Iron Bee first place winner Bert Mayer joins us in this episode. He has been making mead since he turned 21, and when all his friends bought set ups to make beer, his small apartment pushed him in a different direction. A mild hobby at first, he spent more of his time in the underground world of facial hair competitions. Since retiring from that after the World Championships in 2017, he has turned his focus back to the art of making mead, taking classes at UC Davis and the American Honey Tasting Society, as well as becoming a steward captain at the Mazer Cup. With hopes of someday opening a small tap room (a rolling 5 year plan), he hopes to just keep making things people enjoy drinking.
Jeff starts us off in a discussion taken from questions a couple keyholders had, fermentation and storage vessels, what’s good, why and what the crew uses and how do you measure your honey?
Here’s the links to the honey gate and rack Jeff talked about.
Ryan has a couple Facebook Friend questions involving peaches, hibiscus and Mountain Dew mead.
Don’t forget, we’ll be on our 2 week hiatus, and when we come back, look for more exciting shows featuring some really awesome guests! Thanks for your continued support, we appreciate all our listeners. Get a set of keys to the mead house, help keep the Mead House podcast free by subscribing to Patreon, when you do, Jeff will send you some great gifts!
He’s a Minnesota-native, has six Mazer Cup wins, a Minnesota State Fair Best of Show and two first round placements in this year’s National Homebrew Competition. And, he’s only been making mead for a year and a half. Adam Bystrom joins us at the bar tonight.
From the survey files: “I really can’t cook. I love hearing about different flavors or ideas of flavors or blending flavors. Coffee and chocolate, how to make mead with it. I need to try the cocoa nibs I got from the Iron Bee before I ask my friend for some pure cocoa.” A couple of flavors not unfamiliar to the crew, we’ll spend some time on each. Ryan startles the crew with the thought of a White Stout style braggot.
Facebook Friends – William wants to know a little more about starters and Jeff finds a couple people who want to do a BBQ sauce mead.
A Hawaiian Luau mead, got any ideas or a recipe to share? Contact us at info@themeadhouse.com and we’ll share it on the show and invite you on to talk about it.
Get a set of keys to the mead house, help keep the Mead House podcast free by subscribing to Patreon, when you do, Jeff will send you some great gifts!
When asked what kinds of meads he likes to make, he answered this way, “What would I like to drink?” Award winning mead maker, Nathan Steigman drops in, he also put together the winning MVP Challenge mead at the 2019 Iron Bee. We’ll get Nathan’s perspective on mead making, and and ask him the source of his inspiration. Also in this episode, from the survey, recipe development, ingredient characteristics and several different techniques we’ve used in making meads. We’ll wrap the episode with a couple Facebook Friends, Patrick Sheehan asks about coconut, and Jeffery Smith wants to know how long you leave the fruit bag in.
Get a set of keys to the mead house, help keep the Mead House podcast free by subscribing to Patreon, when you do, Jeff will send you some great gifts!
Iron Bee Silver Medalist, Brett Guthrie, stops by the house to talk about his winning entry and thoughts on mead making. He likes doing session meads, and uses his environment of sandy beaches and sunny days as his inspiration. And from the Mead House survey, we discuss kegging your homebrew. Finally, we wrap the show with a few Facebook Friends, and answer a couple questions.
Get a set of keys to the mead house, help keep the Mead House podcast free by subscribing to Patreon, when you do, Jeff will send you some great gifts!
Matt Weide stops by the house, we get his thoughts on the Fenugreek secret ingredient and the MVP challenge. Taking it around the table, we find out what’s on the short list for new projects, JD contemplating another port mead and a Ryanbraggot with citra hops, Jeff has a ton of strawberries, he’s considering using Omega’s Voss Kveik yeast, and Ryan talks about a grapefruit braggot he has in mind. We end the show with a Facebook friend where we discuss Teresa’s rant about tasting mead for it’s qualities, not simply tossing it down like a glass of water.
Hey, don’t forget to let us know what you think, check out our Facebook page and you can also send us a tweet on Twitter, @themeadhouse.
Get a set of keys to the mead house, help keep the Mead House podcast free by subscribing to Patreon, when you do, Jeff will send you some great gifts!
Home meadmaker and medalist, Josh Mahoney joins us on the show for some final thoughts and a wrap-up of the first Mead House Iron Bee competition that took place last weekend in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
The Iron Bee challenge was a secret ingredient, fenugreek, which has properties similar to maple. Some amazing results were achieved, even some that didn’t place in the top 3. Congratulations to;
First Place – Bert Mayer III
Second Place – Brett Guthrie
Third Place – Josh Mahoney
A side challenge that started out after Ryan pulled 3 random flavors off a flavor wheel during one episode, mint, vanilla and pine. It proved to be an interesting combination with some very tasty results.
Congratulations to;
First Place – Nathan Steigman
Second Place – Josh Mahoney
Third Place – Matt Weide
Thank you to all who participated, a big thanks to the judging staff, and most of all, thank you to Ryan and Jeff for their hard work in this fun evening.
Special thanks to the over 80 sponsors who provided over $10,000 worth of prizes and giveaways for the Mead House Iron Bee.
During the night, several raffles were held, and the generosity of the group raised $750 that was given to the Holy Family Maronite Church, our host, for their feeding the hungry program. What an awesome end to a wonderful day!
Need yeast? Just take a mason jar out to your beehive and collect a few bees and put them in your beer wort or mead must! Bryan Heit, creator of Sui Generis Brewing blog joins us this episode to talk about wild yeast among other things! Jeff is in a conundrum, his keg collection might be getting out of control according to his wife, and finally, we tackle a few Reddit friends to wrap the show. Hey, hope to see you at the Iron Bee!
We are several weeks away from Iron Bee Award Ceremony & MeadUp, one of he great mead gatherings of the year! More than 100 meads (commercial and home) will be available for sampling and some of best mead makers in the country will be around to swap stories and bottles. All attendees bringing something to share will get amazing swag-bags with product samples and there will be drawings throughout the night for gifts from our sponsors. All are welcome to attend. RSVP now!
If you are interested in helping with the competition, please register on the competition site. All those helping will get a great Thank You gift from our sponsors. Competition site: www.themeadhouse.com/comp
And don’t forget, take the Mead House Survey, we’d like to hear from you!
Join The Mead House Keyholder Club on Patreon to help support the show for as little as $2/month. We have some great thank you gifts for supporting us including a limited supply of oak infusion spirals from The Barrel Mill and yeast from White Labs. Join The Mead House Keyholder Club and get your own set of keys to The Mead House!
Mazer Cup medalist Pavel Anisimov visits the Mead House to share some thoughts on his mead making, a last minute schedule change for segment 2 leads JD and Jeff into a discussion on using used bourbon barrels and barrels in general and we wrap the show with a couple Facebook Friends.
We are less than month away from Iron Bee Award Ceremony & MeadUp, one of he great mead gatherings of the year! More than 100 meads (commercial and home) will be available for sampling and some of best mead makers in the country will be around to swap stories and bottles. All attendees bringing something to share will get amazing swag-bags with product samples and there will be drawings throughout the night for gifts from our sponsors. All are welcome to attend. RSVP now!
If you are interested in helping with the competition, please register on the competition site. All those helping will get a great Thank You gift from our sponsors. Competition site: www.themeadhouse.com/comp
And don’t forget, take the Mead House Survey, we’d like to hear from you!
Join The Mead House Keyholder Club on Patreon to help support the show for as little as $2/month. We have some great thank you gifts for supporting us including a limited supply of oak infusion spirals from The Barrel Mill and yeast from White Labs. Join The Mead House Keyholder Club and get your own set of keys to The Mead House!
Gina dalla Gasperino from Meridian Cacao Company joins us at the bar to discuss cocoa and the cacao bean. Please visit their website and check out the Education link. Also in this episode, last week we talked about a few summer flavors for some inspiration, this week we narrowed it down to a few projects we’re going to work on. And finally, Facebook Friends, how come I can’t see the numbers on the hydrometer, and a couple others we mention.
We are less than month away from Iron Bee Award Ceremony & MeadUp, one of he great mead gatherings of the year! More than 100 meads (commercial and home) will be available for sampling and some of best mead makers in the country will be around to swap stories and bottles. All attendees bringing something to share will get amazing swag-bags with product samples and there will be drawings throughout the night for gifts from our sponsors. All are welcome to attend. RSVP now!
If you are interested in helping with the competition, please register on the competition site. All those helping will get a great Thank You gift from our sponsors. Competition site: www.themeadhouse.com/comp
And don’t forget, take the Mead House Survey, we’d like to hear from you!
Join The Mead House Keyholder Club on Patreon to help support the show for as little as $2/month. We have some great thank you gifts for supporting us including a limited supply of oak infusion spirals from The Barrel Mill and yeast from White Labs. Join The Mead House Keyholder Club and get your own set of keys to The Mead House!
Bryan Pierce, Director of North American Sales at Yakima Chief Hops.
Bryan Pierce from Yakima Chief Hops joins us for an interesting and inspiring discussion on integrating hops into meads. Summertime is right around the corner, what’s going to be on tap at your house when you fire up the BBQ? We discuss a few summertime flavors and ideas to get you started, and finally we wrap with a couple questions from our Facebook Friends.
Join us at the Iron Bee award ceremony and after-party for a night of fun, entertainment and mead tastings. Let us know you’re coming so we can prepare for your participation! Please go here, Join The Party and send us an RSVP. We’re still looking for judges, if you’re interested, check in at the competition website.
And don’t forget, take the Mead House Survey, we’d like to hear from you!
Join The Mead House Keyholder Club on Patreon to help support the show for as little as $2/month. We have some great thank you gifts for supporting us including a limited supply of oak infusion spirals from The Barrel Mill and yeast from White Labs. Join The Mead House Keyholder Club and get your own set of keys to The Mead House!
Iron Bee first place winner Bert Mayer joins us in this episode. He has been making mead since he turned 21, and when all his friends bought set ups to make beer, his small apartment pushed him in a different direction. A mild hobby at first, he spent more of his time in the underground world of facial hair competitions. Since retiring from that after the World Championships in 2017, he has turned his focus back to the art of making mead, taking classes at UC Davis and the American Honey Tasting Society, as well as becoming a steward captain at the Mazer Cup. With hopes of someday opening a small tap room (a rolling 5 year plan), he hopes to just keep making things people enjoy drinking.
Don’t forget, we’ll be on our 2 week hiatus, and when we come back, look for more exciting shows featuring some really awesome guests! Thanks for your continued support, we appreciate all our listeners. Get a set of keys to the mead house, help keep the Mead House podcast free by subscribing to Patreon, when you do, Jeff will send you some great gifts!
He’s a Minnesota-native, has six Mazer Cup wins, a Minnesota State Fair Best of Show and two first round placements in this year’s National Homebrew Competition. And, he’s only been making mead for a year and a half. Adam Bystrom joins us at the bar tonight.
A Hawaiian Luau mead, got any ideas or a recipe to share? Contact us at 
When asked what kinds of meads he likes to make, he answered this way, “What would I like to drink?” Award winning mead maker, Nathan Steigman drops in, he also put together the winning MVP Challenge mead at the 2019 Iron Bee. We’ll get Nathan’s perspective on mead making, and and ask him the source of his inspiration. Also in this episode, from the 
Iron Bee Silver Medalist, Brett Guthrie, stops by the house to talk about his winning entry and thoughts on mead making. He likes doing session meads, and uses his environment of sandy beaches and sunny days as his inspiration. And from the Mead House survey, we discuss kegging your homebrew. Finally, we wrap the show with a few Facebook Friends, and answer a couple questions.
Home meadmaker and medalist, Josh Mahoney joins us on the show for some final thoughts and a wrap-up of the first Mead House Iron Bee competition that took place last weekend in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
Need yeast? Just take a mason jar out to your beehive and collect a few bees and put them in your beer wort or mead must! Bryan Heit, creator of 
We are several weeks away from 
Join The 
Join us at the Iron Bee award ceremony and after-party for a night of fun, entertainment and mead tastings. Let us know you’re coming so we can prepare for your participation! Please go here,