Raw material influence in mead production

Honey can be fermented to produce different types of mead given their sugar concentration [1]. Mead is a beverage produced by the alcoholic fermentation of diluted honey. This beverage present an alcoholic strength ranging between 8 – 18 % volumes [2]. The aim of this work is characterize the quality of honey mead with different kinds of raw-material: Lavandula honey; Castanea honey and a mixture of waxes and Castanea honey resulting from the beekeeper uncaps process. To produce the honey must the different raw materials was diluted with natural spring-water (37 g of honey/100 mL of water) and mixed to homogeneity. The honey must was inoculated with a commercial wine yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae QA 23 at a concentration of 0,3 g/hL and incubated at 25 0C. Throughout the fermentation process biomass concentrations and reducing sugar of the must were regularly measured. At the end of fermentations the meads were treated with bentonite (100 g/hL). In the meads produced, °Brix, pH, total acidity and assailable nitrogen concentration were evaluated. It was observed that the yeast grow is more efficient in the Castanea honey than in the other samples. Given the results showed in Table 1 it is possible conclude that the meads produced with different raw material are similar and the differences could be attribute to the differences of honey, with different chemical composition. According to the obtained results it can be concluded that it is possible produce mead also with a mixture of waxes and honey resulting from the bee-keeper uncaps process with an important economical benefice.Centro de Estudos Florestais is a Research Unit funded by FCT within UID/AGR/UI0239/2013. ICAAM is a Research Unit funded by FCT within UID/AGR/00115/2013.