Island to host Ireland’s first public mead-making experience

From advertiser.ie

A remote island on Ireland’s Wild Atlantic Way will become the home of what is believed to be Ireland’s first public mead-making experience when visitors gather on Inishturk Island on Saturday, July 11, to discover, taste and create one of humanity’s oldest alcoholic drinks.

Limited to just ten participants, the immersive experience will combine Irish history, traditional craftsmanship, premium Irish honey and hands-on fermentation, with every guest creating and taking home their own one-gallon (4.5 litre ) batch of mead.

The event is being delivered as part of the Taste of Inishturk Festival 2026 in conjunction with Wild Atlantic Mead and the Inishturk Native Irish Honey Bee Sanctuary. The festival celebrates the island’s unique culture, heritage, food, community and natural environment, bringing visitors to one of Ireland’s most spectacular offshore destinations.

The mead-making experience forms one of the festival’s flagship activities and offers visitors a rare opportunity to discover, taste and create Ireland’s oldest drink while experiencing life on a remote Atlantic island. 

Places are strictly limited to just 10 participants, and advance booking is essential. Tickets are priced at €135 per person and include return ferry travel, a two-course lunch, honey and mead tastings, all workshop materials and ingredients, and a one-gallon (4.5 litre ) batch of mead to take home.

Bookings can be made via https://inishturkisland.com and participants must be aged 18 years or over.

Mead, often known as honey wine, predates both beer and wine and is believed to have been consumed for more than 9,000 years. In Ireland, mead was associated with kings, warriors and hospitality, with references appearing throughout Irish mythology and early medieval history.

Ancient Irish kings are said to have celebrated with mead in the halls of Tara, while honey wine featured prominently in feasting, hospitality and ceremonial occasions throughout Irish history.

The drink is also closely associated with weddings and is widely believed to have contributed to the origin of the term “honeymoon”, when newly married couples were traditionally gifted honey wine following their wedding.

The experience will be led by Sean O’Connor, founder of Wild Atlantic Mead, founder of the Inishturk Native Irish Honey Bee Sanctuary, a member of the European Mead Makers Association and the Institute of Brewing & Distilling, and a long-time Irish beekeeper.

Participants will sample a range of premium Irish honeys and discover how different floral sources influence flavour, aroma and fermentation. Guests will learn the science behind mead-making, taste different styles of honey wine and gain practical hands-on experience creating their own batch using premium Irish honey. 

By the end of the workshop, every participant will leave with their own one-gallon (4.5 litre ) batch of mead and the knowledge required to complete the fermentation process at home.

Sean O’Connor said Ireland has an extraordinary mead-making heritage, yet most people have never tasted mead, let alone made it themselves.

“This experience is about reconnecting people with an important part of our history while showcasing the incredible diversity of Irish honey and the importance of our native honey bees.

“By the end of the day, every participant will have made their own batch of mead, gained an understanding of fermentation and taken home a unique product that they can enjoy months later. We believe there is nowhere better to do that than on a remote Atlantic island surrounded by nature,” he added.

The event also supports the work of the Inishturk Native Irish Honey Bee Sanctuary, established on World Bee Day 2026 to promote awareness of Ireland’s native black honey bee (Apis mellifera mellifera ).

The sanctuary forms part of a pioneering three-location monitoring project involving colonies in County Wicklow, County Mayo and Inishturk Island. Using BroodMinder hive-monitoring technology, researchers and beekeepers can compare colony performance across dramatically different Irish environments while sharing live hive data with the public.

Visitors attending the mead-making experience will also learn about the vital role honey bees play in biodiversity, food production and sustainable rural communities. 

https://www.advertiser.ie/galway/article/151584/island-to-host-irelands-first-public-mead-making-experience

Chicago meadery introduces new generation to ancient elixir

From fordcountychronicle.com

CHICAGO — Wild Blossom Meadery & Winery works to bring back an ancient elixir, testing out new and unique flavours all while paying ode to the bees that make this buzzworthy beverage possible.

Once known as the “nectar of the gods,” mead was a celebrated part of ancient cultures around the world, prized by Greek philosophers, Viking warriors, Egyptian priests and Chinese nobility alike. The fermented honey drink reigned supreme for thousands of years. But, with wine and beer emerging as simpler, less-expensive options, mead became a luxury lost to time. Aside from the occasional Renaissance fair, mead has not been part of modern life.

However, interest in this honey of a drink has grown in recent decades. Once a sign of status and privilege, today, mead can be found at wineries, craft breweries and retail stores everywhere. According to the American Mead Makers Association, the number of commercial meaderies in the U.S. grew from approximately 60 in 2003 to an estimated 650 in 2022 – and one of the first began right here in Illinois.

Everything Old is New Again

Clearly, mead is making a comeback, thanks to skilled meadmakers like Greg Fischer, owner of Wild Blossom Meadery & Winery in Beverly on the South Side of Chicago.

“We were Illinois’ first meadery,” Fischer says. “We started at this location in 2001, built up a good following and expanded into a world-class tasting room and winery.”

For a time, Fischer worked as a beekeeper, transporting bees around the country to pollinate crops. Conveniently, honey is one of the main ingredients in mead, so his beekeeping roots came in handy.

“My family grew apples in upstate New York, and we needed honeybees for pollination,” says Fischer, who first became enamoured with bees as a child. “That’s how I got so attached to bees.”

As a pioneer in Illinois’ mead industry, Greg Fischer believes the Midwest is poised to become one of the mead capitals of the world. Photo by Nathan Lambrecht/©Journal Communications

Today, he channels his love for bees into making buzzy beverages. Nestled against the Dan Ryan Woods, Wild Blossom Meadery’s location is both picture-perfect and productive.

“Instead of raising grapes, we raise honeybees,” Fischer says. “Instead of vineyards, we have forests and fields and meadows that we farm.”

He also maintains hives on the Marriott hotel rooftop and other locations in downtown Chicago, a surprisingly bee-friendly place.

“Chicago’s lakefront is just teeming with flowers,” he says. “Cities with parks and flowering trees often have more nectar sources than rural locations. Bees are one agricultural endeavour that can work pretty well in an urban environment.”

In the winter, Fischer’s bees become snowbirds. To protect them from Illinois’ increasingly volatile weather fluctuations, he transports his hives to Florida, where they make honey that hints of local botanicals like palmetto and orange blossom. In the springtime, Fischer’s bees help Michigan farmers boost blueberry production by as much as 40%.

The Art of Mead Making

After those busy bees do their job, it’s Fischer’s turn to roll up his sleeves. A relatively simple process, mead making takes approximately two weeks and three ingredients: honey, water and yeast.

During the first, or primary, fermentation, the yeast converts the honey to alcohol, creating a basic dry mead. During an optional secondary fermentation, the mead maker can add honey back into the batch to sweeten it up as well as flavors ranging from cranberry to chocolate.

By varying the amount of honey added to the water, the mead maker can adjust the alcohol content from very light to as much as 20%. Many people mistakenly assume all meads are sweet, but the varieties are endless.

“Mead can be dry, sweet, spicy – whatever you want it to be,” Fischer says. “It’s the ultimate craft beverage.”

Wild Blossom produces very dry meads comparable to pinot grigio as well as sweet varieties similar to port. None is more sought after than the Blueberry Nectar mead.

“After primary fermentation, we pump the mead over beds of blueberries, and it will ferment on that fruit again, which builds flavor and complexity,” Fischer says. “In the end, we get a really beautiful blueberry flavor with honey in the background. It’s better than eating blueberries.”

One can only wonder what the earliest mead drinkers would have thought of Wild Blossom’s more adventurous offerings. Fischer’s signature creations include the award-winning Chocolate Cherry Honey Buzz and PB&J, made by pumping mead over fresh-roasted peanuts, then co-fermenting it with Concord grapes.

“People are just dumbfounded by it,” Fischer says. “They say it’s like drinking a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.”

A Mecca for Mead

As a pioneer in Illinois’ mead industry, Fischer believes the Midwest is poised to become one of the mead capitals of the world.

“We’re the Prairie State, and we produce some of the best honeys in the world right here,” he says. “Our meads really do wow people.”

Meanwhile, Fischer stands in awe of his honeybees. They fly as many as 15,000 miles and pollinate up to 2 million new flowers to produce the honey needed for just one bottle of mead.

“Bees are just so amazing,” says Fischer, noting the concern of serious threats bees face, such as mites and the changing climate. “When they’re pollinating, they’re either producing more food or more seeds. That’s why mead is the most sustainable wine on earth.”

So, the next time you’re in the mood for merrymaking, grab a glass and rediscover what our earliest ancestors knew: Mead is something to celebrate, along with the hard work of pollinators.

“Mead production supports honeybees, so you can feel as good about drinking mead as you feel when you’re done drinking mead,” he says.

https://www.fordcountychronicle.com/articles/state/chicago-meadery-introduces-new-generation-to-ancient-elixir/ 

“Tell It To the Bees” And More Honey Bee Legends

From farmersalmanac.com

Ever hear the expression “tell it to the bees?” Learn what it means, as well as other interesting lore and legends about honey bees

Honey Bee Lore and Legends 

The value of honey bees has been recognized for millennia. In ancient Egypt, bees were believed to have been formed from the tears of the sun god, Ra, to bring his messages to earth. Likewise, in ancient Greece and Rome, bees were seen as messengers of the gods. Ancient Chinese and Celtic civilizations considered honey as a sacred gift that helped the dead in the afterlife.

“Tell It to the Bees“

The ancient practice of “telling it to the bees” is still popular in both western Europe and Appalachia in the United States. Bees are such a valuable resource to support a family, so people in these areas feel that they should be treated with the same respect of family, especially when there are major changes.

For example, when a beekeeper dies, the bees must be gently told of the change of family leadership (as the keeper is the head of the “family” hive). If not, the bees may abandon the hive and family, or mourn so deeply that their productivity will be dramatically reduced.

Sing, Don’t Swear 

Beekeeping lore insists on always treating a hive with respect and gentleness. Singing to the hive is even encouraged to improve bees’ productivity.  

Bees are believed to be sensitive creatures. Many believe that their productivity can be impacted if they hear swearing or arguments.

Honeymoon  

The word “honeymoon” is believed to originate with a Scandinavian tradition of giving a newly married couple a month’s worth of “honey wine” or mead (a fermented honey drink). This gift would celebrate the sweetness of new marriage and encourage happiness.

More Bee Lore 

• If a bee flies into your house, you will have a visitor. However, be sure to keep it safe or the visitor may bring bad news. 
• If a bee lands on your hand or head, you will receive a reward soon.
• Ancient Greeks believed that if a bee landed on a baby’s lips, that baby would turn out to be a great speaker.   
• Romans believe that Jupiter gave bees their stingers so they could defend their honey. It’s also believed to repay Jupiter for this ability, honey bees would have to die when they sting you.

Keep the Legends Alive 

With so much wonderful lore associated with bees, what can we do to better protect bees today?

• Minimize chemical use, including fertilizers, pesticides, and herbicides, can help prevent toxic contamination that kills bees.
• Plant a bee garden with flowers rich in nectar and pollen. This will give bees a refuge, and adding a shallow “bee bath” as a water source is a great step.
• Don’t mow patches of your lawn to give honey bees places to nest to encourage the next generation.
• Buy local honey and bee-related products to support the next generation of beekeepers, keeping local hives thriving.

What Bees Give Us

Honey bees are essential to our ecosystem. There are more than 16,000 species of bees in the world. They are found on every continent except Antarctica. Bees pollinate beautiful flowers as well as a wide range of fruits and vegetables, from apples, blueberries, and cherries, to avocados, pumpkins, coffee, mangos, and more.

Bee venom is often used in homeopathic or alternative remedies* for its anti-inflammatory properties, and beeswax is used for candles and soap. *Note: Farmers’ Almanac does not offer medical advice. Information contained here is for educational purposes only.

Beekeeping has been a skilled profession since ancient Rome and Egypt and continues today. From both bee-related products to the greater agricultural yields that come with more pollination, bees are estimated to contribute $19 billion to the U.S. economy annually, and more than $217 billion to the worldwide economy. 

With so many positive impacts from bees, it is no wonder that these industrious insects have been part of our lore, superstitions, and cultural beliefs for centuries.

https://www.farmersalmanac.com/honey-bee-legends

Virginia USA: A Meading Of The Minds

From styleweekly.com

By Rachel Kester

Sip on the nectar of the gods at these two RVA meaderies 

It might be one of the world’s oldest alcoholic beverages, but mead (or honey wine) is widely overlooked in a world focused on beer, wine and spirits. Crafted with honey, yeast, water and whatever infusions strike a mead maker’s fancy, this drink marches to its own drum despite often being pushed into the shadows.

In Virginia, there are only about a dozen meaderies—a stark contrast to its over 300 wineries and 200 craft breweries. Richmond is home to two of these meaderies, each with distinct styles but the same mission: To spread an appreciation for the nectar of the gods.

Funktastic Meads & Beer

Tucked in Midlothian’s Alverser Plaza, this suburban meadery has been pouring some of the wildest mead flavours imaginable since opening in 2022. Where else can you order a mug of Sweetish Fish, a play on the popular candy?

“Making mead is very similar to traditional grape wines,” says owner Matt Carroll. “We use honey, water and yeast as a basis for all meads we make and then, us in particular, do crazy stuff to it.” Carroll, who has a chemistry background, infuses batches with everything from fruits and spices to hot peppers and coffee beans.

                                                                                     Funktastic owner Matt Carroll

While traditional mead is available, Funktastic also creates carbonated, pure fruit and cocktail-inspired options. Their flavours hit on nostalgia and are full of intriguing twists. One of their most popular selections is the fizzy F&M Root Beer, an ode to the classic soda.

Funktastic uses about 12,000 pounds of honey yearly—primarily wildflower—but other varieties will sometimes show up, like meadowfoam. This honey naturally tastes like a fresh vanilla-infused marshmallow and is featured in their Marshmallow Eyes.

Carroll is constantly experimenting and has over 200 recipes with 25 meads currently available on tap, although these rotate monthly with about three regularly available.

Black Heath Meadery

Take a drive from the ‘burbs to Scott’s Addition and you’ll find Bill Cavender making mead at Black Heath Meadery.

Black Heath was the first of its kind in the city when it opened in 2015, but Cavender’s passion for the drink slowly ignited about three decades ago after returning home from a semester abroad in England.

“I had really fallen in love with a lot of European beer styles and from there came home making beer and I kind of moved over to honey wine,” he says. Mead making was a hobby for about two decades before it became his primary job.

                                               Black Heath Meadery’s owner, Bill Cavender with office mascot Otis

“[My wife and I] started the RVA Mead Lab and ran that for about a year,” he says. “[The lab] was to explain mead to people and engage people in mead making.” Black Heath Meadery came to fruition soon after.

One of Cavender’s biggest focuses is incorporating local ingredients in his meads, especially fruit. The meadery partners with area farms like Swift Creek Berry Farm and Agriberry for fresh blackberries, raspberries, blueberries and strawberries. These can be found in batches like the award-winning Berry Goode, Red Razz and Bramble Bee.

                                                 Black Heath’s award-winning Berry Goode, Red Razz and Bramble Bee

As a beekeeper, Cavender produces the majority of his own honey with hives scattered throughout the commonwealth. Over 3,000 pounds of honey from the hives is used toward their mead.

Black Heath currently offers 12 meads on draft with about 18 in to-go bottles, including the popular Demon Sweat, a hibiscus and cinnamon blend.

You can also find Black Heath mead in local restaurants and bars that use their concoctions in cocktails, including Bar Solita, who makes their Velvet Lechance with cabernet franc, Black Heath’s blackberry mead, port wine, Spanish vermouth, mulling spices and orange.

If you’re unable to visit the meadery, Black Heath is often at local events, including the upcoming Richmond Renaissance Faire on March 7.

As this year marks a milestone birthday for the business, starting March 15, Black Heath will throw a 10-year anniversary, 10-week long bash. The kickoff party will feature Thai soul food from pop-up Eat Boi! and they’ll also debut a green mead for their small batch Spectrum series which features fruit meads with no water added.

Plight of the honey bee

While it has been around for centuries, mead is still strange to some, one of the biggest challenges for meaderies. It’s why Funktastic added beer to their menu last April. “[There were] people coming in for beer but once they got here they made their way into mead,” says Carroll.

Because mead is honey-based, the plight of the honey bee is also a concern. The insect faces numerous obstacles due to climate change and toxic chemicals which can affect honey quantities.

Despite this, Cavender feels mead provides the perfect learning opportunity. “People are more aware on a larger scale,” he says regarding the honey bee’s significance. “It’s not just honey but all these wonderful foods bees pollinate. Mead has kind of helped educate people on how important the honey bee is.”

                                                                           The exterior of Black Heath Meadery

Mead is believed to have origins in Africa and has been used over the centuries across societies as an offering, medicine and even a good luck charm.

Unlike traditional wine, mead is more resistant to oxidation and spoilage. Its notes also progressively evolve, something evident in Funktastic’s High Tide, a mixture of black currant and vanilla.

“When it’s fresh, the vanilla is really present and pops,” says Carroll. “But over time, it homogenizes into a black currant flavour.”

While made of sweet honey, mead can be savoury or dry, feature up to 20% ABV or go as low as 7% ABV, be aged in bourbon barrels—there’s really no limit to what can be done.

But perhaps for some, what makes mead so spectacular isn’t just how the drink defies expectations but how it uniquely links the world.

“I feel mead is an important cultural and social connection for people,” says Cavender. “Pretty much every society in the world has consumed [mead] in their history. It serves as a touch point for people to find commonality.”

https://www.styleweekly.com/a-meading-of-the-minds/

A buzzy new limited-edition mead helps India’s tribal honey harvesters

From cntraveller.in/story

Made with single-origin honey sourced by tribal communities in Maharashtra and Gujarat, sipping on this small-batch age-old alcohol helps India’s sustainable beekeepers 

The story behind Pune-based Moonshine Meadery is one of the most bizarre backstories of any alcohol brand in India—they legit started making this antediluvian drink because of an in-flight magazine; briefly bootlegging it out of the co-founder’s grandmother’s basement. Their penchant for the peculiar is evinced by their latest limited-edition mead in their Project X series, 1,500 bottles of mead made in collaboration with Under The Mango Tree Society, whose forest-harvested Tribal Gold honey was sourced through tribal communities in Maharashtra and Gujarat. And by drinking it, you invariably help India’s honey harvesters.

Now, you better bee-lieve that goes down smoothly for armchair activists like myself, all too happy to save the planet one sip at a time.

What is mead?

Mead is an ancient alcohol with an ABV of anywhere from four to eighteen per cent, made out of fermented honey. It’s a tipple so time honoured it features in ancient literature with the frequency Japanese whisky blends are touted in lifestyle mags today, listed everywhere from Beowulf to the Rigveda—in the latter, it is referred to as soma.

Why mead?

                                                                                                                               Moonshine Meadery

Started by childhood buddies Rohan Rehani and Nitin Vishwas, Moonshine Meadery—widely heralded as India’s first modern mead-making outfit—came to be because Vishwas picked up an in-flight magazine in 2014. “Nitin read about London’s first new meadery in the last 500 years in Lufthansa’s in-flight magazine, which left us super intrigued as we had only heard about mead in the context of Lord of the Rings and Game of Thrones… we knew it was a beverage that had existed, but thought it was lost to the annals of time,” says Rehani. Excited to get their hands on some, the two started calling up bottle shops across Mumbai and Bengaluru to no avail. But the realisation that mead still could be made kickstarted their curiosity in the honey-based bevy made with water and yeast, an interest that has kept on thumping to this day.

Not before long, the two were homebrewing mead in Rehani’s grandmother’s basement. “Honestly, we very nearly started a bootlegging operation that took us a couple years to transform into a full-fledged legitimate business (hence the name ‘Moonshine’) because there was no law concerning meads in the country; we actually had to go meet the Excise Minister of Maharashtra and convince the officials to change the law to allow mead to be added under the wine category.”

Beyond the legality of their homebrewing business, they were rather concerned that potential customers would write off their product as being too sweet once they found out the backbone of mead is fermented honey. So they directly went the experimental route, producing apple and coffee-forward meads versus straight-up traditional ones.

“But as our operations grew, we saw beekeepers from across the country, NGOs, and even government agencies reaching out to us (for collabs),” explains Rehani. While the duo initially turned down such partnerships, it inspired them to invest in a honey-harvesting structure for the business and experiment with honey-forward meads. Rehani even completed a course in beekeeping at the Central Bee Research and Training Institute (CBRTI) in Pune, and set up 600 beehive boxes, which are now looked after by a full-time beekeeper.

Journey of Project X

“The very first batch of Project X we released, we worked with sidr honey from our own beehives in 2021,” which won a gold medal at the European Beer Challenge in 2021. “Our sidr is a unique honey and translated into mead wonderfully with its creamy, buttery vanilla notes, almost like caramel… Project X became a way of spotlighting honey profiles beyond the super sweet stuff we find on our supermarket shelves;” their avenue to experiment with other kinds of honey after seeing a rollicking response to their nuanced nectar at international competitions and from their regular clientele.

                                                                                                            UTMT Society

“About a year ago, the founder of UTMT Society, Vijaya Pastala, gave us this Tribal Gold honey to sample, which we absolutely loved, from the concept of wild beekeeping adding supplemental income to Adivasi communities in Gujarat and Maharashtra to the unique taste that has a completely different profile to the original sidr honey Project X—plus the idea behind the original Project X was to keep on working with different honeys across India,” recalls Rehani. And it certainly holds plenty of nuances, totally distinct when compared to the profiles of other kinds of honey they have used. “This honey is very earthy, very robust, and very dark in colour… influenced by the forest flora that grows around it”—from flowers like mahua and palash to tropical trees like mango, amla, and cashew.

A planet-friendly pint

“India’s honey industry doesn’t have a production problem, it has a consumption problem,” says Rehani. “We produce so much honey that India is a net exporter of honey; I believe we’re amongst the top ten producers and exporters of honey in the world, but our per capita consumption is really, really low, around 30 grams per person, per year (in other honey producing Asian countries it is way higher; in Iran the same per capita rate is more than one kilogram.) In India, we're so used to using cane sugar that honey doesn't feature highly in our list of sweeteners… this poses an interesting challenge for the country and the beekeeping industry, especially considering global warming.”

                                                                                                            UTMT Society

As an example, Rehani references his own experiences with harvesting honey in India, “Over the last three years, due to climate change, my harvest season has halved but my production costs stay the same—so essentially the cost of my honey has doubled, but I can’t double my price and expect to keep my customers. This happens all around India,” which is why so much great small-batch single-origin honey winds up being sold to larger aggregators that degrade the honey. “We as people as a nation aren't consuming enough honey, so there is no demand and so prices for beekeepers are very low”.

But Rehani says that the dynamic completely changes when honey goes into his meadery. “I can convert one kilogram of honey into alcohol, which translates into about 15 bottles of Moonshine mead. So in one afternoon, a group of friends can finish an equivalent of honey that the same number of people would take half a year to finish. So not only does mead upvalue honey, but it also increases the rate of consumption of honey.” What makes mead even more interesting is that “it actually has a net positive impact on agriculture, because unlike cash crops like barley for beer or grapes for wine, with mead, the farmers put bees in boxes around the farmland or forests, adding supplemental income with adding needed pollinators to the food-growing farm area, making it a net positive for agriculture.”

The limited edition Tribal Gold Project X by Moonshine Meadery is only available in Mumbai and Pune at Rs250

https://www.cntraveller.in/story/a-buzzy-new-limited-edition-mead-helps-indias-tribal-honey-harvesters/

Wouldn't it be interesting to share a bottle of mead with Odin?

From marshallindependent.com 

By Ron Skjong

Wouldn’t it be interesting to share a bottle of mead with Odin? Yes, I mean the old Norse god, Odin, and not some family member of mine. Old Norse legend tells us that mead was the drink of the Norse gods, and it symbolized wisdom, poetry and the divine connection between heaven and earth. The same Norse stories tell us that Odin, the King of the Gods, drank mead to gain his immense wisdom.

I like Norse mythology. The old legends might be part of the past, but the aspect of life that was and is a major influence in the making of mead is still with us today — bees. Science tells us that bees have been on earth for over 100 million years. By way of comparison, humans have occupied earth for about 6 million years. It would seem we could learn something from them, and bees deserve our respect.

Christianity has a saint who is considered the patron saint of bees — St. Valentine. Yup! That same patron saint of Valentine’s Day is not only the patron saint of lovers, people with epilepsy, but he’s also the patron saint of beekeepers. Do you see any connection between those three groups? St. Valentine ministered to persecuted Christians, and, perhaps, that is a service we could better respect today.

I was introduced to mead quite sometime ago, and enjoyed it. Heck! What’s not to like? It’s made from honey! Unlike regular wine that gains its sweetness from the sugar in its grapes, mead is entirely honey based. So, let’s always work together to save our bee population.

That is why pollinator gardens are critical in today’s society. Humans usage of pesticides has negatively affected the bee population, and we need to create more of a buzz about saving these little insects.

Yes, they can make life painful at times, but what I’ve learned is that if you respect them, they’ll respect you. I’ve gotten stung by them, and will never forget the bumble bee that taught me to mind my own beeswax by stinging my ear. However, rather than focusing on that stinging story, let’s allow bees to “bee” themselves.

When first introduced to Stinger Mead, I sipped one of life’s sweet moments. If you haven’t had a glass of this mead, I certainly recommend you try a glass of this wonderful sweetness. But, a caveat here! I wouldn’t do that sipping in a pollinator garden. Those bees would love to have a taste of it, and a conflict would soon result.

I was on a walk, and came upon a little pollinator garden. A bench had been placed right in the centre of the garden so I sat down to rest for a bit. Relying on my mantra of “if you leave them alone, they’ll leave you alone.” I settled down on the bench. There were many bees buzzing around me, and an occasional monarch butterfly. Taking a few deep breaths, I relaxed and enjoyed the beauty of the many flowers and the soft buzzing presence of the bees. They were working very hard finding the flower’s nectar and pollen. The flower feeds the bee and the bee pollinates the flower. I wish we humans always had such a symbiotic relationship with each other.

As I sat in the midst of that very bee busy environment, I smiled as I thought of Odin. If he can gain wisdom from mead, shouldn’t I gain such similar insight as I sip mead?

That question remains to be answered, and I’m certainly not a god, so I should just let it go. However, I will always raise a glass to the bees. And who knows? Maybe Odin will smile down upon me, and grant me a touch of wisdom.

May you stick close your honey, and embrace the sweet moments of life.

https://www.marshallindependent.com/opinion/local-columns/2024/08/bees-and-wine/

Mead has a long history and a future as a sustainable beer alternative

From washingtonpost.com

When Brett and Megan Hines moved to Colorado for graduate school in 2011, they immersed themselves in the New Age subcultures that were taking root in the state at the time. The Eastern Shore Maryland natives took up mountain biking, joined a CSA, volunteered at an organic farm, raised chickens, drank craft beer and eventually joined a home-brewing club, called Liquid Poets, to learn how to make their own. Brett even parlayed the hobby into jobs brewing for local labels. 

But the deeper the Hineses delved into the world of ales and lagers, the more they realised that the industry was out of sync with their emerging environmentalist worldview.

“We wanted to go with our values of sourcing as much local product as we could,” says Megan Hines. “We wanted to make a truly local beverage. And a lot of grain is grown far away at a big commercial scale. Bringing grain in from across the country is not a sustainable long-term thing.”

During their time with the Liquid Poets, the Hinses learned of a different fermentable, one that was made without grain. Mead was essentially honey and water, flavoured with fruits and spices from perennial plants. And they found it every bit as delicious and versatile as beer.

In 2014, the Hinses moved back to Maryland to set up their own organic vegetable farm. They bought sheep, goats, pigs, chickens and bees to raise and planted an apple orchard. But instead of brewing beer, the couple made mead. Six years later, they opened The Buzz Meadery in Berlin, Md.

Mead has ancient roots, predating human agriculture, with origins at least as far back as the New Stone Age. Over the past decade-plus, the beverage has found a foothold in the ongoing craft beverage movement — a recent report from Technavio research group projected mead to be a $2.26 billion global market by 2026. And while Europe, steeped in the mead-making tradition, still holds the largest chunk of that market, the U.S. is closing fast. The American Mead Makers Association (AMMA) reports that the number of domestic meaderies blossomed from just 60 in 2003 to 450 in 2020 — with some 200 more somewhere in the planning stages of opening before the pandemic hit.

Megan and Brett Hines opened The Buzz Meadery in 2020 as a more environmentally sustainable alternative to brewing beer. (Brendan McCabe/for The Washington Post)

Mead’s modern resurgence can be linked to several factors, from appealing to gluten-free drinkers to an association with mainstream fantasy fiction like “Game of Thrones” to sheer novelty. Long-standing industry leaders such as Michigan’s B. Nektar (founded in 2006) and Colorado’s Redstone Meadery (2001) have turned their niche followings into well-known national brands. But whatever the reason for its current popularity, the ancient drink might owe its future to the fact that, in many ways, it’s better for the Earth than beer.

“Mead is perhaps headed to be the drink that, if it’s made as it can be and stays in its own environment, can be the lowest carbon-footprint beverage there is,” says Ken Schramm, owner of the renowned Michigan-based Schramm’s Mead, who has been making the stuff for 35 years and wrote 2003’s “The Compleat Meadmaker,” still considered the authoritative manual for the craft. “If you drink it where you’re at, the whole thing ends up being a very carbon-positive product.”

Proximity is a key differentiator for mead when it comes to carbon footprint. The primary ingredients in beer are barley and hops, the production of which are both mainly concentrated in the western and northwestern regions of the U.S. According to the Hop Growers of America, Washington state produces more than twice the amount of hops than does the rest of the country; and the USDA says that most domestic barley production — three-fourths of which is used for malting — is in Idaho, Montana and North Dakota.

Meanwhile, honey can be produced virtually anywhere, with North Dakota apiaries churning out about 31 million pounds, followed by a far-flung array of regions, including California (11.5 million pounds), Texas (8.32 million), Montana (7.5 million), Florida (7.35 million), South Dakota (7.2 million) and Minnesota (5.2 million). As Schramm points out, many leading meadmakers still import exotic types of honey from all over the world, but usually in much smaller quantities than are grains used to brew beer at commercial scale.

Saving on shipping might give mead a small leg up over beer (after all, honey is much heavier to move than an equal amount grain). But mead’s true viability advantage could lie below the topsoil. Barley, along with other adjuncts in beer, such as corn, rice and wheat, is an annual crop. That means every year, farmers plow and plant, releasing CO2 and carbon into the atmosphere. Those commercial crops often require use of potentially harmful herbicides and pesticides. Perhaps most important: In times of drought, these fields require irrigation.

The fruits generally used in making mead, on the other hand, grow from perennial trees and vines. And the honey?

“You don’t have to irrigate plants that rely on bees,” says Ayla Guild, beekeeper and co-owner of The Hive Taproom meadery, in East Troy, Wis. “During drought, bees are scrappy. They figure it out. Certain plants thrive in drought, and the bees know how to find them.”

Speaking of bees, meadmaking also has the carbon-positive impact of promoting the planet’s most prodigious pollinators, which keep carbon-eating forests and carbon-sequestering prairies healthy. Plus, there’s no strain on the insects’ supply. “Bees make surplus honey,” says Amina Harris, founding director of the Honey and Pollination Center at the University of California at Davis and “Queen Bee” of her family business, Z Specialty Food, LLC. “They’re going to make it whether they need it or not.”

A selection of The Buzz Meadery's meads and ciders, made with locally grown apples and local Maryland honey. (Brendan McCabe/for The Washington Post)

When it comes to actual production, mead requires far less water than beer. While beer wort - the liquid from the mashing process - is boiled, most mead is not. Between water lost in the boil, water used to cool the wort, and water used for cleaning equipment, a brewery could need eight gallons of water to brew one gallon of beer — and that doesn’t include the water-intensive steeping process of malting the grain. Breweries also have bigger physical and energy footprints – they usually require more space and more power than meaderies do.

Of course, part of mead’s overall environmental virtue is the fact that it is still a boutique business and a very tiny wedge of the larger alcohol industry (craft beer’s current U.S. market is nearly $30 billion). And maybe there’s a future in which mead mostly remains hyperlocal or at least regional, with Marylanders patronizing The Buzz, Pacific Northwesterners buying equally sustainability-minded Sky River, and tipplers of the Tri-state area drinking Melovino.

But if mead is to continue to grow as an industry, what’s to stop it from taking on some of the unsustainable traits of beer? Schramm says that the key is meadmakers like the Hineses continuing to capitalize on the inherent advantages of the craft and following a different business model from that of craft beer — that of its closer kin, wine.

“Beer is the ocean liner; we are the rowboat,” says Schramm. “We do have the potential. There’s a notion of having meaderies emulate the great wineries, having the beehives, berry farm and orchard all in one place. Then you can have something that is biodiverse and very environmentally conscious. Alcohol has done tremendous things for our culture. Now it’s time to have it do things for the environment.”

At Buzz, which this summer will release its first cans of carbonated session mead made with Maryland honey, Megan Hines says the calculus is simple: “I think everyone should be hyperlocal and lower environmental impact. Just support your local people.”

https://www.washingtonpost.com/food/2023/08/10/mead-sustainability-beer-alternative/