Perry is one of the world’s most misunderstood, overlooked, and underrated drinks. Made much in the same way as hard cider, but from pears, it has existed in some form or another for over 2,000 years and has survived extinction— sometimes by a whisker — through the grit and determination and sheer bloody-mindedness of a small group of people who know it to be too great a treasure to lose.

Like cider, its flavors derive from a bewildering host of literally hundreds of varieties of pears, each one with a different aroma, character, and texture. Some of these pears, so-called “perry pears” — particularly those most prominently grown in France, the U.K., and Central Europe — have no other use but the making of this drink. They’re totally inedible — 17th century historians wrote that even pigs wouldn’t touch them — but their drink is sublime. Others are dessert pears such as you might find in cans and pastries. Perhaps even more exciting are the perries made from wild, randomly growing trees, the legacy of lost orchards, and seeds strewn in the droppings of birds and animals.

Again, as with other drinks fermented from fruit, these flavors can be ameliorated and manipulated across a dazzling array of styles according to the methods and intentions of the maker. There are perries made the same way as Champagne, every bit as elegant as their grapey counterpart. Others are big and robust, perhaps aged in oak and bottled still. There are sweet, frothy, gorgeously scented perries made in the classic Normandy style, and there are super fruity, dangerously crushable perries that demand hot days and cold, generous glasses. There are even huge, rich fortified perries, crackling with the warmth of Ports or barrel-aged barleywines.

Whatever the pears, whatever the style, perry offers the patient maker and dedicated drinker a host of possibilities. As aspirational cider has continued its rise around the world, so perry has followed along behind it. But increasingly this much-overlooked drink is gaining its own spotlight and appreciation. On both sides of the Atlantic, and indeed all over the world, from Australia to Japan, from Chile to Canada, the best perries that have ever been made are sitting on shelves right now. If you have not already, there’s never been a better time to discover it and to make your own.

A Brief History

As with all drinks, we’ll never know for certain exactly when the first perry was fermented. Beginning in the wild forests of what is now western China, the pear headed east and west, hybridizing, mutating, and ultimately being specifically cloned and grafted as it went. The first mention of a drink that we would recognize as perry comes in Pliny the Elder’s Natural History of 77 AD, in which he describes “the Falernian pear, so called from the drink it affords.”

For the following millennium it was fairly quiet, appearing mainly in ecclesiastical references from France, where it was even drunk as penance by saints — Saint Redegonde, for instance, retired to a convent where she allegedly drank nothing but water and perry! By the thirteenth century it was achieving prominence in central Europe — for a while it was the favored drink of the Bavarians, even ahead of beer. In the 17th century, when continental wars slowed down supplies of wine to England, perry had a brief heyday alongside cider as “the native wine” of the English.

In the United States, perry achieved surprising popularity, particularly in the Northeast, until an incurable bacteria called fireblight appeared in the Hudson Valley of New York, to which pear trees proved particularly susceptible. Since pear trees on traditional rootstocks take decades to come to fruit-bearing maturity, their devastation by fireblight proved a death knell for American perry, until modern makers once again turned their hands to it.  

As recently as 1950, you could have drawn a band across Europe, through the U.K., northern France, Austria, Luxembourg, Switzerland, southern Germany, and conceivably even further, and all along that band perry pear trees were grown by the thousand, and perry was a central part of rural life. But, largely following the mechanization of agriculture, pear trees were cut down to make way mostly for cornfields by the million. Austria’s Mostviertel had a million perry pear trees — today they have somewhere around 200,000. France’s Domfrontais boasted a collective orchard of 1.5 million, but by 1999 only 100,000 remained. In the U.K., numbers would have been very similar, but no one even bothered to keep count. Switzerland, once the heart of the perry world, cut down 11 million fruit trees between 1950–1975 and now I am only aware of two perrymakers in the whole country.

Perry could easily have disappeared entirely; indeed, in some countries it almost did. But thanks to the modern movement around the world, this miraculous drink has been given yet another life.

A Word on the Pears

You can use absolutely any pears in the making of perry, and don’t listen to anyone who tells you otherwise. In the drink’s three modern heartlands — Domfrontais in France’s Normandy, Mostviertel in northern Austria, and the U.K.’s Three Counties of Herefordshire, Worcestershire, and Gloucestershire and just over the Welsh border into Monmouthshire — perry is almost exclusively made with so-called “perry pears.” These varieties are packed with acidity and tannins, like Thorn, Barland, Plant de Blanc, Speckbirne, and Grüne Pichelbirne. You wouldn’t want to eat any of these. Indeed, some are so bitter or sharp that they’ll almost skin the roof of your mouth (trust me, I’ve been there). But these properties can be precisely what lend themselves to the most flavorful and beautifully-structured perries of all. Many of these treasured varieties have now been grafted in American orchards, especially in Washington, Oregon, and New York State, and the comparisons with the flavors of their European equivalents make for fascinating drinking.

Eating pears, generally lower in acidity and entirely without the bitterness of tannin, make a much lighter, subtler perry. All perries are famously hard to make, but without the crutch of lower pH, dessert pear perries can be particularly troublesome. But persevere! Some truly delicious perries around the world, from makers like Oregon’s Blossom Barn, England’s Vagrant and Nightingale, The Netherlands’ Elegast, and Japan’s Kamoshika have used pears like Bartlett, Conference, and Anjou.

The final option is to go wild. America, particularly some of the states already mentioned, has an abundance of randomly grown wilding pear trees, often the legacies of native orchards disrupted or devastated by European settlers, such as those of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy in the area of New York’s Finger Lakes, now harvested by makers like Eve’s. Wild pears offer a whole new world of flavors: Any of these trees has the potential to be the next great perry variety. What’s more, pears that have grown in this way, in U.S. soil, likely have greater inherent resistance to fireblight. As the bacteria continues to decimate pear trees around the world, perries from these varieties may prove to be the most important of all.

Making Perry

The good news, for makers of hard cider, is that the similarity between these beverages means you’re already well equipped to tackle making perry. And homebrewers who have never made cider should not shy away from perry either, because the availability of cider nutrients and cider yeast make perry an approachable thing for good and adventurous brewers.

The basic premise is the same as cider from apples or even wine from grapes. Harvest your fruit, crush and press it, ferment it with pitched or ambient yeasts, and package it when ready. And indeed your choice of styles, maturation vessels, and packaging equipment is effectively identical to those you would consider if working with apples.

There is a “but” (or this section would be very short!). Perry is generally accepted as far more troublesome to make than either cider or wine, which is likely the main reason it doesn’t have the same prominence as those drinks. “If it didn’t make that drink we would stop making perry tomorrow,” Tom Oliver, one of the world’s most renowned perrymakers tells me. “It’s too demanding, it takes too much. Making cider’s a piece of cake compared to making perry, the risks are not there — and then you can’t sell the bloody stuff once you’ve made it! But it’s that drink, honestly. Cider’s great, but if I want to show off to somebody, it’s usually a perry I go for. What a drink.”

So, let’s start from the top with the making of perry and the challenges you’ll face along the way. Though they may sound daunting, they can all be overcome by those who are determined, as homebrewers tend to be.

Harvesting

Depending on the rootstocks, pear trees can grow 60-feet (18-m) tall, with 50-foot (15-m) canopies, and can ripen more than a ton of fruit on a single tree. Sounds great, doesn’t it? Until you consider that you have to get those pears down somehow, and that 60 feet (18 m) is a long way for a piece of fruit to fall undamaged. 

Nightmarishly, some varieties won’t drop their entire fruit load, and you may need to take a very long stick and encourage the remaining pears down. (Being hit on the head by falling pears is a perrymaker’s rite of passage). Even worse, some varieties like Yellow Huffcap may begin to rot from the inside out whilst they’re still on the branch. 

Pears also have notoriously slim ripeness windows. Think of the pears in your fruit bowl — rock hard for days, until you look away for two minutes and suddenly they’ve turned to mush. You can’t ripen many of them off the tree as you can apples; varieties like Thorn need to be harvested and pressed within two days. Moorcroft, also known in the U.K. as “Stinking Bishop,” can be as little as 24 hours. 

Milling (or Crushing) and Pressing

As anyone who has eaten a pear will know, its structure is very different to that of an apple. Milling and pressing overripe pears can be a very messy business. Pears love nothing better than to clog a mill or a press, and since, unlike apples, they don’t float, even washing them is a more tiresome business than it is when making cider.

Nevertheless, despite the clogging and the extra cleaning, any sort of press that can be used for cider can be used for perry. Traditional rack and cloth presses or hydropresses are common amongst small makers, while larger producers might deploy a belt or pneumatic press. We’ve included links at the end of this article for a couple of DIY builds that can help you crush and press your pears (or apples).

Yeasts and Fermentation

Again, yeast selection depends on what you’re attempting to achieve. Amongst small makers in the U.K. and France, native yeasts tend to be commonplace. For larger, more industrial makers, but also amongst many of the makers in Austria who are looking to emulate the style and some of the flavors of still white wine, choosing a particular strain of yeast is more common. Often, though not always, strains of white wine yeast are used for perry production. Cider yeast is also available from some manufacturers in small sachets perfect for 5-gallon (19-L) batches of perry at home, and will work quite well. I’ve even had a perry fermented with kveik, the fast-fermenting Norwegian farmhouse ale yeast.

A note on sulfites is worth making here. Very few varieties of pear — even the perry pears of the U.K. and continental Europe — have pHs as low as those of most apples. Pear juice is far less stable than apple, and far more susceptible to the impacts of oxygen and biological infection. So much so that I know many makers who take a zero-zero approach with their cider or wine, but will still add a small dose of sulfite to their perry. Those who make stupendous perries without sulfites have my absolute admiration; it is very hard indeed to achieve, and not recommended for a new perrymaker.

Pear juice is also — there’s no other word for it — plain weird. In the first place it contains more sorbitol than apple juice. There’s a long-standing myth that this sorbitol content is at laxative levels. Trust me, if this were the case, I’d be a ghost. The myth almost certainly came about thanks to the historic inclusion of overripe fruit at pressing. Where sorbitol definitely causes headaches is with judging when fermentation is finished. This unfermentable sugar doesn’t sit at the same level each year, so especially for makers looking to bottle pét-nat perries (that is, bottling prior to fermentation completion so it naturally carbonates in bottle), judging how far along a fermentation is can be trickier than with cider or beer. Even when you think fermentation is complete, give it another week and check again to be sure.

Pear juice also contains a high concentration of a compound called procyanidin, a type of polyphenol, which binds together in all sorts of different and often unsightly ways. I’ve seen two perfectly clear perries which, blended together, became as opaque as milk. I’ve seen sediment thrown that looks — there’s no nice way of saying this — like an alien’s brain. Most frustratingly, I’ve seen perries disgorged to remove this sediment and then gone on to make it again even after filtering. None of this sediment is harmful in any way. But without an exceedingly tight filter, the use of pasteurization, or heavy fining, it may be something you simply need to explain to those you share your perry with. In Austria especially, it is commonplace to mitigate the worst of this by extensive maceration of the pears prior to pressing.

Maturation and Packaging

Whilst it’s by no means universally true, the majority of pears and perries tend to err on the more delicate side compared to ciders. Their flavors can be gentler, more floral, and graced with more elegant nuance. For this reason, most perries tend to be fermented in plastic, stainless steel, or extremely neutral oak.

With that said, varieties that are bolder in character, or makers looking for richer styles such as mistelles or fortified perries, can often deploy oak with delicious results. Mostellos, Austrian fortified perries from Destillerie Farthofer, mature in casks for at least four years. Flakey Bark, from Herefordshire’s Ross-on-Wye, can spend months in active casks and barely change in the intensity of its unique flavor at all. I’ve had perries that aged in wine casks, spirits casks, even casks that held Islay whisky or tequila. And you know what? I loved them all. 

Options when it comes to finishing and packaging your perry are identical to those available to cidermakers. To arrest fermentation prematurely, retaining natural sweetness, perry can be simply pasteurized, or if a more natural style is intended, cold-racked multiple times to remove yeasts, as is common practice in the Domfrontais. Alternatively, the perry can be allowed to ferment to dryness, though care must be taken to ensure any remaining gravity is purely sorbitol, rather than unfermented sugars. (Unfortunately there is no definite way of telling what is sorbitol and what is not with a hydrometer — for most makers this is a matter of patience and experience!) The dry perry can then be backsweetened, if that is the preference, or simply packaged as it is.

Still perry remains a popular option in Austria and the U.K., whether it is bottled, as is the general Austrian preference, kegged, or packaged in a bag-in-box, as draught perry, as is often found in the U.K. However, it is more common to find perries sparkling. In the Domfrontais this is generally achieved by bottling ‘pét-nat’ – allowing the primary fermentation to finish in its bottle. There are also increasing numbers of traditional method perries, where a secondary fermentation is induced in bottle by the addition of yeast and sugar (around 25 g/L) to a finished perry, in the style of Champagne (Champagne yeast such as EC1118 is the most popular choice here).

If a completely clear perry is desired, maceration prior to pressing as well as heavy fining and filtration are necessary. Because of the biological makeup of pear juice, I have even seen perries reform a sediment after filtration or disgorging. In some instances, the efforts required for absolute clarity in the liquid may come at the cost of considerable amounts of character and flavor. Since perry (other than certain perry pears) has a naturally higher pH than cider, it may also be desirable to adjust acidity and dose with a small amount of sulfite before packaging. 

Perry Recipes:

Two pros share how they make perry — one primarily with culinary pears and the other with perry pears. This decision results in drastically different perry, but both approaches are great options for homebrewers.

Jeremy Hall Founded Blossom Barn Cidery in southern Oregon’s Rogue Valley in 2018.

Our flagship perries that go into cans and kegs are primarily made with Rogue Valley-grown dessert Bosc and Comice pears. These are the pears that have dominated Oregon’s Rogue Valley pear industry going back to the 1880s and the locals love them. It’s the reason we decided to make perry instead of apple cider. These perries range from 100% culinary pears to 90% culinary pears co-fermented with fruit like cider apples, passion fruit, sour cherries, and strawberries. These are crowd-pleasing perries that generally appeal to people that are used to modern, semi-dry ciders.

Dessert pears lend themselves to easy-drinking perries, contributing a creamy mouthfeel that complements co-ferments with bold fruits like sour cherries and passion fruit. These perries can be drunk after just a couple months of aging in a reductive environment. We have made small batches from young perry trees we have on our orchard. These perries really showcase the depth and astringency of the perry pear and benefit from longer aging on fine lees with an occasional pump over to get some oxygen in the cider. This helps resolve all the short tannins into longer tannins that deliver a smooth yet complex perry.

We ferment all of our perries to dry, though we do backsweeten our seasonal perries with juice from local seasonal fruit like raspberries.

The juice undergoes treatment with pectinase to get the pectin out. We also add malic acid to our dessert fruit to get the pre-fermentation pH down to 3.8. After the acid and pectinase treatments, we add 25 ppm SO₂, mostly to control bacteria that convert the high citric acid content of the pears to acetic acid. 

We use white wine yeast to ferment our perry. We’re currently using ES181 from EnartisFerm, and have used DV10 also, but switched as we found the fermentation to be cleaner with no hydrogen sulfide (H₂S) production with a longer, colder ferment. I would recommend a first timer use a commercial yeast — mostly to avoid H₂S and volatile acidity (VA) that can dominate perry ferments. Or at least split the juice and use a commercial yeast on one and a wild ferment on the other.

If you have made hard apple cider but are new to perry, here are a few things to look out for: 

1. Most pears benefit from cold storage to ripen. Even wild pears will ripen more consistently with a couple weeks or even a full month of cold storage. Juicing fully ripe fruit that hasn’t been cold stored can be like trying to get juice out of apple sauce. Pick the pears a little early, cold store them for at least a week, and pull them out for a day or two and then juice them.

2. Unless you’re going to keeve (a process of nutrient deprivation for a naturally sweet cider or perry), the high pectin content can create a lot of issues for fermentation, aging, and packaging. Treating the juice for pectin pre-fermentation is recommended. The citric acid content of pears is a big issue for VA, so controlling the populations of bacteria that cause VA is more important in perry than it is for apple-based cider or wine.

3. You can make a good perry out of any pears that are somewhat firm when ripe. Avoid varieties like Bartlett that are soft and creamy when ripe — they will be tough to juice. 

Chris Weir leads the cidermaking team at Finnriver Farm & Cidery in Chimacum, Washington.

We grow three main varieties of perry pears in our orchard: Yellow Huffcap, Hendre Huffcap, and Romanian. We also have some amazing community members that will often bring us several thousand pounds of wild harvested seedling pears that are generally exceptionally high in acid and tannin content. Typically we produce our estate perry each year for our Orchard Series lineup. If we have an abundant perry pear year we may do an additional one or two specialty releases, such as our Keeved Single Malt Barrel Aged Perry.

Perry pears allow us to produce an assertive and bold perry without the need for fermentation adjuncts, acid additions, or added sugars. While I can certainly understand the appeal of blending in some culinary variety pears to increase volume and mellow out some of the aggressive tannins, I often find that the utilization of these varieties can result in a perry that is a bit more mellow and tame than I generally prefer. But that is just a personal preference. 

We use an extended maceration process for our perry during the pressing stage. We will grind the pears into macro bins and allow it to sit for 24 hours prior to pressing. This extended maceration of the pulp allows for some controlled oxidation to occur, which helps to soften the aggressive tannins. Numbers depend on the harvest, but our juice is usually coming off the press around 3.4 pH and about 0.65 TA (titratable acidity). We sulfite between 15–30 ppm prior to primary fermentation and that is often the only addition made to the juice.

If it is an off year with low harvest yields we will typically ferment all of our perry varieties in one batch. If we have an abundant harvest I will ferment the varieties separately. This can allow for more creative freedom down the line in terms of blending for our final product. It opens up the option of utilizing different yeast strains to highlight certain characteristics of different varieties. There are a massive variety of yeasts available on the market and I enjoy experimenting with what they have to offer. Other times I utilize the natural yeast that comes in on the fruit and allow the wild ferment to do its thing. Ultimately it is a matter of creative inspiration in the moment. For a first-time perrymaker I would generally recommend pitching a cultured yeast. Wild ferments come with some risks and can be challenging to keep clean and healthy if you are unfamiliar with the process and don’t have a solid nutrient plan or temperature control.

Even if you don’t have access to traditional perry pears you can certainly ferment a unique and delicious perry at home. While using juice from entirely dessert variety pears will generally yield a lighter, less complex perry, there are many tools at the cidermaker’s disposal to help build some complexity in the final product. Using a small amount of light or untoasted oak in the primary fermentation can add fullness and complexity without coming across as an inherently oaked or aged perry. If you don’t mind some woody depth, I have used toasted Douglas fir staves to surprising success as well as toasted acacia wood. Co-ferments with other fruits are also a fantastic way to bring a little extra excitement to the table. 

If you are familiar with making hard cider you should be well set to dive into the world of perry, though there are a few differences between them worth noting. Pears contain sorbitol, an unfermentable sugar, which means perry always has some residual sweetness remaining after fermentation. The level of residual sweetness can vary drastically from variety-to-variety and harvest-to-harvest.

Perry is also more challenging to clarify than apple cider and will often remain quite hazy after fermentation and aging. I personally don’t mind a hazy perry, but if you prefer a clear and bright beverage, I have had the best luck achieving clarity with repeated cold-crashing and racking. 

Lastly, if you usually allow for any malolactic activity in your ciders you should bear in mind that pears generally have high levels of citric acid as opposed to apples, which predominately contain malic acid. The bacteria used for malolactic fermentation to convert malic acid into lactic acid will also convert citric acid into acetic acid, which is generally less desirable.

You’ve made some cheese (following the instructions in this story I wrote), and left behind is the whey. While many cheesemakers use the whey in place of broth in a bread dough, or as a treat for a lucky cat, I look for another fermentation from this byproduct. Such projects have included wine, mead, and even liquor (which is then used to make liqueur). Let me explain. 

For any of these projects, my first step is to transform the whey into a wine. A wine made from whey, from milk? No way.  Yes, whey. 

Whey wines have a very long indigenous history in the Highlands and islands of Scotland, as well as Scandinavia, in Mongolia, and in Kyrgyz. In Scotland, a very low-alcohol wine called blaand (as in blond/e, not bland) was made from buttermilk. This was fermented in wooden kegs, by lactose-
consuming yeast, Kluyveromyces lactis. YouTube videos offer lessons on making blaand at around 12% ABV, but the original drink was perhaps closer to kvass, a drink made from rye bread at 1–2% ABV. 

In Mongolia, a low-alcohol wine, koumiss, was made from mare’s milk. In the Kyrgyz Republic, koumiss is fermented in barrels, but in Mongolia this wine is fermented in goatskin bags. 

Rather than search for Kluyveromyces lactis yeast, I ferment “on” the whey and not the whey itself. As I make cheese beginning with one gallon (3.8 L) of milk, I usually finish a pint short of that of whey. I heat the whey to about 200 °F (93 °C) to pasteurize it and eliminate the bacteria with which I inoculated the milk to make the cheese. At that temperature and at the acidity of the whey (a pH of around 5.0 or lower) a second run of cheese, akin to ricotta, may begin to form on the top of the liquid. If it does, remove the foam with a slotted spoon. Then add 2–2.5 lbs. (0.9–1.1 kg) of sugar and mix well to dissolve (this brings the volume back up to about one gallon (3.8 L). Cover the kettle and let the sweetened whey cool overnight.

If you like the idea of making a lactomel — a mead made from whey — add about 2.5 lbs. (1.1 kg) of honey, orange blossom is a good choice, in place of the sugar.

If you add 5 or 6 lactase tablets to transform the (unfermentable) lactose sugars into glucose and galactose you will increase the amount of fermentable sugar, bringing the specific gravity from about 1.090 to about 1.100. While lactose is relatively sweet, it has been determined to be only about 20% as sweet as sucrose, so definitely not as sweet as sugar.

Measure the gravity. If it is significantly above 1.100, add spring water to bring the gravity down for a more balanced wine or mead. Pour the whey into a sanitized fermenting bucket and pitch the yeast. If you intend to drink whey wine as a table wine, pitch Lalvin 71B or QA23 wine yeast at this point. 

As a table wine or mead, add tannin as if this was a fruit wine (about ½ tsp. per gallon/3.8 L) and loosely cover the fermenter with a cloth. After a few days of active fermentation, rack the wine into a carboy. Now seal with a bung and airlock. The wine will need to age about nine months or more before you can really taste its fruity nature, which is very similar to the French sweet wine Sauternes. 

If, however, you are interested in making liquor or liqueurs from your whey, pitch 1 Tbsp. of baker’s yeast. This will take off like gangbusters within a few hours. No need to add tannin or acid. Rack to a carboy after a few days and seal with a bung and airlock. Fermentation will be complete in 3 weeks.

From there, you can distill the wine. The result, for all intents and purposes, is vodka. As such, I’ve used it as a base to make liqueurs. 

Possibly the ancestor of all alcoholic beverages, mead has been enjoyed by audiences across history — from humble working folk to soldiers, pirates, and even royalty. And while its popularity waned in recent centuries, over the last decade or so there has been a resurgence in interest in making this ancient, golden-hued drink. 

Mead is also sometimes called honey wine because it is, in its most basic form, a beverage of similar strength to wine that gets its sugar from honey. Of course, there are numerous variations of mead that differ based on honey source as well as the addition of spices, grains, fruits, and other ingredients that allow for an exploration of creativity.

In this piece, it’s the fruit bit that we will be concentrating on — specifically stone fruit — with the expectation that you already know the very basics of meadmaking (though if you don’t, start here for a good overview of the general process: www.byo.com/article/modern-mead-making). 

Stone fruits, scientifically classified under the genus Prunus, are a type of fruit characterized by their fleshy exterior and a hard “stone” or pit inside, which houses the seed. They are commonly known as drupes. These fruits are known for their juicy, sweet, and sometimes tart flavors, which makes them popular choices for fresh consumption as well as making fruit meads (melomels) of diverse flavors. 

Examples of the more common drupes that we all know are mangoes, nectarines, peaches, plums, cherries, and apricots. Some that may not be as obvious include pecans, amlas (Indian gooseberries), blackthorn (Prunus spinosa) and ivy (Hedera helix). 

Stone fruits are versatile and can be used in meadmaking by combining the juice with other flavors and fruits (more on this later) or used with a single honey variety for a straight- forward mead. Alcohol percent can also range from high-octane still meads that finish dry and have tremendous aging potential, to lower-alcohol beverages (often carbonated) that drink as light and refreshing with more retained residual sweetness. 

No matter the style, making the best stone fruit mead requires the best fruits at optimum ripeness. If you live in an area where these fruits are grown, you have a big advantage as you can use the freshest fruits. That said, there are many other options from canned and frozen fruits to purees that can also have good results. Any of these other choices would be far better than using subpar fruit that you don’t want to eat. Expecting a resulting mead to taste better than the sum of its parts is a fool’s game. And let’s face it: The price of honey is too high to gamble with fruit that has visible mold, wildlife damage, or significant bruising. Though you may be able to find fruit for a discounted price simply for aesthetic deformities, which is a great way to use up perfectly good-tasting fruit.

Sugar Levels of Stone Fruits

Stone fruits vary in their natural sugar content, based on factors such as variety, growing conditions, and ripeness. Now, why is it important that we consider the sugar levels of our stone fruits for meadmaking? Well, besides the fact that it directly adds to the sweetness and flavor, sugar is the main component that ferments in your mead. Because honey is the primary source of sugar in mead — even fruit mead — this isn’t a huge factor, but the more sugar the fruit has the less honey will be needed to hit your target starting gravity. There are numerous sources for average sugar content of fruit online. One I have used is www.sugarnutritionresource.org. Here is the average sugar content of the most common stone fruits used in meadmaking: 

• Sweet cherry (1.036–1.053 SG)

• Peach (1.032–1.036 SG)

• Nectarine (1.032–1.036 SG)

• Plum  (1.024–1.032 SG)

• Apricot (1.024–1.028 SG)

As a homebrewer, you know that averages are just a starting point when it comes to a fruit’s sugar content. As an agricultural product, the actual sugar content will vary from place-to-place, or even tree-to-tree, based on weather patterns and growing conditions. So the best way to get the most accurate measurement is to test the juice using a refractometer. With a fruit like cherries, get a handful and crush them together in a Ziploc bag. Wait a while and then take a sample. With larger fruits, cut slices of a bunch of pieces and follow a similar process.

What’s the Recommended Amount of Fruit to Be Used Per Batch? 

Depending on the flavor intensity and the type of stone fruit being used, the recommendation varies on just how much fruit you’ll need for a batch of mead. However, on average, 1–3 lbs. per gallon (120–360 g/L) works well with most fruits. After using this as a starting point, you might leave it for a week and then have a tasting session to see if you want to add more fruit or not. In my experience, I have found 2 pounds (0.9 kg) of stone fruit per gallon (3.8 L) to work to give me the perfect flavor. The fruit itself and your palate will have an impact on the perfect amount for your mead. 

Fresh, Canned, or Frozen Fruit?

All of these fruit forms yield good results in your mead, but there are some distinctions you must note. 

In my first three years of making peach, plum, and cherry meads, I used canned fruits because it was available year-round. It wasn’t until I went to an open fruit market that I experienced a different taste and degree of tartness in my final product. Fresh fruit is natural, so it is usually less sweet or more tart depending on ripeness, which can be adjusted in the recipe to balance sweetness. You have full control on how it’s processed: Adding of extra sugars or not, freezing or not, removal of skin/seed removal, etc. It’s all your choice. However, the seasonality of fruit means they aren’t available year-round, plus you will have to spend more time cutting, depitting, etc. Just like choosing fruit to eat, most would agree fresh is going to taste best, but the trade-off of time and effort are real considerations.

The canned fruit form is usually available throughout the year, although they often contain added sugars, syrups, and preservatives. I have enjoyed the meads made with canned fruit, and another benefit is a consistent flavor profile for the most part, though they don’t have the same taste as perfectly ripe, fresh fruit. 

Another option is buying frozen fruit. It is similar to fresh fruit (though, again, nothing beats fresh tastewise). You don’t get the added ingredients that often come with canned fruits, and the fact that the fruit is frozen actually makes working with the fruit easy. Why? Well, freezing fresh fruit is a step I recommend anyway, which we’ll discuss in the next section.

Processing 

Processing stone fruits for meadmaking involves several steps to extract flavors effectively and prepare them for fermentation. They are slightly more labor-intensive than most fruits because the pits need to be removed, and the size of many of the fruits means you can’t just crush them as you would a softer berry. Following are the processing steps I take:

1. Choose Ripe Fruit

The same fruit that is the best flavor for eating is the best fruit for meadmaking. Select ripe, preferably freshly picked, fruits for the best flavor. For peaches and nectarines, your nose will tell you when they are ripe. They will emit a sweet – almost floral – aroma. You can also do the pressure test. This is how you can select a ripe plum — take the stem and gently apply pressure. If it yields, you know it’s ripe and ready to go.

2. Rinse

Give the fruit a thorough rinse and rub to remove any dirt, bugs, or residues.

3. Depitting

Before you freeze your fruits, it’s advisable to remove the pits, especially for plums and other fruits that have large seeds. This is because if you decide to crush the stones or leave them in contact with your fruit for fermentation, it could cause a bitter taste (because of the presence of a bitter compound in them, amygdalin). Also, isn’t it just easier to process without a stone to battle with?

4. Freezing

An important processing step for fresh stone fruits is to freeze for 24–48 hours. This will not only slow and retard the growth of bacteria that may be on the fruit, but releases the flavor much easier during fermentation. When fruit is frozen, the water inside the fruit cells forms ice crystals. These crystals expand and rupture the cell walls. When the fruit is thawed, these ruptured cells release more of their internal juices and flavors into the mead. This process increases the extraction of flavors from the fruit as the cellular structure is broken down, allowing more of the natural compounds to mix with the mead.

5. Chopping, pureeing, or juicing

After freezing and thawing, it’s recommended to cut the fruit into smaller pieces or crush the fruits well using whatever device is at your disposal. Another option is pureeing the fruit into a smooth paste by using a blender or food processor. If you have a juicer, you can juice the fruit and add the juice to your fermenter as well. 

Additional Ingredients to Add

While making your own melomel, rather than just the basic mixture of honey, water, yeast, and fruit, why not take it a step further with ingredients to enhance flavor and complexity? Of course, the variety of honey used is important and should complement the fruit you choose. Wildflower and orange blossom honeys are usually safe bets for these types of meads, but don’t be afraid to play around with some more exotic honey varieties that may add to the experience.

Beyond honey variety, here are few ingredients that often pair great with stone fruit meads:

Spices

Cinnamon sticks, cloves, nutmeg, allspice, ginger, vanilla beans, and star anise are just a few of the spices that could be added to your mead. However, the options are vast and can range from floral additions like chamomile, to exotic choices like cardamom or even chili peppers for a spicy kick. If you haven’t experimented before, a good place to start is thinking about some of your favorite dishes. Love peach cobbler with cinnamon and a little nutmeg served with vanilla ice cream? Sounds like a good combination for mead too!

Once you pick the spices to complement your mead, consider when and how much to add. If you want a more pronounced spicy aroma and flavor by the time your mead is ready for consumption, then it is recommended to add spices during the secondary fermentation or aging process. You should carefully consider the appropriate quantity to be added for each spice, as these spices should complement the taste of your stone fruit mead, not overwhelm it. Some spices, like cloves or cinnamon can be quite potent while others like vanilla or ginger can add depth without dominating. Do trials if possible, and remember that more spice can always be added, but once too much is added it can’t be taken out.

Herbs

Herbs also add a spectrum of flavors and aromas that complement and enhance the natural sweetness of mead. Some of the spices listed earlier could also be classified under herbs. Some other popular herbs include lavender, chamomile, and rosemary, all of which add specific subtle floral notes to complement your honey; chamomile imparts a soothing, apple-like flavor and rosemary gives a piney note with hints of citrus. 

Citrus zest

Speaking on citrus, citrus zest is prepared by scraping or cutting from the rind of unwaxed citrus fruits such as lemon, orange, and lime with the use of a micro plane or a fine grater. Zest adds bright, tangy flavors to your mead that often complement the honey perfectly. They could also be added during secondary fermentation or aging. Just be sure to leave the pith (the white layer beneath the outer peel) as it is very bitter.

Other fruits

Who said a stone fruit melomel should only contain these types of fruits? Throw in some raspberries, blackberries, or even apples for that cyser blend. There are a lot of combinations that work well together. A fun trial to see how they will taste together in a mead is to buy an assortment of fruits and try eating them in
different combinations.

Oak

Oak chips and cubes are readily available and convenient for homebrewers. Oak chips have more surface area and can impart flavors faster, while oak cubes release flavors more slowly due to their density. As homebrewers are aware, there are also different oak types; American oak tends to add stronger vanilla and coconut notes, while French oak is known for more subtle spice and tannin. Consider the mead and the flavors you wish to impart with the oak to make
your choice.

Yeast nutrients

While honey provides essential nutrients for yeast, ensuring a robust fermentation process often requires supplementing with yeast nutrients. 

Two popular nutrient options are Fermaid O and Fermaid K. Fermaid O is an organic blend of yeast hulls and vitamins, and Fermaid K an inorganic combination of diammonium phosphate, yeast hulls, and other nutrients designed to support yeast health during fermentation. Fermaid O is more suited for delicate meads and Fermaid K is better used for robust or high-ABV meads.

Yeast nutrients can be added directly into your honey and water mixture (must), when pitching the yeast, but ensure you mix the nutrient with a small amount of warm water first before adding it to the must to minimize the risk of clumping. 

Pectic enzyme

In this article, we are dealing with fruits just as much as we’re dealing with meads, so of course we have to talk about this important fruit enzyme. Pectinase is crucial for the breakdown of pectin, a complex polysaccharide in fruits, into simpler molecules.

During your fermentation  process, pectin tends to cause cloudiness and haze in the mead leading to a turbid appearance. This is where your pectic enzyme clears things up and reduces turbidity. Pectinase could also function in breaking down fruit cell walls, releasing trapped nutrients, sugars, and aromatics in the must. Typically, you should add pectic enzyme during the initial stages of mead preparation (primary fermentation stage). A previous “Mr. Wizard” column sheds more light on pectic enzymes, which you can access online at: www.byo.com/mr-wizard/pectic-enzymes/

Ready to make a stone fruit melomel? Following are two recipes that put much of the information covered here to use. Feel free to experiment and tweak them to your own tastes —that’s what the hobby is all about!

Braggot is a curious and poorly understood beverage with a dubious pedigree. That’s a fancy way of saying that we can’t really say where and when it was developed, and that people today often interpret the style in different ways. Let me try to add a little structure to this discussion, mostly by limiting the scope of what kind of drink we are talking about.

Braggot is best thought of as a type of mead, in that it contains a sizable proportion of honey — often at least half of the fermentables. But it is fair to consider braggot as related to beer since it has an ale-like component with a large proportion of fermentables derived from grain. Yet the proportions matter when defining a braggot — a beer with a small amount of honey is best thought of as a honey beer, while historical beverages involving grapes, honey, grain, spices, fruit, and other components are probably something else entirely. A braggot needs a sizable, noticeable honey contribution to differentiate itself from these other beverages.

Historical written references to something called braggot are found in Great Britain in Wales, Scotland, and England, often going back to the Middle Ages when “ale” referred to an unhopped grain beverage. Honey-based beverages and mead can be found around the world, with ancient or historical references to Greeks, Romans, Hindus, Norse, Celts, Moors, Poles, and others. We aren’t talking about this broader range of beverages, but rather the narrower definition originating in the British Isles.

The Beer Judge Certification Program (BJCP) categorizes braggot as Style M4A within the 2015 Mead Style Guidelines, which places it in the M4 Specialty Mead category along with historical mead and experimental mead. Note that these guidelines are currently undergoing revision and are expected to change within the next year, but that the concept of braggot will not change significantly.

History

Literary references to mead are ancient, including some involving grain. Going back before the Roman occupation of parts of the British Isles over two millennia ago, the Greek historian Pytheas surveyed Northwest Europe and made observations of the British Isles around 325 BC. He wrote of people in a northern land called Thule who drank a beverage of grain and honey. However, this was not called braggot, and there is no lineage with modern braggot. There is a lot of disagreement about what land was actually Thule, ranging from Greenland to Norway and every northern island in between. The writings of Pytheas did not survive to modern times and are only known through the writings of others.

Some of the earliest references to braggot can be found in English literature. Geoffrey Chaucer wrote of it in The Canterbury Tales in the late 1300s, specifically in The Miller’s Tale. Gayre, in Brewing Mead, writes that the church frowned upon the mixing of mead and ale to make bracket, bragget, or bragot at several times during the 800s. So, while the drink may date to antiquity, we know that it certainly was around in the 1300s and possibly earlier in the Dark Ages.

Horst Dornbusch, in Beer Styles from Around the World, writes that braggots were possibly Scottish, dating back to the time of the Picts, and were basically a primitive honey ale. These may have been flavored with botanicals, including the heather of the region (which is also a source of honey). Wales is also mentioned as a source, and both were being brewed as early as the times when Romans walked the British Isles.

Later recipes from the 1800s purport to describe recipes from the 1300s, but these must be viewed with some skepticism. Ken Schramm in The Compleat Meadmaker writes of recipes from the 1600s that describe adding honey to small beer before fermentation, as well as others that add honey to strong beers after fermentation. So, I don’t think we know how these used to be made, or there likely was no consistent method for producing braggot.

More modern examples of braggot may feature more of a base beer style, or use a distinctive honey. Brother Adams Bragget Ale from Atlantic Brewing Company in Bar Harbor, Maine, is one such (quite good) example, with a barleywine-like base. However, classic examples are probably better thought of as meads where a portion of the fermentables are replaced by ale wort, and then fermented like a strong ale.

Sensory Profile

To me, the most important element of a braggot is that it is recognizable as a mead — that is, having a noticeable fermented honey character. Different honey varieties bring their own aromatics and flavors, but those components must blend well with the grain or malt flavors in the braggot. The grain-derived flavors should also be apparent in the finished braggot, but not so much that it seems more like a beer than a mead. If the braggot has a declared variety of honey, then that character should be detectable. Wildflower-based braggots may just have a general floral character, but this varies by region and predominant nectar source.

Meads entered in competition must be declared with different sweetness, carbonation, and strength levels, so braggots can range from dry to sweet, still to sparking, and hydromel (session) to sack (strong). Many historical braggots tend to be still, sweet, and at least standard strength, which can make them seem barleywine-like. If a braggot has a declared beer base style, then the braggot should have some semblance of that beer (malt, hop, yeast, and other character). The base beer and honey choice can affect the color as well, since both malt and honey can have a wide range of colors.

Some modern interpretations take more of a beer-centric view, basically treating them as honey beers with more honey. The notion of base styles is introduced, and can be used to create modern variations, including different varieties of yeast including some interesting ones such as lager and Belgian ale yeast. These variations are valid stylistic choices, but remember that judges will always consider whether the beverage is more like a braggot or a honey beer. To be a braggot, the mead component needs to be recognizable.

Historical recipes may include spices, particularly if hops are not used. For competition purposes, a braggot should just contain honey and grain-derived fermentables. A spiced or fruited braggot is best entered as a mixed-style experimental mead. In these cases, the added components would also have to harmonize with the honey and grain components.

Braggots may or may not use hops, so the balance of the finished product may be different. Historically, hops were not used, but some modern examples and those that have a more featured base beer style may use them. The hops, if present, should enhance the honey experience and not cause the bitterness to clash with the sweetness.

Brewing Ingredients and Methods

Historically, there are several combinations of ingredients that can legitimately be called a braggot. Descriptions exist of mixing honey and ale (akin to sweetening beer, or perhaps making a beer cocktail), to combining (blending) mead and ale, and to combining wort and honey and fermenting together. I think all of these are valid approaches to making a braggot, depending on your goal. The latter two approaches are probably more in line with modern expectations.

I make a lot of beer and often have many meads in kegs, so I frequently make braggots by blending beer with mead. I have experimented with different base styles of beer, but usually pick something malty. English barleywine and Scotch ale are two reasonable choices that match well with the historical area. But I’ve also used sweet stout, doppelbock, dunkel, and Märzen as base beers. These are all malty styles with lower bitterness levels and less late-hop character. 

Once you have a base beer in mind, you can pair a honey variety with it. If I’m blending, it is easy to test small samples of finished beer and finished mead to see how compatible the flavors are, and what a reasonable sweetness level is. In both methods, tasting how well the flavor of the honey and that of the grain go together is the key to a successful marriage. Beyond that, assessing the bitterness level of the beer with the sweetness level of the mead is important. Sometimes, you can achieve a compatible balance, but many times there is a bitter-sweet clash of flavors. 

I try to look for compatible flavors when pairing honey with beer. I have had good luck with wildflower honeys or other honeys without a strong varietal character with a bready, toasty barleywine. A caramelly Scotch ale has paired well with Tupelo honey that brings a creamy (but expensive) flavor. Heather honey would be a nice theme, although the flavor of this honey can take a long time to mature. Blending expensive beer and mead in a small batch can be a competition strategy where you don’t want (or can’t afford) to produce a full keg or fermenter of finished braggot. Buckwheat honey can have a malty flavor of its own, and is an interesting choice in a braggot, provided it doesn’t have too strong of a barnyard character (this is a regional character of buckwheat honey — the Eastern type I get is dark and malty, not funky). Something aromatic like orange blossom honey might be nice in a simpler braggot without a rich malt flavor, something that might go with a Pilsner malt-heavy style like a tripel or Belgian blond.

Beers for blending into braggots are made just like the base style, although you may skew the recipe to the lower end of the bitterness range to make it better match the mead. Malt extract is a reasonable addition for the malt component in a braggot, and can make for a fast brew day.

Braggots produced directly as a single batch are made in a manner similar to the base beer style (or just like a standard ale, if it has no specific style), but the way the honey is handled can differ and is under control of the brewer. 

When brewing braggot as a single-fermented product, the honey can be added at various points in brewing. It can be added at the start of the boil, at the end of the boil, or in the fermenter (at the beginning or later in fermentation). Honey is microbially stable so it does not need to be boiled for sanitation purposes, but heating it can make it easier to pour and mix. Boiling honey tends to reduce delicate flavor and aroma compounds while also denaturing enzymes that can be useful. If adding to the fermenter, it should be mixed in well with the wort, otherwise it tends to not dissolve and thus will be inaccessible to yeast initially. If honey is added late in fermentation, be careful about introducing excess oxygen that can oxidize the braggot. 

My experience with honey beers has often produced beers that are slower to finish fermenting than the plain beers upon which they are based. This problem can get exacerbated when making braggot since the percentage of honey is higher. Some meadmakers will “feed” honey to a fermentation, adding it incrementally as it ferments to not overly stress the yeast. Some will experiment with using mead or wine yeast for fermentation rather than beer yeast, especially if higher alcohol levels are desirable. For me, I think splitting the mead and the beer fermentations allows you to optimize each, and then you can blend to your specific taste when both are finished. However, I know some prefer to only make single-batch products.

Homebrew Example

My example is based on an English barleywine base beer with about half the fermentables coming from wildflower honey. I don’t know if I would declare barleywine as a base style in a competition, since some judges will tend to judge the braggot too narrowly. I might expand on the concept in the competition entry description instead. Keep in mind that braggots will be judged with other meads within a homebrew (and likely also commercial) competitions.

I’m using an English barleywine with a rich, caramelly, lightly toasty malt profile with subtle bittering hops and no late hops. I’m relying on the hops to cut the sweetness a little bit, since I am targeting a sweet mead. Alcohol also will provide some of the balance to the maltiness. A straightforward ale fermentation typical for a barleywine can be used to make this braggot, since the honey is only introduced at the end of the boil. All the hot-side part of the recipe is identical to making a barleywine. If you wish to produce something more historical, leave the hops out entirely or perhaps limit them to less than 10 IBUs so they are below flavor threshold (like making lambic).

My honey choice here is a good, local wildflower honey. In Ohio where I live, this means it will often be largely clover honey. I would not use an expensive or super expressive honey in this mead since the malt character will have a large flavor impact. I add the honey at the end of the boil to help it dissolve but to also preserve aromatics compared to an earlier addition.

The braggot is fermented with an ale yeast tolerant of alcohol to about 10%, so that’s about the finished strength of this mead. It will be a sweet mead with a finishing gravity over 1.040. I plan on it being a still mead, although if it picks up a little carbonation during conditioning, that is no problem. If I find the mead isn’t finishing fermentation, I would use some Lalvin 71B yeast to try to get fermentation to complete.

Most of the time when I make braggots, I am blending a strong, malty beer with a finished mead. That is still my preference since it allows me to more completely control the balance. It would certainly work in this case to make a Golden Promise barleywine and a sweet clover mead and to start blending them at a 50/50 ratio. If you desire a stronger braggot, you can help achieve this because the mead can be fermented using mead yeast that is more alcohol-tolerant. A 10% barleywine blended equally with a 14% mead gives you a 12% braggot. But that’s OK, I’m still fine with a 10% braggot as a winter sipper.

If the braggot seems too sweet to your taste, age it longer or try adding some oak. I prefer to use medium-toast French oak spirals and preboil them to reduce any raw wood character. Use a short contact time, tasting every few days, until the tannins of the oak balance the sweetness. The vanilla, toasty flavor of the oak will complement the base beer. However, oak can easily become dominant, so I prefer to try the unadulterated braggot over time before experimenting any further.