The Tannin Handbook
Jan Dominquez
Any of several compounds used for dyeing cloth and tanning leather. Tannins are usually a catechol, pyrogallol, phenolic, or aldehyde type compounds. Natural tannins are found in many plants and are usually concentrated in bark and damaged tissues such as galls and wounds. Tannins reacts with proteins (Skin, Albumin, Gelatin, etc.) to form insoluble products that are resistant to degradation. Skin treated with tannins is called Leather. Tannins have been used for several thousand years, especially in China. Examples of natural tannins are Tannic acid, myrobalans, and Quebracho. Examples of synthetic tannins are Formaldehyde, Glutaraldehyde, and glycolic acid.
Quebracho produces tannins that can be extracted in quebracho sawmills from the heartwood of both red and white quebracho . Logs are inserted into planers to produce chips that are used to produce the quebracho extract by boiling them into vats. It is used for fine leather tanning and imparts a red-brown colour. Ordinary or warm soluble quebracho (also known as insoluble Quebracho) is the natural extract obtained directly from the quebracho wood. This type of extract is rich in condensed tannins of natural high molecular weight (phlobaphenes), which are not easily soluble. Its use is therefore limited to addition of small amounts during the process of tanning leather intended for shoe soles in hot liquids (temperature above 35C) to improve the yield and the water-proofness of the leather. The cold soluble extracts are obtained by subjecting the ordinary extract to a sulphiting process which transforms the phlobaphenes into completely soluble tannins. The cold soluble quebracho extracts are the most universally known and used types. The chemical structure of these extracts can be described as polymers of epicatechin. The main properties of these extracts are: a very rapid penetration, a high tannin content and a relatively low percentage of non-tannins. The rather low acid and medium salt content characterise them as mild tanning extracts (low astringency). Quebracho tannins give an important added value to the quality of leathers, such as vacchetta, belts and garments, making them more compact and tear resistant with a pleasant touch. The sulphited quebracho extract may be carcinogenous in mice. Other recent studies show that quebracho tannins present a strong anti-mutagenic activity. The heartwood contains from 20 to 30 percent tannin and 3 or 4 percent water-soluble nontannin. It is said to not ferment.
Purity is essential for making fine Mead. All the ingredients of your Mead must be the finest you can obtain. Use the best honey, one locally produced if possible. Avoid honey blends (many of which are made with Argentine honey), and above all avoid honey that is over- processed. Many commercial honeys are strained, filtered, boiled, blended, and Pasteurized so much that they are little more than aromatic sources of sugar. There is nothing wrong with buying honey in a supermarket, but a good general rule is to avoid all national or super-regional brands, since they are usually guilty of most of the adulterations mentioned above. Buy a honey that is collected locally, by a small operation. These honeys usually come in mason jars, with two-color labels, and bear the name of a family rather than that of a corporation. Buy these honeys; they are the next best thing to dealing directly with a beekeeper.
Whether you use lemons and tea to balance the brew, or add measured amounts of malic acid and grape tannin, once again you should keep purity uppermost in mind. When using lemon peel, soak the whole lemon in hot water beforehand to take off any residual insecticides. If you prefer the chemical recipes, keep all chemical additives tightly closed to shut out any contaminants. This is surely commonsense stuff, but well worth mentioning nonetheless.
Each of the above-mentioned three yeasts enhances a different aspect of the finished Mead. This will also be a factor in choosing which yeast to use. Champagne yeast enhances the sweetness and flowery taste of Mead, ferments slowly, and requires the longest aging. Montrachet yeast emphasizes the floral aromas, ferments moderately slowly (but to a high octane), and requires less aging. Tokay brings out the acidic tang of Mead, ferments and clears extremely quickly, and requires the least aging of them all. Tokay yeast is somewhat tricky to use, requiring both a high temperature, and an occasional stirring: the yeast settles to the bottom a little too quickly.
Naturally brewed Mead ferments and clears extremely quickly, but a freshly brewed all-natural Mead can taste like gasoline at first. Natural additives such as lemon peel and strong tea can take a year or more to mellow out, but their use will result in a Mead that is cleaner in taste and much more aromatic. After a year of aging an all-natural Mead will beat out a chemical Mead hands down. Better yet, naturally brewed Meads will continue to improve with age almost indefinitely.
You can get a lot more elaborate than this, but these are the basic items. You will use the same equipment when you move up to five gallon batches, except for a larger brewpot and five gallon carboys. With these few items, a good recipe, and careful brewing, you can brew a Mead that is as good as any you have ever tasted, and superior to all commercial Meads.
I always attach the siphon hose to a plastic racking cane, one of the best inventions since the stone age. A racking cane, which is available at all brewing supply shops, has a cap on the tip and a hole about one inch from the end. This configuration makes it easy for you to siphon the clear Mead off the spent yeast and other sediment. Without a racking cane you will find it much harder to siphon the Mead without disturbing the sediment. For that reason, I consider it an essential piece of equipment. Most racking canes are long enough to work with a five gallon carboy, but I suggest that you cut the cane down so that it is handier to use with a gallon jug. When you move up to five gallon batches, buy another racking cane.
Aside from such basics as brushes, wine bottles, and corks, the above items are all that you really need to brew an excellent Mead. There are a few other items, however, that can make brewing a little more fun, and more convenient. One of my favorite brewing toys is a bottling cane. This is a two foot length of plastic tubing that has a valve on one end. I hook it to the bottle end of my siphon at bottling time. Once you have started the siphon, slip the valve onto the tip of the cane and it will stop the flow. You put the cane into the bottle, press the valve down, and the Mead flows out. Fill the bottle to the top and when you remove the cane the bottle will be filled to the correct level. Handy.
First off, choose a recipe. Several are listed at the end of this handbook. If you have never brewed before, I strongly suggest using the recipe for Northern Light Mead. It will work every time if you do your part, and will give you an excellent Mead. This is a tried and true recipe, and it is the recipe used in the following description.
However, many experienced Meadmakers prefer not to boil the Mead, and firmly discourage people from doing so. Their reasons are as sound as the reasons for boiling it. First off, if you have gone to the trouble of obtaining non-Pasteurized honey, you will undo your work if you boil the Mead. In fact, if you want to avoid Pasteurization, you should not heat the brew above 170 degrees. A second objection is that boiling cooks off some of the volatile aromatic and flavoring components of honey. It does indeed do this, and if you choose boiling, boil only long enough to skim the froth. A third objection is that boiling needlessly complicates the Mead-making process: it necessitates skimming the brew, and forces you to rack the Mead from the sediment before you pitch the yeast. All of these are valid objections, and some of the best Meadmakers refuse to boil their Mead.
Fermentation will slow down in a few days. At that time you should replace the blow-off tube with an air lock. Fermentation will proceed at a reduced rate until either all the fermentable sugars are consumed or until the alcohol content gets too high for the yeast to live. With Northern Light Mead fermentation will finish in a few weeks and the Mead will begin to clear. Other recipes can take much longer, especially if you use herbs of any sort in the brew. Some recipes will even take nine months to a year to ferment to completion. Here is where it pays to be patient.
Once the Mead has begun to clear and has thrown a lot of sediment, rack the Mead into a new container, being careful to leave behind the sediment. Top up the Mead with purified or distilled water and put the fermentation lock back on. Rack the mead a second time when there is a gem-like clarity to it, or after it has thrown a lot of sediment. When fermentation has finished, and all bubbling has stopped, the Mead will clarify quite quickly.
Most problems arise from improper sanitation. You do everyone a favor if you pay close attention to cleanliness. Be careful to wash out all of your equipment with a sanitizer such as bleach, but then be sure to wash out the sanitizer. Rinse until there is no residual chlorine or sulfur smell. Bleach or soap or sulfite residue does extremely unpleasant things to Mead. Contaminated Mead is almost impossible to remedy, so have a care.
Grape tannin will darken your Mead somewhat, and give it a reddish tint, so go easy on it. Sometimes the Grape tannin will not settle, but will instead form a gray-brown glop that floats in the middle of the jug. If your Mead looks like a lava-light after using grape tannin, just stir it up by shaking the jug very slightly. The sediment should settle out. Since tannin induced sediment is very easily disturbed, be especially careful when racking your Mead after this sort of treatment: no sense in undoing all the work by stirring the sediment up at racking time. Once you go through all this, think about how much easier it would have been simply to boil the Mead in the first place and get out all of those suspended solids.
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