/diy/ - Do It Yourself

usually need about 1gallon of honey for 5 gallon batches. plus whatever else you might want to add (fruit juice and shit)

mix as much water and honey (and whatever other tasty stuff you want) to the biggest pot you have. put it on the stove and heat it. you dont need to boil it but it helps to sterilize. collect any of the white frothy shit that forms on the top. you dont want that. after its been above 190degrees F for over about 15-20min, take it off the heat. at this point anything that touches it (spoons, hydrometer) need to be sterilized.

stick it in a sink or bath tub or something and fill it with ice/water to cool the mead down to room temp. once its down to room temp, pour it in your fermentor and pour in your yeast and your done. throw on the airlock and youre done.


honestly though, mead sucks. you should start homebrewing beer. its a little more work but doesnt taste like dick juice

>>130806
Would whole pieces of fruit be okay to put in the mixture, or should I use only the juice?

You're gonna need more honey. About 7 pounds more. And another brew bucket.

>>130806
Never, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever boil your must.

You only need to heat it enough to blend the honey into the water.

Homebrewtalk is a great place for advice.
You want to a long hose from your local brew shop so that you can rack off the crud. You want something to be able to rack into. You want something you are going to be able to age it in. You also are going to need something to de-gas it with.

>>130827
How will I know when I need to rack it? And what exactly do you mean by de-gas?

>>130831
PREPARE TO SPEND MORE MONEY.
You will need a hydrometer.
Degassing is when you remove the co2 from the wine.

>>130837
Mead isn't wine, it's mead. And petilent (slightly effervescent), sparkling (carbonated) and still (flat) mead are all valid options.

>>130837

He has a hydrometer.

You have build up of CO2. I don't know how different mead is to beer (I brew beer), but you will need an airlock. Is that picture of your stuff? If it is you have one, it's that thing on the left.

>>130840
yeah those are my materials that I got from my sister

>>130796
>>130639

>>130796
Post food and cooking things on /ck/,

>>>/ck/3350674

like everyone else. If you need to know how to make an air lock, blow glass wine bottles, or other part of brewing equipment then /diy/ is the place.

>>130822
This guy has your back op, never boil your must.

If thats a pic of your stuff, in three months your going to want to buy 2 or 3 carboy's (glass is best, plastic carboys are fine). My mead recipe is 3 gallons of water and 15 pounds of honey, warm in large pot to 90 degrees, pour in to large 5 gallon bucket and add yeast. Then I put it in my brewing closet (its a room built like a giant humidor, its temperature and humidity controlled inside the closet, the range is about 5 degrees, it never gets colder then 75 and never hotter then 80 and the humidity is controlled to be between 55 and 65 percent. These are ideal conditions, but if you can't create a perfect environment don't stress, just make sure it stays over 60 degrees and under 80 and you'll be golden.

If you hold 8 oz of honey aside you can mix it in when you go from the bucket to the carboy and it will make more carbonated mead. If you don't want it carbonated, don't add sugars at the end of the batch, just let it be as it is and when you transfer it over to the carboys let it sit until it goes entirely flat, then bottle it. Personally, on a 5 gallon batch like this I usually add 3 oz of warmed honey to the bottom of each carboy, before I transfer the mead over, I like carbonated mead.

>>130839
too much co2 stresses the yeast and causes an off flavor. Knock the co2 out during long term fermentation and get some back in later if you want it to sparkling.

I'm about to make some hobo cider. I'm going to use the cap from the jug to make a blowout tube, but I don't know what to seal it with. Any suggestions?

inb4 buy an airlock. I'm in a dry county and the nearest airlock is 2 hours away. I'm doing it this way for a reason.

>>130863
How long are you fermenting it for?
Cider doesn't really need headspace, think almost none, so a blow out tube might be overkill

>>130863
Hot glue, epoxy, or a balloon like in this pic.

I try to stay out of /diy/ homebrewing threads because of this, >>130850 explanation, but this is a /diy/ answer to a /diy/ question. lol

>>130863
http://www.instructables.com/id/How-to-make-your-own-Fermentation-Lock-Not-a-ball/
that's not a balloon!
a simple google search away.

>>130867
I don't much care that it's a blowout so much that I don't have an airlock and I'm not using a condom. It's hobo liquor, not prison liquor.

>>130868
Cool beans. thanks. and I would have asked /ck/ if it was abrewing issue, but I'm actually fairly competent around proper equipment. unfortunately my proper equipment is currently 3000 miles away and I'm not going there any time soon.

>>130863
medical tubing and a rubber band. just make the loops large enough that they don't fold over and pinch the tube shut and your golden.

Thanks for the suggestions everyone. I'm off to the hardware store for some items.

I found a plug for an unused pipe and drilled a hole in it. I cut a hole in the cap of the juice bottles with a whittling knife. I got ahead of myself and didn't take a pic until I had the plug in the cap. Anyway, I affixed a piece of vinyl tubing with a hose clamp and thereyahavit.

>>132650
This is why I don't normally post this early in the AM. Here's the pic.

Here's what I brewed. I used two 1 gallon containers. I used three half-gallons of cider, one pound of honey and two oranges. I put the yeast into one of the jugs of cider, one of each of the other two went into each of my fermenters. I heated the honey in a pot pot water enough to thin it, but I didn't boil it. I then split it half and half between the fermenters. You can see what I did with the oranges. Each bottle has one orange. Finally, I split the half gallon with the yeast in it between the two fermenters.

Now it's sleeping in a box to protect it from light.

Then I got high in celebration of my newfound hobo lifestyle.

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