Six Patterns of Mead

I’m still at the beginning of this quest, and have yet to do much more than sip at the varieties of British Meads. However there is such an abundance of information on the wicked web I’d like to clarify the varieties of Mead as I understand them.

There are muddied divisions between national traditions and names, and the patterns of making the Mead itself. The patterns include

1) Traditional or plain mead
A Mead brewed with honey and water, and little else. Varieties include:

• Great Mead – brewed to be aged before drinking (sometimes Old Mead)
• Short Mead – a more effervescent variety, brewed to be drunk quickly
• Hydromel (also Aquamiel, Idromele and similar and perhaps Berz (Ethopian) - A lighter low alcohol mead, presumably with more water involved so also akin to the Polish Czwórniak and Półtorak varieties
• Sack Mead – a very sweet mead with excessive amounts of honey
• Show Mead – a modern invention? of honey & water with nothing added relying on artificial yeasts and enzymes.
• Bochet – burnt Sack Mead
• Dębniaki - fermented in oak barrels for a specific taste (Polish)
• Thalassiome – mixed with seawater (more of a medicine - ref Pliny)
• Lipce – only uses honey collected in July (Polish/Lithuanian)

2) Braggot (also Bracket, Brackett or Bragawad, maybe also Miodomel)
A Mead brewed with honey and hops, or honey and malt, or sometimes all three. One could argue that Tej (Ethopia) is almost a Braggot, as a traditional mead fermented with Gesho instead of hops. At some points Braggots evolve into ale, and perhaps honey ales deserve some recognition here. Varieties include:

• Stakliškės - lime, juniper berries herbs & hops (Lithuanian)
• Trakai – lime, juniper berries acorns & hops (Lithuanian)

3) Melomel
A Mead brewed with honey and fruit juices. Varieties include

• Cyser – apple juice
• Pyment (also pyment claree)– grape juice. If white grapes sometimes known as a ‘white mead’
• Morta (also Mora)– mulberries
• Omphacomal – verjuice (unripe grapes)
• Perry – pears (although there is a boundary with pear cider somewhere)
• Black meads (also Kurpiowski) – blackcurrants
• Maliniaki – rasberries (Polish)
• Wiśniaki (also Podczaszy) – cherries (Polish)
• Sima – lemons (Finnish)
• Apis? – rowanberries (Polish)
• Bernardyński – chokeberries (Polish)
• Stolnik – plum stum (Polish)
• Jadwiga – raspberries (Polish)
• Lubelski – wild forest fruits (Polish)
• Bočių – juniper berries (Lithuanian)

4) Metheglin
A traditional mead with added herbs and/or spices. Common additives include Ginger, Tea, Orange peel, Nutmeg, Corriander, Cinnamon, Cloves, Vanilla, Rosemary. Varieties include:

• Capsicumel (Chile peppers)
• Gverc (Croatian)
• Pitarrilla (Mayan, Balche tree bark)
• Rhodomel (Rose hips & petals or Rose Attar)
• Trójniak Piastowski – alpine herbs (Polish)
• Hippocras – a spiced Melomel or, according to some,
simply a wine with added honey and spices

5) Undefined (maybe cocktails)
There is a pattern of making, or serving Mead, mixed with another alcoholic beverage, often wine. One interpretation is that this makes such Meads a Melomel. Wine being a fruit (grape) juice. Sometimes this may include alcoholic drinks with honey added, again especially wine. To me there is a clear difference between fermenting honey and fruit juices together as opposed to adding in pre-fermented fruit juice after the honey fermentation has finished. Be it wine, cider, or even a vinegar. Th Polish / Lithuanian meads seem to rely on such a process. So perhaps a question to a Mead maker or some in depth taste testing ( a better option).

Of more concerns that the cheaper Meads I have tasted may be little more than white wines with added honey. Harvest Gold has been described as ‘a classic interpretation of traditional mead’ which sounds like not mead to me. Varieties include

• Pyment – added wine (as above)
• Mulsum – added high strength (fortified?) wine (Roman)
• Oxymel – added wine vinegar (more of a medicine)

6) Distilled Meads
At some point it became possible to distill Mead in the same method as one produces Brandies, whether from wine or cider. One could easily argue that we are now in the realms of liquors and not Meads. Varieties include:

• Krupnik - (Polish)
• Suktinis (Lithuanian)
• Šventinė (Lithuanian)
• Vilnius (Lithuanian)
• Trys karaliai (Lithuanian)
• Žalgiris (Lithuanian)
• Stakliškių pipirinė (Lithuanian)

And more undoubtedly exist.