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What is mead?

Mead is also known as honey wine. This descriptive name pretty much tells you what you need to know: mead is an alcoholic beverage where the alcohol is created by fermenting the sugars from honey, rather than those found in grapes (grape wine) or grain (beer).

This might lead you to think that mead is sweet like honey. That's as true as saying that wine is sweet like grape juice: the end product could be sweet, but it could also be very dry. It all depends on the brewing and fermentation process.

Why mead? It beautifully showcases the flavors of honey. Varietal or "show" meads may use a single honey - just as different grapes make different grape wines, different honeys make different honey wines! Mead can also be an excellent canvas to play with different fruit or spice flavors - the possibilities are endless.

History of Mead

Many texts provide a good overview of the history of mead. The short version of the story is that mead is likely the world's oldest alcohol beverage. Hunters and gatherers in Africa and Europe; mead drinkers millenia ago in Asia; citizens of the Roman Empire; Vikings; medieval nobles; and various modern cultures today have all made and enjoyed mead! Mead fell out of favor when honey got expensive compared to fruit and grains, but it never died out completely. Today, mead is a small but growing part of the U.S. alcohol market, with over 500 meaderies (at least for now).

It is so ancient a beverage that the linguistic root for mead, medhu, is the same in all Indo-European languages where it encompasses an entire range of meanings, which include honey, sweet, intoxicating, drunk and drunkenness. For this reason it has been suggested that fermented honey may be the oldest form of alcohol known to man. —Mikal Aasved, 1988

May Maelgwn of Mona be affected with mead, and affect us, From the foaming mead-horns, with the choicest pure liquor, Which the bees collect, and do not enjoy. Mead distilled sparkling, its praise is everywhere. —XCIII Song to Mead, Book of Taeliessin XIX

Take mead to the river... —Anonymous