Grovedale meadery earns international acclaim at World Mead Challenge

From everythinggp.com

Alberta, Canada

A Grovedale meadery is quickly gaining traction on the international stage, after a trio of their meads placed in the top 10 of the World Mead Challenge this past November.

Stolen Harvest Meadery, owned and operated by Kristeva Dowling and her husband Eric Erme, received the recognition from the Beverage Tasting Institute, with its Saskatoon Honey Wine placing in a tie for second in the world with a score of 92 out of a possible 100 points.

Two of its other meads, the Bochet Honey Wine and the Coffee Bochet Honey Wine, also placed in the top ten with scores of 91 and 90, respectively.

This makes for quite the rapid rise for Dowling, who hadn’t even considered making the fermented honey beverage until 2017, following a very strong harvest of honey on her farm.

Owner and founder of Stolen Harvest Meadery Kristeva Dowling showcasing her offerings at the Grande Prairie Farmers Market (Photo supplied by Stolen Harvest Meadery)

 

“We had like 200-300 pounds that year that our hives had brought in, and I was thinking to myself ‘there is only so much honey on toast you can eat’,” recalled Dowling. wondering what else she could use the abundance of honey for.

“So, I did a further search and down some rabbit hole I came onto mead.”

Mead is a beverage made by fermenting honey and water, and often contains other ingredients such as fruit, spices and grains.

Dowling says the first batch she decided to try and make was with saskatoon berries. Not having been big into meads prior to that batch, she was taken back by the quality and flavour of her inaugural brew.

But she wanted to know what those with greater expertise than her thought of her concoction.

“So, I sent my second batch away to a competition, just hoping to get some feedback, really,” said Dowling. “Like I say, I didn’t really know what I was doing.”

“And, I won a gold medal.”

With that quick success, Dowling says she began to make other meads and entered them into competitions.

Clearly receiving strong feedback, and her wanting to have a career where she could work from her farm in Grovedale, the decision to turn her mead hobby into a business became clear.

Dowling adds mead’s popularity is gaining traction here in Alberta, and her ability to showcase the world-class honey that is produced here in Alberta is exciting.

“Mead in Alberta seems to be growing, and rightly so,” said Dowling. “It should be something that grows here, because Alberta is also one of the greatest producers of honey in Canada. So, it’s a natural economic development growth pairing.”

Stolen Harvest currently produces five different types of mead. More details on those can be found at the Stolen Harvest website.

Aside from her mead operation, Dowling is also a published author. Her book Chicken Poop for the Soul: A year in Search of Food Soverignty focuses on her learning how to hunt, forage for, and preserve her own food.

https://everythinggp.com/2021/01/29/grovedale-meadery-earns-international-acclaim-at-world-mead-challenge/ 

 

 

 

 

York Viking shop Asgard to sell mead after lockdown lifts

From yorkpress.co.uk/news

VIKING mead in an array of different flavours will be on sale in York, UK after lockdown.

The owners of Viking gift shop Asgard have secured an alcohol licence in order to sell a specialist range of meads from their Little Stonegate premises.

James and Catriona Glazzard opened the business in July 2019 selling a range of replica Viking artefacts, textiles and books.But they now want to add Viking mead to their shelves.

Mead, explains Catriona, is a strong alcoholic drink made by fermenting water and honey with yeast and was popular in Viking times. 

"The Vikings drank mead but also light beer because it was safer than drinking water. The brewing and fermenting processes killed off all the bacteria and staved off dysentery," she said.

And mead has undergone its own makeover in recent times - much in the pattern of gin, becoming more popular and available in a wide range of flavours and styles. 

Catriona said: "From being a niche interest, mead is now a lot more popular.  Ten years ago, there were only one or two places in the UK that made it but in the past three or four years there has been more and more domestic manufacturing."

Lyme Bay Winery is one example where manufacturers are experimenting with the ancient product, making a black cherry mead as well as a chilli one.

Catriona said: "They sent us some samples of their Christmas mead and it was really good. It tasted almost mulled with flavours of cinnamon and cloves.

"But the black cherry was my favourite - I would love to make a trifle with that!"

Catriona says mead is quite strong - at 10 or 12 per cent - and is sweet like a dessert wine, although you can buy drier varieties. Sparkling versions are available too.

Elderflower flavoured mead is also popular, she added.

The shop plans to sell mead to customers once it reopens after lockdown. It will only be available to be consumed at home and not on the premises, she added.

"We want to introduce mead to people who have not had it before. It is not something you find in the supermarket. To be able to bring it into the shop and introduce it to people will be awesome. It is something a bit different. We will not be selling beer or gin - just mead because it fits in with our ethos."

The shop also sells decanters and glass ware - ideal for mead, she added.

The couple applied to City of York Council's licensing section for a premises licence/club premises certificate plus sale by retail/supply of alcohol.

A spokesperson for City of York Council said: "Police mediated with the applicant and agreed conditions, no representation have been received. The licence has been approved in the terms applied for with agreed conditions from the police."

 https://www.yorkpress.co.uk/news/19028003.york-viking-gift-shop-asgard-sell-mead-lockdown/

Is mead more like beer or wine?

 From foodprocessing.com.au

Believed to be the oldest fermented drink in the world, mead is also commonly known as ‘honey wine’ as it’s traditonally made from honey. So what on earth is mead and is it more like beer or wine?

Most people’s knowledge of mead (outside of Europe at least) is limited to Skyrim or Game of Thrones; however, this unique drink is on the rise worldwide.

Historically, the beverage has been popular amongst ancient Greek, African and Chinese cultures as they are known to have used mead in their diets as far back as 3000 BCE. It is also frequently consumed in Eastern Europe and Russia.

Today, Poland is the largest mead producer; however, the US is racing to take the crown with a new meadery said to be opening on average every three days.

In Australia, Honey Wines Australia brews mead using honey produced from its own hives scattered throughout the Hunter Region of NSW, from Toronto to Pokolbin. The company recently purchased another 50 hives to increase honey production, making them one of the busiest and fastest growing mead breweries in Australia. The honey used in their mead has been filtered but otherwise untouched, with no artificial additives.

Just like beer, mead is often flavoured with spices, fruits, hops or grains. It is generally higher in alcohol than beer and more in line with grape wine — typically anywhere from 8 to 20%. While it can be carbonated, it is more commonly still.

According to Honey Wines Australia owner Martin Jackson: “Honey wine is a very unique drink. Unlike grape wine, which is limited to a few grape varieties, mead can have almost unlimited flavours. This makes it exciting for us to bring new flavours out in the future as it is only limited by our imagination.”

The current line-up of mead flavours at Honey Wines Australia includes: traditional plain mead, Turkish delight, chai, watermelon, orange and pink grapefruit, lemon and ginger, and peach and passionfruit.

Honey Wines Australia said it now has plans to open a cellar door in the Pokolbin Hunter Valley wine trail in 2021.

https://www.foodprocessing.com.au/content/ingredients/article/is-mead-more-like-beer-or-wine--197603472 

Step back in time with glass of mead

 From eu.uticaod.com

---

By Colin Hubbell

Of all the fermented beverages on earth, it is believed that the most ancient of all is one that you don’t see much of these days (until very recently) — mead. With archeological evidence going back as far as 9,000 years ago in China, this historically prized concoction of fermented water, honey, and yeast — along with other adjunct ingredients depending on time, place, and brewer’s whim — has been the choice of kings, queens, and anyone else seeking “nectar of the gods.” Today there are over 500 meaderies in the United States alone, which speaks to its revival over the last decade or so.

A few years ago, pottery jars discovered preserved in Jiahu, China were dated to 7,000 BCE. Upon chemical analysis, they were revealed to be vessels for a mixed fermentation of honey, rice, and fruit. When Dogfish Head brewery found out about this discovery they used it as an opportunity to team up with archeologist Patrick McGovern to recreate something similar resulting in Chateau Jiahu. Brewed with muscat grapes, orange blossom honey, barley, hawthorn fruit, and sake yeast this occasional rarity is 10% alcohol by volume, and it has always been a personal favorite from their ancient ale series, giving one a sense for the variation of mead throughout the ages. 

Mead is so varied by some counts there are as many as 40 or more different types defined by regional fermentation methods, ingredients, aging, and a myriad of other factors. According to Trish Faubion of “Craft Beer & Brewing,” just a few of the more common types you may encounter on your mead-tasting journey include: Show Mead, a plain mead using just water, honey, and yeast; Melomel, mead with fruit added; Sparkling Mead, a bottle-conditioned version using sugar to create carbonation; Cyser, fermented with honey and apple cider; Metheglin, made with spices; Short Mead, produced using fast fermentation techniques; and Great Mead, brewed for strength and intended for aging. The diverse range of flavors in this unique beverage is also contingent on the honey type utilized, which in turn is based on the plant that these wonderful pollinators frequent. 

B. Nektar out of Ferndale Michigan is a company consistently producing tasty mead iterations, most of which are brews and blends incorporating spices and fruit for more approachable, lower alcohol interpretations that put exciting new spins on this antediluvian elixir.

If you happen to call upstate New York home you might be able to find some palate-intriguing meads from a small, local producer like Heartsease Hill in West Winfield. Here a husband and wife team pays close attention to the pollinating bees and their honey while creating imaginative variants of their own. Heartsease’s Satan’s Kiss presents an exciting interplay of flavors with subtly sweet honey and spicy pepper character, and for the adventurous palate, this mead is refreshingly different.  

This week's recommendation: Heartsease Hill Satan’s Kiss a strong mead fermented with spicy pepper. 10% ABV. West Winfield, New York.

Colin Hubbell is the co-owner of the Green Onion Pub and The Beer Hub in South Utica.

https://eu.uticaod.com/story/entertainment/2021/01/14/step-back-time-glass-mead/6597263002/