India: Honey, We Made Mead

From spiritz.in

Mead isn’t merely a beverage business; it’s a personal exploration of flavour, fermentation and the limitless possibilities of craft, says AMAR Shrivastav, Co-Founder, HIK! Craft Meads 

Once an ancient drink, mead is finding a new audience in India. The beverage is being given a distinctly contemporary identity, with brewer-turned-mead-maker AMAR Shrivastava experimenting with honey, fruits and fermentation. Through HIK! Craft Meads, the mead maverick, Amar is helping create a culture of curiosity around a category that is still waiting to find its place on India’s drinking map, writes Bishan Kumar.

There are drinks that announce themselves with swagger, and then there are drinks that invite curiosity. Mead belongs firmly to the latter category. Made from fermented honey, mead has an ancient pedigree, yet in contemporary India it remains an intriguing newcomer: one that is slowly finding its way into the glasses of consumers looking for something other than the familiar beer, wine and other spirits. In Pune, Amar is betting on that curiosity

For Amar, mead isn’t merely a beverage business; it’s a personal exploration of flavour, fermentation and the limitless possibilities of craft. His meadery, HIK! Craft Meads, represents the meeting point of science and imagination: honey forms the foundation, fermentation gives it character, while fruits, herbs and unconventional combinations provide the element of surprise.

 Curiosity built a brand

When he was young, Amar heard about a wine-taster; but he couldn’t fathom how “a beverage could have so much depth that studying, evaluating and creating it could become someone’s profession.”

That question would eventually become a career. As his professional life drew him to breweries, microbreweries, wineries and different forms of fermentation, he was presented with a front row view of the craft beverage revolution. That sparked a desire to explore the unknown.

“I began to feel that I wanted to explore something beyond what was already established,” he recalls. “In many traditional beer styles, there are defined parameters and guidelines. There is definitely room for creativity, but I wanted to work in a space where we could experiment more freely with ingredients, flavours and processes,” he adds.

Moving towards mead

HIK! Craft Meads was created in 2022 by Amar, along with his partner Hemant Jadhav. They had known each other for years, having been in the microbrewery industry — their shared passion for the craft becoming the foundation for HIK! — the first product being a Mango Mead produced in July 2023.

Since then, Guava, Blueberry, and Cherry Cola have emerged among the flavours consumers can encounter on tap; the wider mead range includes Belgian, Hopped, Lychee, Hazelnut Coffee, Jamun, Peach and Pineapple flavours. The brand has also ventured into stronger expressions, including its 10 per cent Karwanda Mead. More recently, Jamun Mint Mead has added another distinctly Indian twist to the portfolio.

For Amar, however, the point is not to assemble a fixed list of flavours and reproduce them indefinitely. His Meadery’s philosophy is deliberately fluid. “The philosophy behind HIK! is actually very simple. The product has to come first,” he says. “We don’t create something just because putting a new flavour out there sounds exciting. If we make something, it has to be something that we believe in,” he asserts.

There is also a more personal test. “If we cannot enjoy drinking it ourselves, it shouldn’t go out to the consumer,” Amar says. That attitude explains why he is reluctant to describe even the brand’s more popular expressions as permanently fixed. “The idea is not to create a fixed portfolio and keep making the same products forever. If tomorrow we feel like there is something more interesting to work on, we should be able to stop making one flavour and start creating something completely different,” Amar elaborates.

Making Mead an experience

HIK! has moved beyond simply selling a beverage to building occasions around it. Its flagship initiative, HIK! Fest is positioned as India’s first mead festival that offered consumers an immersive way to discover the category firsthand.

The brand has also launched the HIK! Experience Centre, debuting at Chug Biergarten in Pune’s Koregaon Park. The inaugural event brought together a Mead 101 session with Amar, a cocktail session with Vins on Tap, Mead Games, and a live performance by Sabali; it’s a format being rolled out to other outlets where HIK! meads are poured.

Then there is HIK!Nik!, an experience that would invite consumers into the meadery itself & closer to the craft behind the drink.

Where honey meets science

For Amar, quality begins at source. He, however, guards his honey sources with fervour. According to him, a good mead requires a lot more than mixing honey with water and waiting for fermentation to happen — his biotechnology background, combined with his experience in brewing, gives him a strong technical foundation to work from.

“A great mead starts with the quality of the ingredients and an understanding of what you want those ingredients to become,” he explains.

Honey, naturally, is at the heart of the process. HIK! works with some of the best honey available in the market, and for its fruit-based expressions, the team uses fresh produce to make its own fruit pulps. Fermentation typically takes around 22 to 25 days: something that Amar approaches with precision and instinct.

“Fermentation is not just about following a timeline. It is about understanding how the ingredients behave, how the flavours develop and how everything comes together,” he shares.

That same rigour shapes how HIK! approaches experimentation. Every new ingredient must earn its place — surviving fermentation, integrating with the drink, and contributing something meaningful to the final flavour. “The real challenge is understanding whether that ingredient actually works in the product, how it behaves through fermentation and whether the final drink is something people would genuinely enjoy,” he says.

Teaching India to taste Mead

The biggest challenge for any mead maker in India is building familiarity. According to Amar, consumers are accustomed to thinking in established categories: beer, wine and spirits, all occupy their own clearly understood territory. Mead, however, leaves the drinker wondering where exactly it belongs.

Amar would rather not force it into any category. “For me, the simplest answer is that it should be experienced for what it is,” he says.

The solution is not technical explanations but a recognisable starting point. A Guava Mead, for instance, uses a known flavour to open the door to an unfamiliar beverage. “They know guava. It is familiar to them. Our job is to take that familiarity and use it as a way to introduce consumers to something new,” Amar says.

And then comes the most convincing form of education: tasting. “At the end of the day, you can tell someone a lot about mead. But I think the best way to introduce them to it is to let them try a good one.”

That approach has helped HIK! attract a surprisingly diverse audience. Amar broadly places HIK!’s consumers falls in the 21–45 age group: social and outgoing, willing to experiment and explore beyond their usual beer or wine.

Can Mead become mainstream?

Amar believes it can, but not overnight. He draws the parallel with India’s microbrewery movement. When he entered that industry, microbreweries were still relatively new to Indian consumers, he says, but now they are an established part of the country’s urban craft-beverage landscape. “I believe mead has a similar opportunity,” he says.

However, he believes that the category must grow on the strength of the liquid. “You can introduce consumers to a category through branding and storytelling, but ultimately they have to enjoy what is in the glass,” he points out.

Quality and consistency will be non-negotiable as HIK! grows — organically, and on its own terms rather than in a race for scale. Consumer feedback stays central. “The category has to earn its place in the market,” Amar says.

https://spiritz.in/stories/honey-we-made-mead-12543646

British Columbia: First local meadery officially open, adding to Kamloops Wine Trail

From castanetkamloops.net

Kamloops’ first meadery and the fourth member of the Kamloops Wine Trail officially opened for business out in Monte Creek on Saturday.

Lion’s Head Meadery, located at 4006 Shuswap Rd., held a grand opening ribbon cutting ceremony with a couple dozen people, following the opening of its tasting room back in July.

Co-owner Bernita Wienhold-Leahy told Castanet Kamloops the business venture has been six years in the making alongside her husband and beekeeper Leroy Harder.

The couple moved to Kamloops six year ago to start the business — converting their garage into a working meadery.

The pair have been making the ancient beverage for a decade and use mostly their own honey, fermented directly with fruit and yeast to produce a dry mead.

“It’s our retirement plan if you believe not or not,” Wienhold-Leahy said.

She said they enjoy living off the land and felt this was a great option for a home-based business, so they can be their own bosses while having fun.

Photo: Michael Potestio

Lion's Head Meadery co-owner Bernita Wienhold-Leahy and her daughter (holding scissors) cut the ribbon officially opening their business, surrounded by various business and tourism dignitaries on Saturday

The fermented honey beverage is close to a wine, and Wienhold-Leahy said they have plans to create a variety of products including carbonated mead and a mulled mead in time for this year’s Christmas Market.

Trish Morelli, executive director of the Kamloops Wineries Association, said Lion’s Head Meadery is a great addition to the Wine Trail as Kamloops’ first honey winery.

“Each winery along the trail has such a different experience, different tastings, different views and things to offer," she said.

The Kamloops Wine Trail also includes Privato, Monte Creek Winery and Sagewood Winery.

Morelli hopes the Wine Trail will grow, and there’s potential in the area — the former Harper’s Trail Winery property is up for sale, and there were recent efforts to explore growing grapes in the Tranquille Creek area as part of a failed housing development.

https://www.castanetkamloops.net/news/Kamloops/631825/First-local-meadery-officially-open-adding-to-Kamloops-Wine-Trail- 

Mead is having a moment in Japan

From japantoday.com

By Rachel Teo

Dating back to 7,000 BC, mead is one of the oldest alcoholic beverages in the world. As the Agricultural Revolution progressed, grains, hops, and grapes made winemaking and beer-brewing more commonplace. Since honey was more expensive and more difficult to scale, the beverage was slowly lost to time.

In the last five years, there’s been a resurgence in the popularity of mead in Europe and the US. This wave is finally hitting Japan, with meaderies opening across the country and selections from Japanese brewers gaining recognition at prestigious international competitions.

According to Good luck Trip, Japan now boasts 20–30 facilities that produce the beverage, with six companies opting to specialize in making only mead. The drink is also gaining ground in Japanese pop-culture, being featured in a number of anime and manga, and is even sold as part of certain anime-related merchandise.

Antelope Meadery

The tasting table at Antelope Meadery. Image: Rachel Teo

Antelope Meadery is a small, award-winning facility tucked away in a quiet residential neighbourhood of Yasu City in Shiga Prefecture. Set up in a small warehouse that used to be a bakery, the meadery opened in 2020 right before the COVID pandemic, and currently produces 13 different brews of mead, ranging from 4% to to 14% ABV.

Although mead has been around for centuries, not many people know about the beverage in Japan. In fact, Yuki Yazawa, head brewer and CEO at Antelope, struggled at first with getting his operation up and running.

“I opened the meadery in early 2020, right before COVID hit. We were actually the first facility in Japan that’s completely dedicated to making mead,” says Yazawa.

As businesses around him screeched to a halt and travel restrictions were imposed, Yazawa had to hunker down and focus on experimenting, refining recipes, and constantly researching. Finding answers to his questions and troubleshooting recipes proved extremely challenging, though, since there was no precedent for mead making in Japan. But through years of practice and dedication, and along with some mead-making advice from kind strangers on the internet, Yazawa steadily perfected his craft.

“Traditionally, mead is sweet and weighty. The level of sweetness varies, and they can go from very sweet to very dry,” says Yazawa. “Besides just honey and water, you can also use fruits, hops, spices, or grains to create additional flavours.”

Using traditional Japanese aromatics, including lemon leaves, lime zest and kuromoji (a spice from Kyushu), a variety of their meads have seen success in Hong Kong, Singapore and Taiwan.

International recognition

Antelope Meadery recently added the Grand Champion Pro award to their accolades. This award is given at the Mead Madness Cup, the largest mead competition in Europe. Held in February this year in Krakow, Poland, the Cup featured 777 entries from 35 countries and 222 participating organizations. Evaluated by experienced mead, wine, and beer judges, including representatives from the European Mead Makers Association, this is the first time the award has gone to a producer outside Europe.

“We were chosen as the Grand Champion out of 777 entries. We weren’t thinking anything of it – we didn’t enter [the competition] thinking we were going to win, so it just came as a big surprise to us!” says Naoko Shimogaki, an inventory associate at Antelope.

Aurea 13, the winning brew, also won the Medium Session Mead award for best traditional mead with a semi-sweet or semi-dry flavour profile. Made with domestic honey from Hamamatsu in Shizuoka, Aurea 13 is a light and sparkling, semi-sweet brew with a golden hue with a faint green tint. With aromas of muscat grape, mint, and a touch of lemon, it has a bright acidity and a faintly bitter finish, and an ABV of 6%.

“Meads are coming back, and based on this win, we think there could be a shift in the preferences of mead drinkers [worldwide],” says Shimogaki. “Meads are usually rich, sweet, and weighty, but Aurea 13 and the meads we make are mostly light, sparkling, and not too high in alcohol content.” These flavour profiles also correspond with the styles of wines that the Japanese prefer: light, fresh, and low-alcohol styles that pair easily with local foods.

Mead’s low ABV and adaptability to take on additional flavours might even give it an edge, in light of the changing drinking preferences. “Maybe some people don’t want to drink alcohol too heavily, or maybe they’re just looking for something light to make a toast over dinner,” says Shimogaki. “We want to make drinks that really capture the essence and intricate flavours of the honey, that still pairs well with both food and celebrations.”

Japan’s growing mead scene

Yuki Yazawa, head brewer and CEO of Antelope Meadery with wooden casks of aging mead. Image: Rachel Teo

As the new player on the drink scene, mead has to compete with the current mainstays: Japanese sake, Japanese whiskey, and local craft beers. But while the mead scene in Japan is just under a decade old, the achievements in this area are already quite impressive. Japanese brewers have been winning awards at international competitions with select, high-quality meads since 2021.

Besides Antelope Meadery’s win at the 2026 Mead Madness Cup, Kyoto Mead Brewery also secured two bronze medals on their first competition appearance. Wicked Way Mead from Nagano won two awards at the same event, and has won other mead awards such as the 2026 UK Midsummer Mead Awards, and the 2025 Mazer Cup (USA).

At the 2024 Mead Madness Cup, Honeyboy & Co from Kagoshima placed second at the Traditional Dry Mead category with their Meadol Linden Honey mead. Eight Crowns, a meadery from Miyagi Prefecture, took home a gold medal at the 2023 BTI World Mead Challenge with their Wildflower Traditional Mead.

The scene faces two main challenges moving forward: promoting mead in Japan and procuring a sufficient stock of high-quality domestic ingredients.

“There’s a limited supply of domestic honey,” admits Yazawa, “while we source from Shizuoka, Nagano, Kumamoto, and all over Japan, it’s always a bit of a gamble, because the type of honey really affects the taste and quality of the final product.”

While Antelope’s earlier recipes made meads with honeys imported from Myanmar and Vietnam, the master brewer is now dedicated to keeping ingredients local. His goal? To capture the aromatic properties of the honey in every bottle.

Antelope Meadery hopes to create a beverage that showcases the best of Japan’s native goods.

“Local craft beer and gin use Japanese agricultural products, like hops, wheat, and barley,” notes Yazawa.

Although these ingredients are grown domestically, they were almost all originally brought to Japan from overseas. The type of honey and other aromatics that Antelope uses, on the other hand, are fully native to Japan.

“I really want to create a unique, and truly Japanese brew,” he says.

Other breweries are likely to follow suit, until the country as a whole has a new beverage to add to the repertoire of artisanal craftsmanship.

https://japantoday.com/category/features/food/mead-is-having-a-moment-in-japan 

From tapestry to taproom: British Museum commissions its own mead

From telegraph.co.uk

Fermented honey drink enjoyed by Vikings goes on sale at Bayeux exhibition 

While some may find history to be a bit dry, the British Museum has pulled out all the stops to make the Bayeux Tapestry exhibition a truly intoxicating experience by commissioning its own bottles of mead.

Tucked in the same gift shop as the more standard mugs, books and children’s toys are bottles of new “Bayeux Mead” created for the museum by the Biddenden vineyard in Kent.

This marks the first time the cultural institution has commissioned its own line of drinks.

Mead, a fermented honey drink, has been enjoyed for millennia, and Beowulf, the Anglo-Saxon epic, has scenes set in an immense “mead-hall” where warriors downed the drink.

Marketed as the “nectar of the gods” and bearing the museum’s branding, the mead will be sold to ticket holders alongside new “Bayeux” lager.

This has been appropriately brewed “for the British Museum” by the Battle Brewery, located in the Sussex village where the Battle of Hastings took place in 1066.

Lager cans feature the ill-fated King Harold II of England taking an arrow in the eye, a concluding scene from the 1,000-year-old Bayeux Tapestry, which will be open to the public from September 10.

The British Museum’s Bayeux Mead was made in Kent and is marketed as the ‘nectar of the gods’

The exhibition’s latest batch of tickets has sold out, and the museum’s display space seeks to control crowds and ensure ticket-holders can make it from one side of the 70m-long artwork to the other within their 40-minute timed slots.

On Monday night, VIP visitors attended the museum’s exhibition opening, which was attended by celebrities including actor Damian Lewis.

Despite the stature of those in the crowd, they were forced to join a queue several hundred yards long to catch a glimpse of the embroidery.

On first entering the space, visitors are shown a video that sets out some basic rules and states: “To ensure everyone can enjoy this remarkable object, please do not stop.”

If visitors do encounter dawdlers refusing to shuffle past the vast glass case, they are assured “you can move around other visitors to view the next part”.

A series of animated videos guide visitors through some of the basic history of 1066, a year in which William the Conqueror successfully contested the throne of England with Harold Godwinson.

The display room is dimly lit to protect the tapestry from damaging light and is filled with ambient music. The hope is that this will encourage a “solemn” atmosphere in which visitors will keep the noise down.

Signs also repeatedly tell visitors not to lean on the cabinet containing the fragile artwork, which could be destroyed by forceful vibrations.

Mitigating these vibrations was the most challenging aspect of moving the embroidery from Bayeux to London, a move supported by Emmanuel Macron, the French president, but opposed by many heritage experts in France because of the risks involved.

Science & Mechanics in Conservation of Heritage, an engineering company, and Hizkia, an art transportation company, transported the medieval artwork after months of preparation.

Part of this involved testing shock-proof crates on poor-quality German roads to prepare for potholes in the UK that may have caused vibration sufficient to rattle the tapestry.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2026/09/07/from-tapestry-to-tap-room-british-museum-commissions-mead/

California: Sonoma County’s only mead producer launches first taproom

From pressdemocrat.com

If the word “mead” brings to mind brawny Vikings or medieval kings clinking oversized mugs of sweet, heavy honey wine, HiveWorks Mead would like to change that image.

The Rohnert Park company is making a lighter, drier and effervescent version of the ancient drink — and now has a taproom where customers can try it.

HiveWorks opened its new tasting room July 15 on State Farm Drive, next to its production facility. The taproom gives the two-year-old company an expanded home as it looks to build its following for session-style meads.

“Our customers have consistently asked for a dedicated place they can hang out and enjoy our mead,” said Alexander Mendoza, HiveWorks’ co-founder, head mead-maker and CEO. “When the perfect spot opened up right next to our production space, everything just clicked. It felt like the exact right time to take this next step.” 

HiveWorks Mead Company launches new mead taproom in Rohnert Park. (Gunther Kirsch)

Made by fermenting honey with water and yeast, mead has long occupied a niche corner of the alcoholic beverage world. But producers are increasingly experimenting with sparkling, fruit-infused and lower-alcohol versions aimed at drinkers accustomed to craft beer, cider and wine.

The global mead beverage market is projected to reach $720.93 million in 2026 and nearly $1.89 billion by 2036, growing at an annual rate of 10.1%, according to Future Market Insights.

“People are definitely looking for craft alternatives to traditional beer and wine, and we feel our mead hits the mark,” Mendoza said. “It’s genuinely delicious and very approachable for all palates.”

From home brewing to mead

Mendoza and co-founder Sean Duckworth, both Sebastopol natives, met in second grade. Years later, while attending Sonoma State University, the two began making beer and cider in the closet of their small apartment. Their friend Julian Frank was experimenting with mead.

“We just loved the process of mead-making and found the history really interesting,” Duckworth said in a 2024 interview with The Press Democrat. “The fermentation process is really complex, and you have to use a lot of science and math to get the results you want.”

The trio eventually set out to create something different: a session-style mead that would be dry, carbonated and lower in alcohol than many traditional versions. Since founding HiveWorks in 2024, Frank has left the company while Duckworth remains a shareholder and Mendoza the chief executive.

HiveWorks uses Oregon honey and filters its mead to prevent re-fermentation in the can. The mead is produced without sulfites or preservatives — selling points Mendoza and Duckworth have banked on.

“It checks a lot of boxes for modern consumers,” Mendoza said.

HiveWorks Mead Company launches new mead taproom in Rohnert Park. (Gunther Kirsch)

HiveWorks currently offers several meads, including its flagship Skyborne, a dry session mead; Crimson Queen, made with blueberries; and Emerald Swarm, a dry-hopped version. Seasonal and experimental releases rotate through the line-up.

“Opening a taproom is a dream come true,” Mendoza said. “We’re so excited to finally have a brick-and-mortar home to share with the local community, and we can’t wait to welcome our neighbours and the supporters who have championed us from the start.”

The details

HiveWorks plans to celebrate the new taproom with a grand-opening party from noon to 9 p.m. Sept. 19, featuring live music, Dino’s Greek Food Truck and a new mead release.

The taproom is open 3-9 p.m. Thursday, noon-9 p.m. Friday and Saturday, and noon-6 p.m. Sunday.

HiveWorks Mead Company: 5701 State Farm Drive, Suite 116, Rohnert Park; 707-241-3143; hiveworksmead.com

https://www.pressdemocrat.com/2026/09/02/sonoma-countys-only-mead-producer-launches-first-taproom/

Alberta: Meadery in Mountain View County feeling ripple effect from U.S. tariffs

From thealbertan.com

Following past substantial growth, Fallentimber refocusing amid tariff uncertainty and reduced consumption 

MOUNTAIN VIEW COUNTY – Staying afloat as a business amid the economic turmoil created by U.S. tariffs as well as other factors like evolving consumer trends necessitates not only an ability to find opportunity in challenge but especially a willingness to adapt.

That kind of entrepreneurial spirit is one Nathan Ryan endeavours to embrace.

Ryan is the general manager at Fallentimber Meadery, a family-operated business that he and his brothers established some 16 years ago.

“I’ve been working full-time in Fallentimber since 2010,” he told the Albertan when contacted for comment on Aug. 25 in light of trade negotiations between the U.S. and Canada breaking down when Prime Minister Mark Carney had just days prior opted to walk away preferring “no deal to a bad deal.”

ON Aug. 22, the U.S. instituted tariffs of 50 per cent on various Canadian products.

All of Fallentimber’s sales of mead, honey and soda are primarily in Alberta, he said. 

“There is a small token amount of special order products that leave the province.”

However, even though Fallentimber currently does not directly do business anywhere in the U.S., the meadery has felt the ripple effect from recent U.S. tariffs, which increase costs for certain supplies crucial to their production line.

“We’ve seen price increases on things like cardboard,” he said.

“Now we’re starting to see aluminium increases. It took longer than I expected with aluminium, but it’s not insignificant,” he said, citing a close to 25 per cent increase since current tariffs went into effect earlier this summer.

“The cans went from about 21 cents to 28 cents starting the first of July,” he said. “That was a big jump.”

To date, Fallentimber has done what it can to eat those costs rather than pass them on to consumers. 

“Through the majority of all of the cost increases we have experienced over the last five to six years, we have absorbed it,” he said.

“Our observations on retail spending lately have led us to believe holding the line is all we can do. Honey is maybe our exception, where we don't really follow market pricing; we have a finite amount of honey that meets our desired quality for sale.”

Yet while Fallentimber is finding a way forward, the situation is a far cry from what before the pandemic was a much more promising future.

“We made huge moves towards growth in 2019,” said Ryan.

“We had talks with distributors happening from the U.S. and Asia and other places,” he said.

“COVID just kind of shut all those conversations down.”

The uncertainty of 2020 and 2021 also took a bite out of their bottom line, but there was “a huge surge in growth” going into 2022, he said.

“And then we started to see people sort of recoiling and clamming up in terms of alcohol consumption, it felt like,” he said.

“It also kind of correlated with when a lot of the Health Canada guidelines started coming out,” he said, referring to revised consumption guidelines that changed from a recommended maximum of two daily alcoholic beverages to two weekly drinks to minimize adverse health effects.

“I really didn’t expect it to have any sort of effect, but I feel like it did,” he said.

“I think it was an eye opener from, you know, the end of COVID days where everybody was letting loose and happy to be out and socializing.”

As to the latest round of tariffs imposed by the U.S. on Canada, which came into effect Aug. 22 with Canada set to impose dollar-for-dollar counter-tariffs that come into effect Sept. 8, Ryan can for now only speculate how Fallentimber will feel the impact.

“I don’t know where that’s going to go just yet,” he said, anticipating at the least an impact on honey pricing.

“We’ll keep our eye on the tariff side of things,” he said.

“But that’s all pretty new for us. It’ll take a while to realize what’s going on.”

https://www.thealbertan.com/mountain-view-county-news/meadery-in-mountain-view-county-feeling-ripple-effect-from-us-tariffs-12708489

Mead on the Menu: Is Honey Wine Hospitality’s Next Big Drink?

From businesstraveller.com

By Rebecca Pitcairn

The Ritz’s first female sommelier Emily Lambert has turned her passion for English wine and hospitality into a new generation of mead – taking this ancient drink into some of the UK’s chicest hotels, restaurants and wine bars 

In a world increasingly led by consumer demand, hotel and restaurant wine lists are evolving. From grower Champagnes (sparkling wine made by the same farmer or estate that grew the grapes) to no and low options, natural wines and sparkling ciders, the choice is expanding far beyond the traditional.

British sommelier-turned-winemaker Emily Lambert is on a mission to merge the worlds of modern and traditional wine by putting a contemporary spin on one of the world’s oldest alcoholic drinks – honey wine. 

Lambert made her name as the first female sommelier at The Ritz London, where she joined the hotel’s pioneering academy at just 17. She went on to become a champion of English wine, appear on BBC Two’s Million Pound Menu and work as a wine consultant before co-founding Loxwood Meadworks with her partner, Danny Bacon, in 2022.

A Revelation at The Ritz

Wine was not an obvious career choice for Lambert, who admits she knew little aside from the obvious categories – red, white or rosé. But a family visit to The Ritz for afternoon tea as a teenager left a lasting impression, and when she decided that further education at college was not for her, she began looking for an alternative path. 

Serendipitously, she discovered an advert for The Ritz Academy on the final day for applications, quickly submitted and of more than 400 hopeful applicants, she was one of just three chosen to join that year. The course trained apprentices across all departments of the hotel but Lambert’s first post was with the restaurant team, where she found herself working alongside sommeliers – despite being only 17 and unable to drink the wine.

“I was just pouring water at first, but I just loved the theatre of it all – the elegance and service of being a sommelier, and I guess entertaining the diners,” she explains. 

Becoming The Ritz’s first female sommelier was not without its challenges. In a traditionally male-dominated environment, she recalls guests sometimes assuming – with her hair slicked back and uniform of suit with tails – she was a young man. But those experiences only served to strengthen her determination and open doors. 

Emily Lambert     Credit: Loxwood Meadworks

Discovering English Wine

Lambert realised that some of the most interesting wines at The Ritz were not necessarily from the traditional European powerhouses. Working alongside French and Italian colleagues, who naturally championed their own countries’ wines, Lambert found herself becoming something of an English wine evangelist.

“My first was Gusbourne and I remember tasting it and being like ‘whoa, this is amazing,” she says. “Everyone talked about how bad English wine was, and I was like, look it really isn’t and that snowballed into this passion of wanting to represent them.”

But rather than trying to make English wine feel worthy or overly serious against its counterparts, she wanted to make it accessible, contemporary, fun and flirty. 

“I just feel that wine is enjoyed in such a fun environment. People typically enjoy it with friends and partners, and on a date, and I just felt like all those moments felt playful and sexy.”

It was that determination that led her to apply for Million Pound Menu with her then housemate, chef Ruth Hanson, in 2018. The BBC Two TV series mixed the competitive pressure of MasterChef with the investment drama of Dragon’s Den and saw the duo develop an all-British restaurant concept called Epoch, with everything sourced from within the UK. 

“We didn’t even use pepper, we dehydrated horseradish instead, we used completely British beverages, and obviously English wines, which was my passion.”

The pair secured interest from investors including chef Atul Kochhar, although the investment ultimately did not materialise. It was disappointing, but Lambert now sees it as part of a much bigger journey.

“I wouldn’t have met Danny if we didn’t do it this way.”

An Ancient Drink Gets a Modern Makeover

The couple met at Lockswood Joust, a medieval festival organised by Bacon and his family in West Sussex and where he was showcasing his mead. It was a drink that, despite years working in hospitality, Lambert had barely encountered.

Mead is believed to be the oldest fermented alcoholic drink in the world – archaeologists discovered evidence of honey wine production in China dating back to around 9,000 BC. It is also thought to be the origin of the word “honeymoon”, when newlyweds were traditionally gifted a one lunar cycle’s worth of honey wine to drink after their wedding.

“I just thought, ‘why do people not know about this drink?’ and felt it needed more recognition,” explains Lambert. She went on to develop Loxwood Meadworks with Bacon, to give mead a more contemporary identity and deliberately position it as a wine rather than a niche historical product. 

“We call it honey wine over mead, because I think that’s how customers can comprehend it in their mind better,” she adds. 

Credit: Loxwood Meadworks

From Bee to Bottle

Traditional winemaking techniques are used to create different expressions, from off-dry to oak-fermented and a traditional-method sparkling honey wine. The latter took patience with the second fermentation in bottle taking 18 months, compared with two to six weeks for grape wine. 

“But then that gave it its own distinct characteristic,” explains Lambert. “It had been that long on the lees, and then it started to develop these caramelized notes.” 

The wines are also beginning to demonstrate the importance of provenance. The honey comes from hives on a single-estate in Loxwood, and Emily says, there has been huge vintage variation. 

“In 2023, 12 hives produced more than 1,000 bottles. In 2024, the same hives produced only around 500 so it’s difficult to forecast what’s to come,” Lambert explains. “The flavours can be quite different too: 2023 was peachy and full of stone-fruit character, while the following vintage was more herbaceous.”

This is down to where the bees choose to fly. They can travel up to six miles from the hive; with the plants they visit influencing the resulting honey and wine. This provenance and ‘terroir’ is what makes honey wine – similarly to grape wine – fascinating when it comes to pairing it with food.   

“Depending on where the bees go, depending on the weather, depending on the soil,” says Lambert. “There’s so many factors that affect the influence on the wine.”

Winning Over Hospitality

Honey wine has found a receptive audience among some of Britain’s leading hospitality names; the Mandarin Oriental, Jason Atherton restaurants, Lady of the Grapes, Fortnum & Mason, Row on 5, The Dorchester and Coworth Park are among those that list Loxwood Meadworks, while they have collaborated with the recently opened Derby London City, Curio Collection by Hilton hotel on a bespoke bottle for its minibars. 

One of Lambert’s favourite early successes came at Gordon’s Wine Bar, where the product was placed under a dedicated honey wine category.

“They sold around 1,700 bottles in a year, which I think just goes to show that the demand for honey wine is there if venues are open to listing it,” she says. “It’s a lighter and fresher drink than people probably expect – quite aperitif-esque and I think that’s why it works well.” 

For Lambert, the parallels with the English wine category moving from curiosity to credibility – driven in part by sommeliers and hospitality professionals willing to put something unfamiliar in front of customers – has been essential to the marketing strategy. 

“Sommeliers act as our ambassadors – just as I did for English wine,” she says. “Our biggest challenge as a business is getting the message out there to the general public that honey wine could and should be a part of modern drinking culture.” 

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