Miracle Stag Meadery Highlights Local Honey in Loveland, Colorado

From westword.com

Arpad László Kovacs combined his desire to make wine with his family’s experience in bee keeping to open Miracle Stag Meadery in Loveland, where he creates a wide variety of meads with Rocky Mountain water and local wildflower honey. “Honey is obviously the most important part of the product,” he explains, so he uses natural and organic ingredients, with no preservatives, whenever available.

One of his most popular small-batch meads, Dragonblood, is inspired by Game of Thrones. “It gets its wonderful red colour from cherries, raspberries, blueberries and blackberries,” Kovacs notes, adding that Dragonblood has a rounded character from oak aging, but the fruitiness still comes through in the finish.

                                                                   Arpad László Kovacs

Honeymoon, which is also oak-aged, is made with raisins and dates. “The oak flavour makes it perfect for making mixed drinks with whiskey or bourbon,” the mead maker points out. “In general, meads tend to have a bit of a sharp, boozy quality initially, which smooths out with oxygenation. It’s something not far from what you’d experience in whiskey or bourbon."

Just in time for fall, Yule Lad is spiced mead similar to apple cider. “It’s the flavours you’d find in an apple pie,” Kovacs says. Saucy Wapiti is his most classic mead style, made with just honey, water and yeast.

“People are realizing it’s another gluten-free option,” Kovacs notes of mead's recent increase in popularity. He adds that he has seen an increased interest from bars that want to offer mead to customers.

Because mead has the potential for aging well, Miracle Stag's bottles are labelled with a "born on" date, and they're also marked dry, semi-sweet or sweet to help you pick the right mead for your palate.

Currently, Miracle Stag Meadery is available by the pour at Brix Brew & Tap in Greeley, Loveland Tap & Tavern, and The Barrel and the Wapiti Colorado Pub, both in Estes Park. You can also buy it by the bottle in liquor stores throughout Northern Colorado, including Argonaut Wine & Liquor in Denver, Boulder Wine & Spirits and Wyatt’s Wet Goods in Longmont. For more information, visit miraclestagmead.com.

https://www.westword.com/restaurants/denver-best-green-chile-11483894

Mead is having a moment. Here are eight Ontario-born bottles and cans to try this fall

From torontolife.com

Mead doesn’t have its own section at the LCBO. The fermented honey beverage can be found stacked next to beers, ciders and wines. It’s not the Liquor Board’s fault, though: mead can be confusing. The ancient beverage has a huge scope of flavour profiles. There are straight-up meads that taste like a syrupy potion—the type of stuff Vikings wrote epics about. There are meads that are drier than a crisp chardonnay. And then there are a whole whack of mead blends. But one thing is for sure: craft mead is on the cusp of booming in Ontario. Here’s a look at a few locally made meads.

Royal Canadian Mead's Feels Like Friday

This summer, Royal Canadian Mead launched a line of sessionable meads, including one called Feels Like Friday, which marries honey with hopped buckwheat. The easy-sipping thirst quencher is aimed to woo craft beer and cider drinkers away from their preferred craft cans. Brewed out of Collective Arts (using soft Burlington water and a blend of wildflower and buckwheat honey from Bath, Ontario), the upstart mead company is hoping to grow big enough to open their own meadery. (That would require getting a property set up with a minimum of 100 on-site hives up and buzzing.) Until then, the Royal Canadian Mead guys are having fun collaborating with the Collective Arts cider maker Matthew Howell on crushable cans. $3.75. royalcanadianmead.com

Royal Canadian Mead's All Day Croquet

Although you can’t find Royal Canadian Mead’s sophomore effort, All Day Croquet, at the LCBO just yet, it’s at a dozen bars around town including Pharmacy, Poor Romeo, Antler and Ronnie’s. Civil Liberties is even creating on-the-fly cocktails with this sparkling mead. Although All Day Croquet is a blend of Oregon peaches and wildflower honey, the stone fruit is subtle and the sugar is kept in check. The crisp drink hits the nostrils with a bouquet of clover and peach. Drink this when you want taste summer.$6-$8. royalcanadianmead.com

All Or Nothing's Mind Over Matter Mead Braggot 

Not to reinforce stereotypes, but this barley-brewed beverage was born at a renaissance festival. A decade and a handful of tweaks latter, Oshawa’s All or Nothing brewery has moved their mead away from the sweet stuff they thought cosplaying knights wanted. The bubbly braggot (that’s a honey-fermented beverage brewed like a beer with barley malt) is refreshing with a nose of wildflowers, citrus and biscuits. $3.75. @allornothinbh

Rosewood Estate Winery's Mead Blanc

What happens when a third generation beekeeper becomes a winemaker? You get Niagara’s Rosewood, which produces top wines, meads, and pyments (wine-mead mashups). The sprawling Beamsville Bench property houses only a fifth of Rosewood’s bees. Their 300 hives are spread across eight sites, which means the bees feed on a mix of Niagara fruit trees and wild flowers such as milkweed, clover, black-eyed Susans, goldenrod, and dandelion. Rosewood’s most popular pyment blends honey and gewürz grapes into a bottle that’s sweet, but far from cloying, and perfect for pairing with Thai and Indian curries. $25. rosewoodwine.com

Rosewood Estate Winery's Mead Royale

Head winemaker Ryan Corrigan has more experience with grapes than bees, but he’s been becoming more comfortable with honey since arriving at Rosewood. Recently he began experimenting with aging meads in different types of barrels. “I’m taking meads to the dryer side—some end up sharing more of an identity with spirits, than wine,” he says. The Mead Royale—Rosewood’s most classic mead—ferments in stainless steel tanks before being moved to French oak barrels for six months. The resulting nectar—just a mix of estate honey, water and time—is sweet, but not syrupy, and at just shy of 50 grams of sugar per litre, it’s actually less sweet than most ciders. $19.95. rosewoodwine.com

Windswept Cider's Kyoto Rose Kombucha

Although this honey-brewed kombucha doesn’t quite fit into the mead category, for teetotallers looking to get in on the effervescent bee-sweetened action, this sub-0.5% ABV drink—made from dried rose petals and organic green tea—fits the bill. Windswept Orchard also makes a cyzer (a mead-cider hybrid), and this stuff actually tastes more like a lightly sweet cider than your run-of-the-mill vinegary kombucha. The Georgian Bay-based cider makers don’t always bring everything they produce down to Toronto when they pop down to peddle their bottles at local farmers' markets, but much their online store has very reasonable shipping rates. $12. windsweptcider.com

Munro Honey's Sweet Mead

Although this Alviston apiary has been collecting wildflower honey from their hives since 1914, it wasn’t until 2000 that third generation beekeeper John Bryans began selling mead. He started out as a home brewer (it was easy enough to siphon off a few buckets of honey to experiment with—he produces about 500,000 pounds of the sweet stuff annually). Today, he has the distinction of being Ontario’s first official meadery. Bryant is a big fan of honey-forward classic meads like this straw-coloured Sweet Mead, which is as advertised (sweet), and is best paired with strong cheeses. $15.86. munrohoney.com

Munro Honey's Black Currant Melomel

Munro Honey’s blend of honey and Ontario black currants has a tart nip to each sip. Although this melomel tastes slightly less sugary than Munro’s straight-up Sweet Mead, this actually packs more alcoholic punch. But, at 12.3 per cent, it’s no worse than a white wine. $17.46. munrohoney.com

https://torontolife.com/food/wine-and-beer/mead-is-having-a-moment-here-are-eight-ontario-born-bottles-and-cans-to-try-this-fall/

Bistro 72’s Locally Sourced Mead Cocktail: Mead Me at Bistro

From longislandpress.com

When luck pairs a local meadery with a restaurant that sources only locally grown ingredients and regional wines, something special happens — and it’s quite sweet. 
Mead Me at Bistro is a drink inspired by Beacon Meadery in Mattituck, says Robert Salvatico, president and COO of Hotel Indigo East End, which houses Bistro 72, an American restaurant and lounge with a farm-to-table menu ranging from tacos to flatbreads, burgers and seafood. The partnership came about after a chance meeting between executives from Bistro 72 and Beacon Meadery at the Long Island Food Council Summer Celebration, which hosted food and beverage tastings for more than 200 people.

“At Bistro 72, we use local ingredients from Long Island’s East End at any chance, and to work with this start-up for a light and crisp summer cocktail was a perfect match,” Salvatico says.
Mead Me at Bistro is made with Beacon Meadery Raspberry Mead, Deepwells Botanical Dry Gin (produced by Long Island Spirits, a micro distillery in Baiting Hollow), fresh raspberries, lime, and club soda. 

“With few ingredients, each flavour can be tasted as they work together for this summertime cooldown,” Salvatico says. “The mead is sweet and a bit thick in texture; paired with gin and club soda it cuts to a fresh and light texture with plenty to dance on your pallet. The muddled fresh fruit adds little bursts of summer and the lime juice adds a zing to accompany the raspberry.”

To make the cocktail, muddle the fresh raspberries with lime. Add the Beacon Meadery Raspberry Mead and Deepwells Gin into a cocktail shaker. Shake and pour over ice in a collins glass. Top with club soda, and garnish with a lime wedge and raspberry. 

“This new addition has been well received by guests,” he says. “With the growth in popularity of mead, it grabs attention with its fun name and bright colour. Many people visit Long Island’s East End to try new spirits; having mead on the menu absolutely fits into the experience our guests are looking for.”
Bistro 72 is located at 1830 W. Main St. in Riverhead. bistro-72.com

https://www.longislandpress.com/2019/09/07/bistro-72s-locally-sourced-mead-cocktail-mead-me-at-bistro/

Eat, Drink And Be Murphy: NY feels the need for mead

From waynepost.com/news

An upcoming Cornell Cooperative Extension of Ontario County conference in Geneva aims to create a new buzz for this old craft beverage made from honey

GENEVA — Many of the Earle Estates Meadery visitors have stopped in to try mead because they’re fans of the hit show, “Game of Thrones.”

For the purposes of this column, all you need to know about the show is that it’s set in medieval times and its characters drink lots of wine and lots of mead.

So many may come because of the show, said Paul Curcillo, who with wife Stephanie King are principals of the Penn Yan meadery, which with Torrey Ridge Winery and WortHog Cidery make up CK Cellars.

But when they leave, they’re fans of mead.

“I think people are looking for something different and something new,” Curcillo said.

New York state, and perhaps the Finger Lakes region, is poised to experience a renaissance for what many consider the world’s oldest craft beverage — mead.

Sometimes known as sweet wine, this craft beverage made with honey has the industry abuzz, according to Pilar McKay, agricultural economic development resource educator for the Cornell Cooperative Extension in Ontario County.

Late last year, the state authorized the licensing of farm meaderies for the manufacture and sale of mead made exclusively from New York-produced honey. Similar legislation led to a boom in the local craft beer, cider and distilled spirits industries throughout the state.

A two-day mead-making conference in Geneva next week, with tastings the first night, will focus on all aspects of making mead, from production to marketing to merchandising and more — and will bring together honey producers in front of craft beverage makers in the hope of determining the next step for growth.

Mead is probably one of the last craft beverages that can be opened up for growth this way, said McKay, who is organizing the conference.

“It’s an exciting time to learn about mead,” McKay said. “For me, the conference is an opportunity to listen and to find out where the missing links are.”

New York is well-suited to support mead in a big way.

Here are some numbers: According to the USDA, New York produced more than 2,668 million pounds of honey in 2018, which was valued at $8,978,000 — more than Maine, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Vermont combined, McKay said.

“We already have the honey to do it,” McKay said. “We may already be there. It’s part of the excitement of discovering new things.”

New York has been gaining speed quickly in the mead industry, and the passing of the farm bill makes it easier to start a meadery, according to Vicky Rowe, executive director of the American Mead Makers Association and a scheduled speaker at the conference.

“I expect to see a lot more meaderies in New York going forward,” Rowe said in an email. “There is plenty of interest and enthusiasm for mead.”

And it’s not like mead is a hot new fad, although Rowe calls it “the oldest new thing out there in craft alcohol.”

Mead has been around since ancient times, according to many historical accounts. The oldest meads came from China and India, said Rafael Lyon, owner of Enlightenment Meadery in Brooklyn and a speaker at the conference, but it was and is made all over the world.

“Anywhere people kept bees, they made mead,” Lyon said.

Mead saw renewed attention in the 1950s, but the industry really took off in the 1990s, Rowe said. Right now, there are 600 operating meaderies, with over 200 in the process of opening.

“A lot of the momentum is coming from the under-40 age group, who are very open to new things,” said Rowe, who added she has been fascinated by the beverage since the 1980s and makes it herself.

Because of its culinary history, many people are more apt to have family recipes passed down than for, say, beer or spirits, McKay said. Mead also is a craft beverage that is gluten-free.

Keynote speaker Ken Schramm owns a meadery in Michigan and is author of the home mead-making guide, “The Compleat Meadmaker.”

“It’s easier to make mead than other craft beverages, at home,” McKay said.

Mead and cider, in a lot of ways, are similar. Both are perceived to be sugary and sweet, which is a misconception, Lyon said.

Some are, but not always.

Lyon said almost 2,000 customers visit for tastings every month.

“We like to explain that in fact, all alcohol, whether it be beer, wine or spirits, starts as something sweet,” Lyon said. “How it ends up when it’s done is up to the winemaker or mead maker.”

In addition to fermented honey, mead can be made with apples and cherries and other herbs such as chamomile, yarrow and rosehips, Lyon said. Enlightenment Meadery uses sumac flowers because of the Hudson Valley ecosystem it’s located in and only makes dry mead, Lyon said.

Rowe said mead can range from as dry as a bone to as sweet as anyone could want, with a virtually unlimited number of flavour combinations, from honey to fruits to spices and even chili peppers. The drink also can have as low as a 5% alcohol level or as high as 18%.

Here, Earle Estate uses clover honey, and some styles include raspberry and strawberry, some of which are drier or sweeter than others, Curcillo said.

“Now, there’s a mead for everybody. The truth is, a good wine, a good cider, a good mead is one you like,” Curcillo said. “It’s the beauty of our industry. You can taste it before you buy it.”

And many believe there will be more opportunities to try it as the industry grows.

Citing American Mead Makers Association statistics, Lyon said mead became the fastest growing product category in the alcohol trade in 2013, and continues to grow every year.

“I think as long as mead makers focus on using local honey and local ingredients, we can generate a New York mead industry,” Lyon said. “Small mead makers, embracing their local environment, is the way to go. Much like in any winemaking practice, with grapes or otherwise high-volume industrialized production, using bulk foreign honey and fruit produces a lower quality product and destroys the sense of place that consumers are looking forward to.”

Mead has been around this long, so why not even longer?

“It’s a fantastically versatile beverage that has been a part of the human story literally as long as we have written history,” Rowe said.

https://www.waynepost.com/news/20190906/eat-drink-and-be-murphy-ny-feels-need-for-mead