r/mead•
SidequestCo

At bottling stage and realised I doubled the honey

Help!

Novice mead maker - successfully made JAO mead and decided to try a simple 3 ingredient honey using some local unheated honey (and water + EC118).

My biggest error? I got confused with pounds & kilograms and ended up using 3kg honey for 5L demijohn (~5lb in a gallon for US).

Second biggest error was not taking a hydrometer meter that day.

In JAO style, I added the airlock, put it in my basement and once I confirmed it was happily bubbling, ignored it for the next few months (checking just every now and again to confirm ongoing activity). After about 3 months it had stilled, and tonight I got around to bottling it.

However, the hydrometer now is reading 1.140, and unsurprisingly it is unpleasantly sweet to drink as-is.

What are my options now? Dilute in half, hope fermentation restarts? Fortify it with spirits and pretend it was intentional? Mix with something else?

Posted Jul 5, 2025, 1:35 PM UTC

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