The drink of Vikings, mead is back with a bang. As a drink, its reputation spans generations and is the stuff of legends, literally. However, it is understood that Vikings have no monopoly over good old mead. Known as honey wine, mead stands out as something of a hybrid between wine and beer. There is no such thing as a simple mead recipe, after all. The truth is far from it.
Mead lovers have ensured that mead has respectably made a comeback and with the popularity in sales across the country, it seems like the drink is here to stay. Naturally, you need to first understand mead’s primary backbone. Then you need to know how it stands apart from both beer and wine. Here is a structured analysis.
Beer Brewing Story
Beer draws up its taste from the use of hops, barley, yeast and water. The beer making process sees sugar extraction and fermentation using the ingredients mentioned. This gradually converts the sugar into carbon dioxide and alcohol. The process begins with heating, drying and cracking grains of barley.
Then some heavy duty soaking activates the enzymes in barley. Once this step, called mashing, is over; the makers move on to boiling the wort (sugar laced raw beer). Post this, the addition of flavours takes place. After some more cooling, yeast helps ferment the liquid to lend it a final avatar called beer!
Mead Making Story
Explore how mead is manufactured, and analyse the differences. The primary ingredients here are water, yeast and honey. Honey is thinned using water to form a dilute version called must. Customization of taste is done at this stage using fruits or even veggies.
Post this, yeast clubs up with oxygen for fermentation. After this, the mead is left to rest for long spans that run in months or even years.
While both these drinks come in varied styles, their flavours are distinctive. Mead has a cider-laced undertone dominated by fruity taste. It ranges between dry and sweet. Beers range between malty to bitter to even roast-y. Some are even crispy and hoppy
Wine is just Fine
Wine is said to be a fine drink. With lots of variety and flavour, wines are a tough nut to crack when it comes to analysing quality. Then again, wine is starkly different from mead even though the fruity undertones sometimes seem common depending on the wine/mead in question.
The crux of wine is grapes. Period. Wines need very specific conditions for manufacture while mead is not selective in such contexts.
Wine production is a complex process. It involves harvesting grapes in specific climatic conditions. In the easiest way, it can be stated that wines come to be post crushing of grapes and involve aging grapes, in some cases. Yeast isn’t a preferred medium for fermentation in most wines.
Variants of wines are categorized as per region of origin, toastiness, sweetness and dryness. Wines also see huge taste alterations due to the levels of fullness, tannins and acidity involved.
Conclusion
Mead is a drink that is easier to store and lasts longer, in comparison with wine. Despite the comparison, mead is gradually becoming an everyday drink, of late. Price point wise, mead beats both beer and wine. The only thing is that you need to adapt to mead. It is a robust drink but lovers of mead swear by it. Overall all, the three drinks have their loyalists. The peculiarities of each make them so exclusive that comparing among these seems paltry! Let us finally raise a toast to mead for holding its own against the popular cousins.
Bochet vanished for centuries, but meadmakers are bringing it back—at least in spirit
It starts with a cauldron, an open flame, and a good measure of raw honey. Then—double, double, toil and trouble—stir constantly until the honey spits black steam at you. Add water and stand back as it erupts, volcano-like. Throw in some yeast and spices and, after it ages a bit, behold: bochet, a mysterious and lost style of mead.
My path to recreate this ancient and mysterious beverage would take me on a deep dive into the nitty-gritty of medieval yeast strains, and turn my tiny kitchen into a mad scientist’s lab. It would have me digging through scant archival records about obscure systems of measurement in 14th century France. This experiment would require my biggest stockpot—and nerves of steel.
“Caramelizing honey is kind of terrifying,” says Ontario microbiologist Bryan Heit, the brains behind popular homebrewing reference site Sui Generis Brewing. While Heit experiments mostly with beer, particularly traditional styles, he’s been intrigued by bochet for years.
“It truly is a lost style. It’s not a historical style that has survived into the modern era,” says Heit. “It’s literally something that disappeared.”
A sip of honey, caramel, and history in a glass of finished wild-ferment bochet. Gemma Tarlach for Gastro Obscura
Bochet is mentioned, briefly, in French texts as early as 1292, according to research by independent scholar Susan Verberg, published in 2020 in ExArc Journal. The first and only complete recipe for the drink—and the primary source for modern recreations—turns up in 1393, in what might be considered a manual of mansplaining.
An anonymous French writer penned an exhaustive guide to etiquette, moral conduct, and the practical concerns of a young bride, from choosing servants to throwing feasts: Le Ménagier de Paris (The Good Wife’s Guide). “It’s a ridiculous book,” says Verberg. “It’s micromanagement. I would not have wanted to be his wife.” The book was known mostly in medievalist circles until 2009, when it was fully translated into modern English for the first time. And there, in between reminders of the need for wifely submission and tips on keeping fleas out of the bedclothes, was a curious recipe for something called bochet.
The recipe called for water and honey, plus “brewer’s yeast” and an assortment of spices, including ginger and cloves. That’s standard fare for medieval mead, as were the steps describing fermentation. But the very first few steps were unique: “Put it in a cauldron on the fire to boil” and stir until the honey blisters and bursts, “giving off a little blackish steam.” Unlike any other mead, which is based on raw or gently warmed honey, bochet requires the honey to be caramelized.
A preserved recipe for an extinct beverage is a rarity, and its unique method tantalized historic reenactors and homebrewers alike, including myself. While I’ve made small-batch meads in the past, they have all been based on modern ratios, and none involved a cauldron. Commercial meadmakers have been particularly intrigued by the idea of caramelization: The process offers new possibilities, unlocking “all those roasty, toasty, nutty flavours,” says Jen Otis of KVLT Mead in Tacoma.
Finding a vessel that’s big enough can be a challenge, however, particularly for commercial-scale bochet. “Honey can double, possibly triple, in volume when heated to certain temperatures. For safety, the vessel would have to be four times larger than what you think you would need,” says Ricky Klein, head meadmaker at Vermont’s Groennfell Meadery. He has made small-scale, experimental bochets, and has some words of wisdom. “There are two things I will always say about a bochet. One is, you have never been scalded like getting boiling honey on your skin. It is a second-degree burn, immediately. It can be a very, very nasty burn,” says Klein. “The second thing is, what I just said.”
For some homebrewers, the danger of recreating bochet may be the very thing that attracts them to it. “People who like rollercoasters and jumping off cliffs like bochet,” says Verberg with a laugh. “You can make a sugar volcano that will explode, violently.”
To recreate bochet—at least the version detailed in Le Ménagier, the only full recipe to survive—I started at the source. Most modern interpretations call for a ratio of 3–4 pounds of honey per gallon of water. Le Ménagier calls for one quart of honey (about 3 pounds) per septier, an antiquated measurement that varied from one region to the next. Digging through the scant historical records available online, I found that, in Paris, a septier equalled about four gallons. Modern versions use four times the honey, or more, as the 1393 version.
“The Beekeepers” by Pieter Bruegel, 1565, shows cone-shaped skeps, made of coiled hay or dried grass, used to house honey bees. Beekeepers often crushed the entire skep, bees and all, to harvest the honey. The Print Collector/Getty Images
Then there’s the honey itself. “Honey as diverse as what they had access to then, when monoculture was not a thing, was very different,” says Verberg. Harvesting techniques have also changed: Today, commercial beekeepers and most hobbyists use extractors that pull honey out of the wax comb through centrifugal force. Back in medieval times, says Verberg, “They weren’t extracting the honey, they were crushing it.” In addition to bits of wax, the medieval mead makers also had pollen and the occasional squished bee in their raw material—components missing from modern honey that would have added more flavour. For example, propolis, a sticky, antibacterial compound that bees produce for colony health, has a zingy taste, and beeswax itself can impart a fuller mouthfeel. “I found that that contamination is really good, and we’re really missing it,” says Verberg, a beekeeper who has made traditional meads.
As a beekeeper, I have access to raw honey produced from a wide range of flowers. Instead of using honey I’d extracted and strained the modern way, however, I crushed some comb taken from a colony that had unfortunately not survived winter—the bees’ lasting legacy would be to provide honey close to what was available in the 14th century, including the occasional stray leg or wing.
The bochet bubbling away as it ferments. Gemma Tarlach for Gastro Obscura
To avoid the chlorine, fluoride, and other additives found in modern tap water, I opted for distilled water. The spices called for in the Le Ménagier recipe include supermarket staples such as ginger and cloves, but also long pepper and grains of paradise. I used a pepper blend that included grains of paradise and added some cardamom, which, combined with black pepper, is often cited as a long pepper substitute.
The toughest thing to recreate from 1393 is the yeast, which, next to the caramelization of the honey, would have had the most impact on a bochet’s taste. Unlike medieval yeasts, which were not cultured in clean labs, modern commercial yeasts are typically single strains bred for reliability and characteristics specific to their use: A commercial wine yeast will perform very differently, and create different flavours, than bread yeast. While most modern bochet recipes use a wine or champagne-style yeast, Le Ménagier called for beer (or, in a pinch, bread) yeast. Heit, Verberg, and others who’ve dabbled in historic bochet suggested trying everything from English-style ale yeast to Norwegian Kveik, now commercially available after being used by farmhouse brewers “for over a thousand years,” says Heit. “It’s not the yeast historical to the France area, but it might be closer to what they had.”
To get as close as possible to a vintage 1393 bochet without investing in special equipment, and to learn how different yeasts might affect the final product, there seemed only one option: a controlled trial. I adapted Le Ménagier’s recipe for a smaller batch and then divided that into six micro-batches; only the yeast would be different.
I bought a few commercial ale-brewing strains other mead makers had suggested, as well as a dry white wine variety often called for in online modern bochet recipes. I also reserved a little of the caramelized honey for a wild-ferment bochet: I would collect whatever yeast was in my environment, similar to how sourdough bread is traditionally made.
I also added a few organic raisins, which would help the yeast get started. The concept is the same as adding a lab-derived yeast nutrient powder, called for in many modern bochet recipes; the difference here is that medieval mead makers would have had access to raisins or other dried fruit.
With a big enough pot, caramelization was a safe and stress-free process—though, full disclosure, I’ve worked as a pastry chef and this was not my first time to the sugar volcano rodeo. Once measured into their glass jars, each batch bubbled away happily for a month before being strained and moved into new, clean containers for the duration of fermentation.
While transferring them to new jars, I sampled the month-old batches. They were thinner in body and less sweet than other meads I’ve made, thanks to the lower ratio of honey-to-water. The different yeasts gave each micro-batch its own distinct character, from a bone-dry, astringent drink made with white wine yeast to the sweeter and smoother concoction that used English ale-style yeast. The Kveik’s dominant notes were bitter and medicinal—perhaps appropriate, since Verberg’s research suggests bochet may have been drunk to balance one’s humours. The wild yeast strain was milder overall, similar to the English ale–style but not as sweet.
My mad experiment. Gemma Tarlach for Gastro Obscura
“You have to do a decent amount of conjecture as you try to get close to what they did,” says Jereme Zimmerman, author of Make Mead Like a Viking. “In some cases, you really try to recreate what they did historically, and it doesn’t come out that great.”
The experiment was not a disappointment. Unlike many beers, meads are generally meant to be aged, and most don’t reach their potential for a year. So I’ll bottle these batches when they stop bubbling, and set them aside to see what develops. All of them taste of caramel, honey, and history.
Bochet
Adapted from Le Ménagier de Paris, 1393 Yields 1 gallon
Ingredients 1 pint (24 ounces by weight) good quality, raw honey, preferably local and multi-source, such as wildflower honey 1 gallon plus 1 pint water, distilled or spring (do not use tap water) 4 grams (about 1 rounded teaspoon) of commercial wine, beer, or bread dry yeast, either single-strain or a combination per preference (do not use rapid-rise bread yeast) 1 ounce (28 grams or about 3 tablespoons) organic raisins, chopped 6 grams (about one tablespoon) fresh ginger, skin on, chopped 4 cloves, whole 20 green cardamom pods, lightly crushed 8 grams (about one tablespoon) whole black peppercorns, or peppercorn blend (preferably including grains of paradise), lightly crushed
Step 1
The first step toward making bochet is the most important and potentially most dangerous: Caramelize the honey. Boiling honey, or any sugar, can be messy and, if done improperly, can cause severe burns (unlike water, boiling sugar adheres to the skin). Choose a tall pot at least three times larger than the volume of the honey.
Place the pot on stove and add one gallon of the water. Make a mental note of the waterline on the pot for later reference (if using a pot that has quarts and gallons marked on the side, skip this step). Pour the water out into another container but keep it within easy reach. Wipe the pot dry.
Turn the burner on medium-high heat and add the honey to the pot. Monitor the honey closely; when it starts to bubble, begin stirring it gently with a long-handled stainless steel or wood spoon, making sure that the spoon touches the bottom of the pot. Avoid sloshing or splattering honey up the sides of the pot, where it can burn. The edges of the honey will begin to darken when caramelization starts; the bubbling will then slow and the honey will take on a foamy appearance. The bubbles will start to pop and emit steam; to avoid scalding your eyeballs, do not lean over pot. If the honey begins to swell, lower the heat but do not stop stirring.
As the honey continues to darken, you can test its colour by letting a drop of it fall from the spoon onto a plate, where it will quickly harden. Do not stick your finger in the boiling honey. Do not touch the drop of honey, which will remain hot for several minutes.
When the honey is a deep mahogany colour (after 20–30 minutes, depending on the type of pot and burner setting), turn off the burner. Do not lean over the pot. Slowly pour in about two cups of the water while continuing to stir. The caramelized honey will swell dramatically and sputter intensely for a few seconds, shooting up a lot of steam. If you have chosen your pot wisely and are not leaning over it, you’ll be fine.
Continue stirring and gradually add the remaining water. Bring to a boil and reduce to the level noted earlier (or to the gallon mark on the inside of the pot). Turn off the burner and remove the pot from the heat. Let it cool to room temperature, which may take a few hours or even overnight. Do not refrigerate, since fermentation will only occur at or slightly above room temperature.
Step 2
While the caramelized honey syrup is cooling to room temperature, wash and sanitize the fermentation vessel and lid. To make a gallon batch of bochet without investing in specialized home brewing equipment, use a wide-mouth gallon glass jar and a silicon fermentation lid. Be sure the jar and lid are dry before proceeding.
Prep the spice sachet by adding the spices to a square of cheesecloth, folding up the sides and tying it with kitchen twine to make a little bag.
Add about ¼ cup of distilled or spring water to your vessel. The water should be between room and body temperature, neither cool nor hot. Add the chopped raisins. Sprinkle the yeast into the water and let it sit for a few minutes until the yeast dissolves and the water looks cloudy.
The nice golden hue of a bubbling batch of bochet. Gemma Tarlach for Gastro Obscura
Pour in the caramelized honey; you may strain it through cheesecloth if you wish but this is optional. Leave about an inch of space at the top of the jar. Place the spice sachet in the jar and then cover with the fermentation lid and outer ring. You want an airtight fit so that undesirable microbes can’t get in. Swirl gently and place it out of direct sunlight but somewhere you can keep an eye on it. Do not place the jar near a heat source. After an hour or two, you should start to see lots of tiny bubbles shooting up through the liquid. The top of the developing mead may foam or get scummy-looking. Just let it be. If liquid overflows through the fermentation lid’s one-way valve, wipe it with a clean cloth but do not open the jar. After two days, open the jar briefly just to remove the spice sachet, which you can toss or reuse if making another batch at the time.
After two to four weeks, you will notice the bubbles slow. Wash, sanitize, and dry another gallon jar and place a funnel with a double layer of cheesecloth in its mouth. Remove the fermentation lid and gently pour the liquid into its new home. Discard the semi-solid material in the original container. The liquid should appear clearer once transferred. Close the new container with the fermentation lid and store in a dark, cool place for at least a month, preferably three or more. You can transfer the liquid to a new vessel monthly for a clearer finished product, but this is optional.
To bottle the bochet, wash and sanitize flip-top beer bottles; be sure they are dry before using. Using a funnel and cheesecloth, gently pour the bochet into each bottle but do not fill completely. Leave at least two inches of space. Close using flip-top and store upright in a cold, dark place. Avoid shaking.
Excessive gas can build up in the bottle if you overfill it or bottle it before fermentation has finished. This may cause the bottle to explode. For this reason, I store my bottled mead and bochet in a large bin in the basement, with the bin lid weighted down so that, if it does explode, it won’t make too much of a mess. When opening a bottle of homemade bochet, do so outside or with the bottle in the kitchen sink, just in case built-up pressure causes a geyser-effect.
A pair of brothers, Bryan and Kevin Logue, have embarked on a new business venture in rural Fountain, and they recently gave an interview to introduce their business to the community.Sugar Creek Vineyard and Meadery has been open since the spring of this year, and the brothers say that it’s a case of “so far, so good.”
As a small family-owned business, the Logue brothers wear many hats in their operation, and they rely on help from their families as well.Although both brothers pitch in on wine-making, Kevin tends to specialize on the care of the vines and growing, Bryan handles most of the marketing and sales.
Kevin and Bryan enjoying the fruits of their labour. Photo by Rich Wicks
Kevin noted that the vineyard includes several varieties of grapes that are hearty enough to withstand the harsh Minnesota winters.Currently, the vineyard includes Itasca, Frontenac Blanc, Breanna, and Prairie Star grape varieties.Kevin noted that grape growers have to be constantly vigilant for a number of threats to the crop.When the vines are young, grazing deer are a significant concern.As the vines get older, fungus becomes more of a worry.And during harvest time, birds become a pesky problem, as they attempt to steal the ripening grapes.
Both Bryan and Kevin shared that their business is a lot of hard work.Kevin explained, “You’re got to really enjoy working outside.Most of the work happens in the vineyard, it doesn’t happen in the winery.Things in the winery can always wait, but things in the vineyard can’t.”He said the busiest time is during harvest, and added, “When certain varieties get ripe, you’ve got a window to pick them.You’ve got to get them in.And once you get them off the vine, unless you have a lot of refrigeration, you’ve got to get them crushed and stemmed and pressed, and you’ve got to start the fermentation process really quick.”
For those not familiar with the term “mead,” it refers to wines that have honey as a significant ingredient.Bryan explained that he and Kevin have worked hard to avoid a heavy, sweet honey flavour in their meads.Instead, they aim for a barely noticeable honey flavour, which enhances the individual flavours of the grapes being used.
Bryan raises his own bees to provide much of the honey needed for mead production, but says when more honey is needed, they buy it locally.Regarding the number of bees he keeps, Bryan answered, “Ideally, I want to be around 10 to 12 hives.I had everything up north for quite a while, then I moved it down, and the bees didn’t appreciate that, so a lot of them took off.So I’m starting from scratch.I’ve got two really, really big hives, and they’re doing great.”Bryan added that he aims to “hide” the thick honey taste so that his meads appeal to a wider audience.
One of Sugar Creek’s most popular products so far has been “Meadarita,” a mead that includes jalapeno and lime.Although the mead smells quite spicy, Bryan explained, “I use the lime zest, I don’t use the rind.And what that zest does is it pulls that heat off your tongue right away, and it comes back abut twenty seconds later.”He added that at tasting events, when people hear about Meadarita, “Most of those people who say they’re not going to like it end up leaving with a bottle.”
Bryan and Kevin welcome the community to come out and see them, or talk with them at any of the local wine tasting events they participate in.Several local outlets have started selling Sugar Creek wines and meads, and more are expected.Sugar Creek Vineyard & Meadery is located two miles west of Fountain, at 23661 County Road 8.From now until late autumn, the brothers expect to be open Saturdays 1-8 p.m. and Sundays 11 a.m.-5 p.m.
When asked about their business plan and what goals they have for the future, Bryan stated, “It’s just kind of grown slowly.We’re both well into our careers and we just want to do it right.Every week we’ve had more and more people coming.”
Currently the brothers offer five varieties of wine and six types of mead, although they said those numbers will see seasonal fluctuations.Kevin added, “Our goal is to work on the craft.Get a good product, make sure people like it.Figure out what people want, and then if we get a good response, then we’ll grow.”
BOVILL – Camas Prairie Winery in Bovill, Idaho is North Idaho’s oldest winery that houses six different types of meads and various wines making it the perfect destination to celebrate International Mead Day.
The winery itself has been in business since 1983, however, owner Jeremy and his wife Heidi Ritter took over about 10 years ago. Camas Prairie was home to meads long before the Ritter’s celebrated the grand re-opening, but it was always something that peaked their interest.
“I got into it as first as a hobby,” said Ritter. “When the business was for sale I took to opportunity to keep it going”.
Mead is a honey fermented wine that has proved challenging to make. Ritter mentioned that it is just like making regular grape wine with the exception that honey is harder to get into the solution. Every mead sold from Camas Prairie is made with the lightest local honeys around ensuring every glass is packed with flavour.
The winery offers mead in a regular flavour called Palouse Gold, raspberry, strawberry, blackberry, elderberry and then their most popular huckleberry flavour. Your first taste of the sweet drink you catch all the flavours mixed into the beverage and then the honey flavour sneaks in leaving a delectable aftertaste.
The signature meads have stood the test internationally and won over 50 medals and awards over the years at commercial wine competitions. Most recently, the raspberry flavour won a double gold, and the strawberry won silver at the San Francisco International Wine Competition.
They also have a wide variety of other drinks in their tasting room. They offer a unique spiced wine and have their own grape wines as well such as, merlot, Riesling, wild plum and many more. They also have a full bar inside to ensure there is a drink for everyone.
Being open seven days a week there is a constant flow of individuals going into their tasting room in Bovill, as well as, their pop up tent at the Moscow Farmers Market. Jeremy is the sole worker at the winery every day other than Saturday. When he is at the market, Heidi steps in to help out. As much as he works, Ritter loves what he does.
“Moving forward, my biggest plan is to just keep making mead,” said Ritter. “I want to expand on that part and keep having people come in and try everything we have”.
To try Camas Prairie’s signature meads yourself they are open Monday – Saturday 11 a.m. – 7 p.m. and Sunday 12 p.m. – 6 p.m. You can also find Jeremy himself under their signature tent at the Moscow Farmers Market on Saturdays 8 a.m. – 1 p.m.
