New Year Wrap Up

With the Chai Mead bottled, I think that that calls an end to the mead making for the year, and realistically to SCA activities in general as well. Marguerite's mother is coming to town on Sunday and remains in our dwelling until the new year. I am looking forward to meeting her, although I must confess I am more than a little nervous as well. This is Cú Allaidh signing off for now.... Merry Christmas to all, and have a Happy New Year!

Chai Mead progress and other stuff

SG is now at 1.072 which puts the abv now at 9.2%. I tasted it too and it tastes wonderfully festive. I am thinking that this mead does not NEED aging at all, that it tastes lovely, and I think I'll be able to take a bottle or two with me to each of my christmas functions to see how well it goes over. Faye enjoyed it and agrees that aging is not 100% necessary. I am still going to put aside a gallon of mead to age with some oak to see what happens, and some bottles are already spoken for, but other than that the rest is ready for drinking.

The next batch will by the chocolate mead, and I have decided that a full 6 gallon carboy is the way to go on that one, especially if the mead is even half as good as it sounds. Though from all accounts chocolate mead is one that absolutely HAS to age. So the plan with the chocolate mead is to prepare six gallons in the carboy, allow it to ferment dry, age it for 6 months minimum in the carboy, put aside another gallon jug to age for another 2 years, bottle the rest and take out a bottle every now and then tasting it at various stages of aging.

My intent is to get to the wine shop today and talk to the proprietor about it and find out about the possibility of getting wine bottle sized bungs for running the course on mead at FOOL. With any luck I'll be able to provide every participant with a simple mead for them to take home and allow to finish fermenting. Not sure how well such small batches would turn out, but it might get a few more people interested in mead making, which is a good thing in my book.

My lady has put me to the task of assisting her in researching some period candy recipes as well. I know she has been considering a cooking course for FOOL, perhaps a candy course might be on the plate, I think it would be quite popular. If we are not careful we might end up being known as a household of decadent treats LOL.

Introduction to Mead Course

So I have decided to offer a course at fool on the basics of mead making, well actually two separate courses. One in which myself and the participants will make period fireside mead using a variation of the weak honey drink recipe from Sir Kenelme Digbie's Closet which was published in 1669, the recipe is a very period method of making a weak mead which would have been common throughout Europe for many centuries. The other course would be a course on making more modern mead, and hopefully we can make individual bottles of mead for each participant.

I have to go to the wine shop I frequent and ask if there is airlock for such small batches in order to do this, but I think over all it could be a very popular course. Faye (Marguerite) says she is pretty sure no one has ever attempted to hold such a course.

So What is This SCA Thing Anyways?

Wassail (Wassail is a general greeting/cheer that people in the Kingdom of Ealdormere use) readers. So you've popped into my little blog here and are wondering what the heck the SCA is. Sit down and allow me to regal you with the tale of the SCA.

The SCA is the Society for Creative Anachronisms. In case you don't know an Anachronism is something out of time. For example if you are watching a period movie such as Brave Heart and one of the characters has a wrist watch on, the wrist watch is an Anachronism within the movie. Within the Society the Anachronism is the players. I know this doesn't really answer the question, but it sets the tone for how the name came about.

The SCA is oft quoted as "The Middle Ages as they should have been". We are reinactors who don't necissarily bother with the trivial details of actual events but rather the time itself. That is not to say we aren't interested in actual historical facts, but rather that we are interested in the way things worked and not the geography or actual battles and such.

The SCA started in the late 60's by a bunch of sci-fi/fantasy geeks (writers and readers) at a birthday party in which they hosted a middle ages themed tournement. From there it progressed to over 30,0000 members world wide. For more information visit thier website.

The SCA is a global organization, and it has been devided up into The Nineteen Kingdomes:

Æthelmearc Ansteorra An Tir Artemisia Atenveldt Atlantia Caid

Calontir Drachenwald Ealdormere East Gleann Abhann Lochac

Meridies Middle Northshield Outlands Trimaris West

I reside in the Shire of Trinovantia Nova which lies in the kingdom of Ealdormere. Check out this site for an interactive map of the Knowne World. The Kingdom of Ealdormere is the only all Canadian Kingdom, it encoumapses most of Ontario. The Shire of Trinovantia Nova encompases London and surrounding area (no idea how far it stretches, but I believe it includes Woodstock).