Welcome to Jack Keller’s WineBlog
Imagine pouring a glass that smells like a chocolate-covered cherry just climbed out of a jar and landed in a meadow. That’s the dream behind this Maraschino-Chocolate Sweet Mead — a one-gallon honey ferment built around a big jar of maraschino cherries and a measured handful of unsweetened cocoa powder. The honey brings floral sweetness, the cherries bring that neon-bright fruit note, and the cocoa rounds everything into something that sounds like dessert but drinks like a serious, slow-aged mead.
The beginner trap: Tasting this before it hits the 9-to-12-month mark — chocolate meads smell and taste rough when young, and impatient sipping will convince you something went wrong when nothing did.
Ingredients
- 4 lbs honey (clover or wildflower both work; 3¾ lbs is the minimum)
- 2 lb 5 oz jar maraschino cherries (the whole jar, syrup reserved separately)
- 4 oz (½ cup by volume) unsweetened cocoa powder (Hershey’s natural works fine)
- 2¼ tsp acid blend
- 1¼ tsp yeast nutrient
- ⅛ tsp yeast energizer
- 3/16 tsp grape tannin
- 1/16 tsp potassium metabisulfite
- Water to bring total volume to 1 gallon
- 1 packet wine yeast — Lalvin 71B-1122 or Red Star Premier Blanc (formerly Premier Cuvée)
Method
-
Make a yeast starter the night before: combine 1 cup of lukewarm water (around 98°F) with ½ tsp sugar and a pinch of yeast nutrient, sprinkle yeast on top, cover loosely with a cloth or paper towel, and set aside to culture for 12–15 hours.
-
Heat the honey: combine honey with 1 quart of water in a large pot and hold the temperature at 140°F for 25 minutes to knock out any wild organisms, then remove from heat and let cool to room temperature.
-
Prepare the cherries: drain the jar of maraschino cherries and save the packing syrup; add the syrup to the cooled honey mixture, then chop the cherries by hand into rough pieces.
-
Blend the cocoa: add the cocoa powder to 1 pint of warm water in a blender and process until smooth and fully incorporated, then add the acid blend, grape tannin, yeast nutrient, yeast energizer, and potassium metabisulfite to the blender and mix briefly.
-
Combine everything: stir the cocoa mixture into the honey mixture, then top up with cold water until the total liquid volume reaches 1 gallon; stir well.
-
Check your gravity: draw off a sample, let it cool to 68°F, and take a hydrometer reading — if the reading is off the scale, dilute 100 mL of must with 100 mL of water and double the result (target is around 1.150).
-
Bag the cherries: place the chopped cherries into a nylon straining bag, tie it off, and set it in your sanitized primary fermenter (at least 2-gallon capacity).
-
Pitch the yeast: pour the must over the cherry bag, then float a large spoon horizontally on the surface and slowly pour the yeast starter onto the spoon so it spreads gently across the top without sinking; do not stir.
-
Primary fermentation: punch the cherry bag down 2–3 times daily; after a few days the cherries will look spent — squeeze the bag gently to recover liquid, then remove it; keep the must in the primary until vigorous fermentation slows, regardless of gravity reading.
-
Transfer to secondary: siphon the must into a 1-gallon jug and seal with an airlock; rack at least twice over the next several months, topping up with water each time.
-
Stabilize and age: after 6 months of bulk aging, stabilize with potassium sorbate and potassium metabisulfite; if the mead finished drier than you like (below 1.020), sweeten to taste after stabilizing, then age at least 6 more months before bottling.
-
Bottle: once the mead is clear, stable, and tastes smooth, bottle it and allow at least 3 additional months for the bouquet to develop.
Why this works
Honey ferments slowly and can finish sweet or dry depending on yeast strain and starting gravity. Here, the combination of a high starting gravity (around 1.150) and a yeast strain with a moderate alcohol tolerance — 71B tops out around 14% — creates a natural residual sweetness without back-sweetening. The acid blend supplies tartaric and malic acids that honey lacks entirely, which is why straight meads often taste flat or one-dimensional. Grape tannin plays the same structural role that tannins in grape skins play in wine — it adds a backbone that keeps sweetness from becoming cloying. Cocoa powder contributes fat-soluble flavor compounds that only fully express themselves after extended aging, which is the scientific reason this mead genuinely needs a year before it tastes right.
Notes
Frozen maraschino cherries are not a practical substitute here — the jarred, syrup-packed variety provides both the fruit and a significant sugar load that shapes the final sweetness. If 71B-1122 is unavailable, Red Star Premier Blanc is a reliable alternative with similar alcohol tolerance. If the mead finishes too dry (below 1.010), stabilize first, then sweeten with a measured sugar syrup rather than adding more honey, which can cloud a cleared mead.
