Time for your weekly Thursday Fun Fact!

Myth: Bees go to heaven to get honey, then they bring it back and put it in hives for the exclusive purpose of providing it to us so that we can make mead out of it.
Fact: Yes, according to Ken Schramm, author of The Compleat Meadmaker, this was a genuine belief. Actually, we’re only taking it on his good word that it’s a myth at all. Maybe that is where bees get honey. Hell if we know.

Disclaimer: All Thursday Fun Facts are culled from millennia of texts as well as random statements around the internet and they are also made up. They are only facts in the loosest sense of the word (or possibly not at all). Please note the dearth of citations.

Many people want to know just how old mead is. Our usual response is, “look on the label.” That’s just because we’re a little sassy, though. We know what you really want to know: Is mead the oldest fermented beverage in the world? The short answer is: Possibly. The long answer is: Possibly, but does that really matter?

People want to feel like they’re part of some tradition linking us with our most distant human ancestors. Archeological evidence points to beer, wine, and mead fermentation from roughly 10,000 years ago. The thing is, if it has sugar and water, humans have probably tried to ferment it. We as mead makers are indeed part of a very very very old tradition, but so are the folks at Magic Hat, Shelburne Vineyard, Budweiser, and Little Penguin, not to mention tens of thousands of home brewers.

But just because something is old, that doesn’t mean it’s automatically good. Mead comes from the same time period in which we punched holes in people’s sculls to let the evil spirits out. So, y’know… What matters is that mead – after ten millennia – is still around.

The fundamental rules of mead have not changed in 10,000 years: Add together honey and water then be patient. In the modern world, however, we no longer have to wait for wild yeast and bacteria to fall out of the air into our pot of sugar water. We needn’t be subject to random fluctuations in temperature which might kill the poor yeast before it’s done its work. We can bottle up our product without the fear that it will explode and send shards of glass or pottery into the walls (or worse yet, into our customers).

Every generation of mead makers gets to stand on this cusp of the breathtakingly old and the startlingly new. Mead is both an ancient tradition and a complex modern science. We at Groennfell, like so many others in the world of brewing, are thrilled to embrace both the old and the new.

Time for your weekly Thursday Fun Fact!

Myth: Mead will help cure allergies.
Fact: Maybe, but not as well as unfermented honey which doesn't work as well as fexofenadine which doesn't work as well as allergy shots. They all work equally well if your allergies are all in your head, though. As does tea, coffee, beer, magic beans, wheat grass juice, multi-vitamins, and watching The Lawrence Welk Show.

Disclaimer: All Thursday Fun Facts are culled from millennia of texts as well as random statements around the internet and they are also made up. They are only facts in the loosest sense of the word (or possibly not at all). Please note the dearth of citations.

Hello My Little Vikings,
We’re getting ready to move into our facility in Colchester, VT and we thought you might like a sneak-peak inside! Well, unfortunately we don’t have any photos of the inside. But, guess what we do have: Blue Prints! It’s just like seeing the inside if you were flying in an airplane next to a graphic designer who’s wearing x-ray glasses and sketching everything she sees. You can click the image to make it bigger.

We’ll let you know when we’re all set up to receive visitors, but until then feel free to send us a postcard at our new address:
Groennfell Meadery
856 Hercules Dr, Suite 20 
Colchester, VT 05446

Time for your weekly Thursday Fun Fact!

Myth: The clarity, cloudiness, foaminess, packaging, viscosity, glassware, legs, color, or some other cockamamie visual cue tells me how good a mead is.
Fact: Why would looking at a drink tell you how good it is? Drinks are – despite popular misconception – a thing for your nose and tongue to tell you about.

Disclaimer: All Thursday Fun Facts are culled from millennia of texts as well as random statements around the internet and they are also made up. They are only facts in the loosest sense of the word (or possibly not at all). Please note the dearth of citations.

Obviously, everyone loves mead.

It can be sweet or dry with less alcohol than a beer or enough alcohol that Odin himself would get the ol’ knee-wobbles. Mead can taste like a barley wine, cider, pinot grigio, or an entire honey-comb in your face. It is both ancient and timeless and only as fancy as you want it to be. But, what the hell is it, exactly?

We at Groennfell think that people should know what they’re drinking. No one wants to be at a party, drinking down a cool, refreshing Mannaz, and have to say, “You know, this is probably the best one of these things I've ever had. I wish I knew what the hell it was.”  And with that in mind, here’s Mead 101.

Mead is honey, water, yeast, and a healthy dose of patience. That’s it. Grapes make wine, grain makes beer, apples make cider, and honey makes mead. Now you know. Sure, there’s other stuff you can throw in like yeast nutrient or some raspberries or a stabilizing agent. But, at the end of the day: Honey + Yeast + Water = Mead.

So, you can now be the pompous ass correcting everyone who calls their beverage “Mead Wine,” “Honey Beer,” “Honey Wine,” or whatever else people can come up with. (Also, while you’re at it, could you do our friends over at the Vermont Hard Cider Company a favor and correct everyone who calls their fine beverages “Cider Beer.” Don’t know if it’s getting on their nerves, but it’s sure getting on ours.)

Hello My Little Vikings,
Without further ado, our official logo:

Special thanks to our graphic designer, John Stanhope! Coasters coming soon!