Mead Making Progress

I stopped fermentation on my mead on Saturday Nov 14th because it had dried out quite nicely. It is now in a 1 gal bottle to age out a bit before I bottle it.

It was still quite cloudy when I bottled it, but an hour after I bottled it it had already started to clarify, now it is pretty much all clear with considerable sediment on the bottom. I was quite surprised with how much it has clarified, I thought considering the cider base it might remain quite cloudy but instead the apple particulate fell like a rock once the yeast wasn't swimming around any more. Quite nice.

The final gravity reading is 1.000 which is the same reading you get of water which means it dried pretty much right out. There is almost no sugars left in the mead. It should be somewhere around 10.3% and 11.7% assuming a starting gravity of 1.08 or 1.07 but could be as high as 13%.

I think it will need considerable aging to make this a really good mead so I am planning a few months in the gallon jug followed by as much time as I can stand in bottles.