Plain Jane is a traditional mead. At bottling time we added Orange Flower Water to make Orange Jane, and Rose Flower Water to make Rose Jane. Rose Jane takes the longest to age, after five years she was just thinking about getting drinkable. Plain Jane was good after about a year in the bottle, and continues to improve.
Ingredients:
February 20, 1997 - Heat honey with water to 170 F. Skimmed some scum, put the must chiller into the kettle, heated back up to 180 F, and kept hot for 15 minutes. Cool, pour into carboy and add water to make 5 gallons. Pitch yeast. Stir and store with bubble lock.
May 15, 1997 - Racked, SG 1.025
September 11, 1997 - SG 1.022
September 18, 1997 - Rehydrated another 5 gm of Red Star Pasteur Champagne yeast. Let yeast hyrdrate for several minutes before stirring in 2 T yeast starter, 1 T yeast nutrient, 1 heaping tsp. ascorbic acid. Poured yeast mix into a clean carboy and racked mead in afterwords.
January 14, 1998 - SG 0.996
February 5, 1998 - To bottle, we put an ounce of Rose Water into ten 12-oz. bottles, and an ounce of Orange Flower Water into another ten bottles and then the bottles were filled with Plain Jane, making Rose Jane and Orange Jane. The rest was bottled as Plain Jane.
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