Green Tea and Ginger Mead

[manwithbeers]

Help me out here folks. I'm going to do my second mead batch ever. I've decided this only because I love the combination of Green Tea and Ginger.

My first mead was 10 years ago. It was also a Metheglin but I used Lemon-balm. I thought I was using a lot of Lemon-balm but the flavor was barely there. Probably because I boiled it in the must. The Lemon-balm was unimpressive but the mead was, especially once it hit the 3 year mark. I shared my last bottle when it was 8 years old and it was wonderful.

So back to the topic at hand. I have no idea how much Ginger to use! Or tea for that matter but there are enough tea recipes out there that I have some guidelines. I have not seen any recipes with Ginger. As a starting point I'd even like to know how Ginger is used in soda pop, again as a guideline. So if anyone has come across or used Ginger I would like to know some details on flavor and procedure as well as quantity used per gallon.

FYI I want a dry mead, ~12% alc./vol., enough Ginger in the background that it is noticeable but not spicy and then that Green Tea tartness. Canada Dry has their Ginger ale with Green Tea these days and I'm drinking a lot of it, very refreshing. I'm probably only doing a 3 gallon batch but 6 gallons isn't out of the question because I'd like some extra for blending or adding fruit. This weekend I'm going to see if I can find cranberry flower honey or strawberry flower honey to use. I like Fireweed and that's what I used last time but I want some new flavor this time. If it goes well maybe I'll make more before another 10 years is up. LOL

[DannyW]

Jeff Renner's ginger ale (soda pop) recipe with which I started making the stuff says 200g fresh ginger per 5 gallon batch. I found that a bit light for my taste, so I have boosted it over time to more like 300g per 5 gallons. It is a light, dry-ish recipe so the ginger is not overwhelming.

[manwithbeers]

Jeff Renner's ginger ale (soda pop) recipe with which I started making the stuff says 200g fresh ginger per 5 gallon batch. I found that a bit light for my taste, so I have boosted it over time to more like 300g per 5 gallons. It is a light, dry-ish recipe so the ginger is not overwhelming.

Do you boil that or soak it for some period?

[alan_marks]

I'm thinking with my chef brains now, you would probably extract the most flavor by boiling it in your must. I would not boil the tea leaves, a 15 minute infusion would suffice. With all that being said, are you going to grate or smash the fresh ginger to release the juices from the pulp?

Just my two cents,
Alan

[manwithbeers]

So I started this mead about two weeks ago. I've been keeping a detailed log this time as to what i've done and how it's going.
It isn't a big mead. OG is only 1.066. I plan to keg this one and serve on tap with my beers.

I used 4 ounces of thinly sliced ginger which was boiled in a light honey solution for 15 minutes then it was strained and I added the liquid to my no boil must. The tea was 36 g in 3 L of water steeped at 180F for 3 minutes. I can't pick out either the tea or ginger in the taste I had tonight. My gravity is at 1.000.

I'm thinking now of adding a couple chunks of candied ginger to the secondary. Dry spicing I guess. It will be racked on day 14 so I'll decide then as I have 2 days to think about it.

I used 3 Kg of Cranberry varietal honey and 1 Kg of Clover honey for the must.
19.2 L batch size to start.

I'm going to do another batch now; 2 gallons of Semisweet Blackberry mead. Part of my yard was overtaken by wild Blackberry this summer so I don't want to waste them.

[cbraun77s]

I have used crystalized ginger in a saison I make several times. I find it imparts a great ginger flavor. I am a ginger lover and am thinking of adding this flavor to one of my future meads. Let me know how this develops. thanks