it pretty much just contributes alcohol without adding body (which can be nice, especially in homebrewed recipes using extracts which need some lightening anyways).

Then there's a mead style called braggot, which is truly a hybrid beer and mead. But it's very meadlike, it just has malt character as well.

If you're a homebrewer don't hesitate to experiment with honey in your recipes, especially light-bodied styles like pilsners.

[nursebee]

We are

If all you have had is commercial meads, I've never liked any of them either. I have enjoyed all of my own and many of others. But I use little chemicals and let them age a long time.