Field Trip: Adjusting Batches for Bottling (w/ Carl)

On July 31 Carl graciously hosted us for a second time in his meadery (basement) for a master class on mead adjustment after secondary fermentation and prior to bottling.  Bullet point summary of what we learned:

1) Cam wants an analytical balance in the worst way
2) Various acids plus sweetness covers a multitude of sins
3) A little bit of tannic acid added to a "flabby" batch can make magic and even add smoothness
4) Cider is a great sweetener for appley batches
5) This takes a lot of time, but is very much worth it.
6) We need a case of tasting glasses
7) Carl recommends a three step process
     a. Prove Concept - figure out which ingredients a batch needs by overadding and seeing if the effect is the desired one (go or no go)
     b. Determine Concentration -  Set up varying samples of known volume and add varying amounts of the acid, sweetener, and or conditioner from the prior step to achieve different concentration.  This can be done one at a time per ingredient or in concert.  See item 1) above.
     c.  Scale up - Based on known ideal concentration of specific ingredients, Carl adds 80% of target and tastes, then adds more and more up to 100% based on taste.  If more than the theoretical is needed, that is added over 100% in small increments.  DON'T OVERDO IT!
8) Glycerin or Maltodextran can add viscosity to improve "mouth feel" if it just feels watery.  Glycerin also adds non-fermentable sugars, so sweetens the batch as well.
9) Carl makes some really good mead
10) We will be much more happy drinking and sharing adjusted batches than our prior stuff.

During the tasting/adjusting, we determined rough recipes for the following batches:

Prehistoric Cider
Batch 1 - hard cider
Batch 1Z - hard cider
Cam's Adkins Cyser

Cider adjustment notes (July 31st, 2012):

Drier then need less acid
5 glasses
Glycerine USP for mouth feel

Measure out-add 80%-add rest in increments

Malto-dextrine - used for added mouth feel

Start with a 30% sweet cider to dilute. too sweet
10% next stop -just right. (Batch 1)
closer to 12-15% when measured with syringe

Measured 20% with 1-Z
0.1g citric acid - clean finish not as appley
0.1g malic acid -tart apple flavor

Prehistoric batch
10% sweet cider - better taste, tart finish. 15% might be better.
Wine Tannin - made it a lot better. Smoothed the taste out.
15% tasted (12.5ml in 50ml)
0.02g wine tannin

Adkins
20% sweet cider
Add glycerine and add malic acid
60mg malic and approx 0.5 ml glycerin to 30ml of Adkins.

Add 2-3 drop olive oil and 1.5g epsom salts to all batches

Also experimented with Methyglyn Batch 5 but did not come up with a suitable approach due to lack of time.  I think it needs to age a bit more before we know exactly how to bring out the spices.  I'd also like to sweeten with honey since it is straight mead and spices, no apple.