Beer Forum

I just made a mead that was 1.093 and went down to .996 in two weeks. The thing is, it´s very cloudy. Almost tea&milk like cloudy.

So I want to secondary it but I am not sure if I should wait for it to clear out or not. Right now it´s at about 70 degrees. Should drop the temp. all the way down to 32 (crash-cooling it)?? Should I rack right now or not? Can it be left on yeast for how long?

Anyways, my main question is: If it´s done fermenting (and I think mine is), should I crash cool it and age in 32F or will it benefit with a higher temp. (say 40-50F)???

I've been storing my mean at room temp (low to mid 60s) and plan on transferring it to a better bottle after a month or so (any day now). I plan on keeping it in the secondary for at least 6-8 months at room temp (might put it in the fridge during the summer).

This is my first time making mead though, anyone wanna chime in with what they've found to work best.

If fermentation is complete go ahead and transfer to secondary for further clearing. If you can "crash-cool" the primary before transfering to secondary that would speed up clarifying. I usually bottle after secondary upon clearing (some use a tertiary to clear further) and age in my basement 62-68 deg F.

After its done fermenting take it to the secondary and leave it until you see a good layer of lees (dead yeast, proteins, etc..) on the bottom. I tend to leave it for 6 months at a time. Some people will transfer sooner than that but it seems to be working for me so far. It will clear over time. Mead takes longer to clear than beer does to just be patient. There are really no set rules. I really only bottle when I want to drink it or when I have to make space for another batch.

The grizzled old dude who used to sell me honey and makes mead 50 gallons at a time told me to rack at 3 weeks, 3 months, and then don't mess with it again until it is clear. Seems to work, although I do that last step in a corny so I can't really tell when it is clear. i just let it sit a long time (like a year).