5 Things to Consider when Planning a Mead Tasting

Every meadmaker eventually encounters the problem of having too much mead. I know, it’s tough to consider; if you like drinking it how do you accumulate too much? Well, it happens, and when it does, you need a plan to get rid of it. One of the best ways I’ve come across is to host a mead tasting. You get the opportunity to show off your meads, get feedback on what everyone likes, and generally share the beverage with those who may have never heard of it. But how do you go about planning it? We’re here to help. Here are the 5 things to consider when planning a mead tasting.

1. Who to Invite

As much as we try, there still aren’t that many people who know what mead is. So consider who you invite. Will you invite friends that know nothing about it? Have they tasted mead once or twice, but really don’t know what it is? Are they experienced home brewers and have a few meads under their belt, or are they even experienced judges?

Understanding who you plan to invite will greatly influence the rest of the factors to consider. When I’ve hosted tastings, undoubtedly most of the guests to their first tasting had’t had much mead previously, and thus were open to anything they tried. In this case, make sure it is something good! Don’t scare them away from the beverage any more than you have to.

If you have a gathering of experienced mead enthusiasts, your options are just as open, and you don’t necessarily have to worry about quality as much. Maybe your intent is to get feedback on your mead. Experienced tasters are far more likely to give you better feedback than just, “This is good” or “That is bad!”

2. The Mead Category

Within the mead beverage category, there are a lot of options available for you to try. Where do you begin? Do you want to showcase the entire range of mead, or do you want to showcase just a single variety? And within the variety, do you choose only dry, semi, or sweet meads?

I’ve found that for a structured mead tasting, it is a good idea to include a single category. Give your guests the full range of a single category, and let them identify the differences, better training their palette to the spectrum of mead. Save those specialty meads for the after party.

But maybe you want to prepare a mead pairing meal. In this case, exploring the different options may be better. You can start the meal with something light for the first course, and move heavier as you try your way through the different courses. I’m thinking here of beer pairing events, where you start with a pilsner, move through wheat, reds, or even an IPA, and finish the meal with a nice stout or porter. This is also a great way for just a mead tasting, but your tasters may experience palette fatigue with the number of flavors available.

You can’t really go wrong here. Just make sure you have an idea in mind of what you want to share. Your guests are bound to find something in the lineup they appreciate. Note, I use appreciate purposefully. Not everyone will like mead. The intent isn’t to make everyone a convert. Showcase the breadth of mead, and they are likely to identify flavors they like, even if on the whole they aren’t a mead fan.

3. Sourcing the Mead

So you know who you’re inviting, and you know what meads you want to share. Next up, where are you going to get the mead? This is easy if you are just trying to get rid of your old meads to clear storage space in your mead closet. But if you don’t have the mead on hand, what are you options to locate good mead?

Well, first off, you can make it. Give yourself some time here (at least 6 months). Again, as we mentioned above, don’t give your guests bad mead. Yeah, it might be a funny prank. And we all have bad meads we’ve made… But if you don’t follow up with something good, you may actually create a lifelong mead hater, no matter how much you or the mead industry would have it another way. Just don’t do it!

If you can’t make it, or only want to showcase one or two of your meads, you are in luck. The mead industry continues to grow around the world, and sourcing it is becoming easier and easier. If you don’t have any mead at your local liquor store, be sure to ask for it. It’s the best way to get it on the shelf. If that doesn’t work, check Got Mead’s mead finder or the listing in the back of the American Mead Maker Journal (neither list is complete, but I don’t know if Google can help you more). If you can’t find it locally, maybe Amazon can even ship it your way.

Another option is to hold a mead challenge. Get all your friends to make a batch, and see which one you like the most. Maybe even require that everyone makes a couple extra bottles. The maker of the most liked mead goes home with the extra.

4. What Materials to Prepare

Once you have your mead, you should consider looking at other materials to help your audience appreciate mead. During the beginning of the MeadMakr Podcast, we struggled a lot to define the flavors we encountered in our meads. There are a lot of flavors out there, and if you can’t properly identify them, how are you to know what you like or don’t like?

We’ve covered this in depth in our post, What does mead taste like? So rather than copy that post completely, we’ll give you the links to save you some time.

5. How to Serve

You are coming up on the day of your tasting: mead is in hand; tasting sheets have been prepared; and invites have been sent out. The last thing you need to consider is how you actually plan to serve your mead. When planning this last step, keep in mind the glassware for the tasting and the logistics behind temperature control of the mead.

Glassware

Your mead glassware, much like wine glassware, should concentrate and focus the mead’s aroma. Similarly, the glass should be colorless and clear, helping to evaluate appearance of the mead.

You may choose a simple tulip-shaped wine glass for this. Stemmed glassware is better than stemless to avoid fingerprints on the glass. In fact, at competitions, glasses with fingerprints on the cup are returned for re-pours so that judges can better evaluate the appearance.

Your glass must also hold a minimum of 2 ounces. 2 ounces is an adequate pour amount for evaluating flavor, and extra room will allow for the concentration of aroma in the glass. Also, depending on the number of your guests, this small pour may leave some precious drops leftover for the afterparty!

Temperature

The temperature of the mead may heavily impact the flavors identified by your guests. Often, chilled beverages will mask flaws within the mead. Sometimes you may also want to serve a warm, mulled mead on a nice winter day.

When considering the temperature to serve at, consider the logistics behind keeping the meads at a steady temperature. If you are going to serve chilled, are you keeping them refridgerated? Are you laying the bottles in a cooler with ice (difficult to avoid sediment as picking up the bottles from a sideways condition re-stirs the sediment)? If you plan to mull the mead, how do you intend to scoop out the precious liquid and ensure everyone’s remains at the same temperature for evaluation?

There is no wrong choice in your mead temperature, just understand that tradeoffs have to be made to maintain temperature across the different meads being served. Competitions get around this by serving everything at close to room temperature. Every mead is evaluated at the same point, and hiding flaws from chilling or heating cannot be done.

Bonus Consideration: Palette Cleansers

One last thing you may want to consider is what to serve between the meads. If you are pairing with food, you can probably ignore this section (although cleansing between courses would still be nice). If you are just serving mead, you will want to provide the ability to cleanse the guests’ tastebuds.

There are two primary ways to do this: (1) simple water or (2) unsalted, plain crackers. Water is your best bet, as the crackers may leave an aftertaste. However, crackers are good for soaking up flavors if you can’t seem to shake the previous mead’s “hang-time” (see Epi 014 with Michael Fairbrother).

Give your guests a few minutes between each mead to let the flavors dissipate.

 

And there you have it, the things you need to consider when hosting a mead tasting. What do you think is the most important part of preparing a tasting? Or did we forget something you think should be considered? Let us know in the comments section below!