Blueberry melomel?

[Newsman]

Anyone ever made a Blueberry melomel? My plan is to.make a 1 gallon "test" batch by mixing about 3# of honey. And fill the rest with Blueberry juice to just over 1 gallon (account for loss due to trub, etc). Thinking of adding frozen & thawed blueberries in "secondary" for a couple weeks for flavor.

 

[DBhomebrew]

I'm in the research stage of my own blueberry melomel. Using juice seems to be well regarded by the Mead House guys.

My one suggestion would be to look at your chosen yeast's alcohol tolerance and be sure you've got headroom. 3#/G honey/water is already a solid wine-strength mead. The fruit and juice will likely put it in the sack mead category. Better be sure your yeast are up to it and don't leave you with an unattenuated mess.

 

[Newsman]

Maybe I should reduce the honey and/or reduce the amount of juice? Maybe 1 qt of juice and 2qts water? I have a 1.5 gallon jar for a fermenter, so thatbshould leave plenty of headroom. Maybe 1.5# of honey?

 

[DBhomebrew]

By headroom, I was referring to the yeast's ability to eat all the available sugar before they hit their alcohol tolerance.

If the yeast is listed as 14% tolerance, I would limit the must to <13% potential.

The other way around, if my proposed must has a 14% potential I'd select a yeast with >15% tolerance.

 

[Newsman]

By headroom, I was referring to the yeast's ability to eat all the available sugar before they hit their alcohol tolerance.

If the yeast is listed as 14% tolerance, I would limit the must to <13% potential.

The other way around, if my proposed must has a 14% potential I'd select a yeast with >15% tolerance.

Oh, gotcha.

 

[Newsman]

So Knudsen "Just Blueberry" juice has 24 carbs/ cup(8oz) and 17 of those carbs are sugars. How do I figure out how much honey vs how much juice and how much water to top off?

 

[DBhomebrew]

So Knudsen "Just Blueberry" juice has 24 carbs/ cup(8oz) and 17 of those carbs are sugars. How do I figure out how much honey vs how much juice and how much water to top off?

I use @VikeMan's spreadsheets.

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/threads/fermenting-temperature.693216/post-9122360