07/25/10 JAOM

So this is my attempt at a pretty well known (in the mead circles at least) beginners mead. Joe's Ancient Orange Mead, or JAOM for short, is a melomel (fruit mead) that uses basic materials that anyone can get at a grocery store anywhere. Well, maybe not the jug and air lock, at least the standard issue ones.  I've seen pictures of some pretty makeshift airlocks and carboys before on forums.

Here is the link to the recipe that I used:
http://www.homebrewtalk.com/f80/joes-ancient-orange-mead-49106/

I made it pretty much to a T, only I used the imperial gallon (4.5L) instead of the US gallon (3.7L). This may have had an effect on my OG, which was only 1.076 as opposed to the 1.100 that the poster had. Also I snapped the cinnamon stick in half and only put in 1 clove and no nutmeg or allspice. And by reading through the comments I saw that a number of people we complaining about a pithy taste to the mead, so I zested and then peeled the navel orange that I used. The handful of raisins I used were 30ish golden ones that I had on hand. And the most important ingredient (the honey o_O) was 1.6kg local clover honey.

I'm going to stick by the recipe and not touch it at all. It's been 19 days and the airlock is still dropping every 6-8 seconds. The basic mead slowed right down after about the first 7 days. Hopefully all goes well, I can't wait for September 25 to roll around.