Did I use too little honey?

[Allen]

I made my first mead this weekend. I used the JAO recipe, but less honey. I made a 3 gallon batch, and used 7-1/2 pounds of honey. The reason for this is I want a slightly off-dry mead.


If my calculations are right, the bread yeast will ferment to 12% so for 3 gallons, I need 36 ounces of honey for fermentation. I added 8 more ounces of honey, so I would get a little bit of sweet at the end of fermentation.


Does this sound right, or will the yeast keep eating until the honey/sugars are gone?

 

[vcasey]

First - I have never made the JAO. I can tell you it is meant to be an early drinker and early drinkers are usually sweet. Just from my experience making mead, I can tell you I use 3 - 3 1/2 lbs. a gallon for a dry mead. So you may need to add even more honey and honestly I would follow the directions for the JAO since any changes will affect the outcome. Did you by chance take a starting SG reading? I know the recipe never says to take one but others have and that will give you a better idea of the final alcohol %.
VC

 

[Allen]

I did actually. before I pitched the yeast, the SG was 1.090.

 

[vcasey]

I am going to guess that the bread yeast will eat everything and drop the mead's SG down to around 995 or so. Which means you are going to get a dry mead and will have to decide to back sweeten some (after adding kmeta & sorbate) or let it age. Dry meads really need to be aged for a while before they become enjoyable.
Like I said this is meant to be an earlier drinker and I can't answer on how well the mead will mature using bread yeast. I really would follow the original recipe (you can easily add more honey just make sure to mix it well) and then pick up the supplies needed to make a mead using wine yeast. This way you can compare the two.
VC