Damson Plum Mead

This recipe uses damson plums from the garden. It's a bit time consuming processing the plums (picking, washing, pitting, and freezing the plums - especially in the heat of summer - but its worth it. The mead is delicious and looks beautiful - a lovely clear but deep red.

RECIPE

Approx 4kg damson plums: picked, washed, pitted, frozen, defrosted
6L spring water
~2L honey aka 2.6kg
1 pkt Mangrove Jacks M05 mead yeast
Mangrove Jack's mead nutrient

Go-Ferm

Pectic enzyme

potassium sorbate [wine stabiliser]

Campden tablets

bentonite

10L fermenting bucket w. lid and airlock

DAY 1 [SAT 27 SEP '25]

1. Cook plums in water in brew bag: bring up to about 80° C for 15 minutes then remove from heat; cover and allow to cool[1]

2. When plums cooled to approx. 30° C, remove bag with solids in from liquid

3. Add honey to sanitized fermenter

4. Add plum liquid to fermenter, add pectic enzyme, and stir to dissolve all the honey[2] 
- take gravity [1.100] and PH [3.0] readings

5. As required, adjust PH up slightly

6. Move approx. 250ml of the must into a sanitized jug; add yeast with nutrient, and Go-Ferm

7. Allow yeast to hydrate then add back into fermenter and stir in

Place fermenter in dark, temperature-controlled space.

Notes:
1. This creates about 8L liquid
2. Your volume is now about 9.75L

Photo 1: Cooking the plums. Everything soon gets a lot more red.

[Preview] Cherry Mead

Another pretty little bottle of mead, this time cherry. Recipe will follow.

White Peach and Passionfruit Mead

White Peach and Passionfruit Mead

This is the first recipe I'm posting which is based on commercial, off-the-shelf fruit juice. The main trick when using such juice is that it has to be as clean as possible - look for additives like sugar [might not be an issue for a wine, is an issue for a mead since you want to be adding sugars in the form of honey], non-fermentable sugars [xylitol, erythritol, etc.] which are not necessarily an issue but will impact your recipe and finishing, stabilisers [sorbates, sulfites], colours, and so on. Some COTS juice products can also really be quite acidic out of the bottle, and it's sometimes necessary to adjust that before beginning fermentation.

The process follows a basic nutrient step-feeding process I found on the internet [I think it was r/mead on Reddit.]

[ NOTE TO SELF: the post-ferment process documented here could probably be improved to check gravity again after a few days to confirm complete, and not just leave the primary sitting for so long? ]

Photo 1: The juice in question

[Preview] Damson Plum Mead

Just a pretty little bottle of damson plum mead, mid-process – pre backsweetening and aging. Recipe will follow. [Update: here]

Lemon Lime Wine

This recipe is based off of HowToDoneRight's [Youtube channel] Skeeter Pee recipe. It's brilliant for drinking on stupidly hot summer days, and/or spashing into a gin'n'tonic for a bit of extra heat - that kind of thing. Recipe makes a 27L batch.

RECIPE

6.5 kg lemons[1]

2.5 kg limes

6 kg sugar

2x 750ml bottle of The Limery lime juice or similar[2] 

2 pkt Mangrove Jack's R56 yeast[3]

4 tsp wine tannin

4 tsp wine nutrient

4 tsp pectic enzyme

4 tsp acid blend

potassium sorbate [wine stabiliser]

Campden tablets

bentonite

spring water

32L fermenting bucket w. lid and airlock

Notes:

1. Or adjust amounts within 9kg total e.g. 8kg lemons & 1kg limes

2. Whatever you use, make sure it doesn't contain -ites and -ates, which suppress yeast activity, or any other additive shite – as organic as possible

3. Or substitute as desired – have also had success with Mangrove Jack's CR51

Photo 1: 9-ish kg of lemons and limes, cleaned