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While not quite mead, Sbiten is a honey-based drink that is quite popular in Russia and eastern Europe. Sbiten is most comparable to a mulled wine, and is generally served hot in the winter months. At its base, Sbiten is a water and honey mixture that is spiced up by boiling it with a collection of spices and adding jam to further sweeten it. It can be made alcoholic by swapping out red wine for the water. Occasionally a garnish or mint leaves or cinnamon sticks is added.

Sbiten was quite popular from the 12th century when it first made an appearance, up until the 19th century when tea and coffee started to take over.

Example Recipe

Ingredients

• 1/2 cup honey
• 1 tablespoon whole cloves
• 3 cinnamon sticks, cracked in several pieces
• 1 teaspoon ginger
• 16 ounces blackberry jam
• 10 1/4 cups water (or red wine)
• 1/4 teaspoon nutmeg

Optional

• 1 mint leaf
• 2 dried chili peppers

Combine the ingredients in a saucepan, and slowly bring it to a boil over medium heat. Stir frequently. When the honey and jam are completely dissolved, remove it from the heat. Allow it to cool, then strain the liquid through a cheesecloth. Squeeze the solids that get caught to get all the liquid. It can be refrigerated, and reheated to serve.

The first Saturday in August is a celebration of the world’s oldest fermented beverage. It was established by the American Homebrewer’s Association in 2002 as a way to bring awareness to this oft overlooked drink in the states. It also acts as a means to foster a sense of community among fellow mead makers.

If you missed it this year, don’t fret. You now have a whole year to prep for the next one! If you’re just getting started on your brewing journey, take a look at the beginner’s guide or the intermediate guide to making mead.

The best part about brewing your own mead is drinking it. But what better way to enjoy your special brew than by pairing it with a meal that compliments the unique flavors in your creation? You hear tons about what wines pair with what types of food. Even beer has some available guidelines on which flavor profiles of food compliment the different styles. But given mead’s fairly recent resurgence into mainstream awareness, there really isn’t a lot of available information about what specific varieties of mead will complement different foods. While part of this is likely due to its relative “newness” in the brewing scene it can also be attributed to mead not having the most clear cut of styles. Most beer and wine types describe a specific flavor profile, while mead is more broadly defined by the types of ingredients used. Metheglins just describe a mead with spices or herbs in it. It doesn’t tell you much about what it will taste like. Spices and herbs cover a wide range of things from cinnamon to mint to rose petals.

Chrissie Manion Zaerpoor has done a fantastic job of compiling quite the thorough reference guide on the very subject of pairing mead with your meals in The Art of Mead Tasting and Food Pairing. She has years of experience not only judging mead in competitions but making it herself, so is more than qualified for the in depth instructions she gives on how to properly taste a mead. Her guide also goes in depth on the different varieties of mead: from traditionals, to sparkling, or melomels to braggots. Outlining what the defining characteristics of each varietal is, and based on those unique traits how you would go about pairing them with food. She aims less to define a static list of pairings, but more to teach the reader the process of matching flavor profiles of mead with those in food.

As Zaerpoor mentions in her book, the flavors that come out as you drink your mead will gradually change from sip to sip. This can occur due to oxidation after opening the bottle, as well as your taste buds noticing subtler flavors after they adapt to the more prominent ones. This evolution can become even more pronounced when pairing it with the foods you eat. There are two main paradigms involved with pairings: mirroring, and contrasting. Essentially the food can mimic and compliment the tastes that come across in your mead, or instead they can provide a stark difference to highlight them. This dance of intermingling styles is where the fun of pairing really shines through.

She guides you through designing your pairings from both a perspective of the mead as your starting point, as well as from a food basis. This includes a breakdown of different regional cuisines, as well as information on balancing spiciness. It also contains a fair amount of advice on specific diets such as Paleo, gluten-free, dairy-free and vegetarian.

The guide is chock full of other useful information such as how to keep mead after opening, the best ways to store or cellar your bottles, and plenty of history behind the drink and the evolution of the different styles.There are plenty of recipes included in the book as suggested meals with which to begin your pairing journey. But, again, these are presented as examples to spark your creativity rather than hard and fast required pairings.

If you’re looking to experiment, and expand your culinary palate within the world of mead, do yourself a favor and check out The Art of Mead Tasting and Food Pairing.

Mead has been making a bit of a comeback in recent years, seeing a boost from the craft homebrewing boom. Given its long history, and inclusion in a lot of lore and myth, a lot of people have rediscovered this oft overshadowed beverage.

I am a hobby mead brewer, myself, and have put together some guides on how you, too, can join in on this fun and creative past time. Mead is one of the least complicated drinks to get started homebrewing with. In addition it has a very broad flavor palette – with countless variations.

So if you’re merely curious about what mead is, or are looking to jump into making your own, feel free to take a look around.

In recent years, more and more people have begun realizing they have an intolerance for gluten, and the food products that contain it. In case you are unfamiliar, gluten is the general name for a group of proteins that are found in a variety of grains such as wheat, rye, and barley.Gluten acts as a sort of glue holding different foods together. Given the prevalence of these ingredients in the foods we eat, being intolerant of gluten can be a difficult obstacle to overcome. Especially if you want to enjoy a drink. Given that beer is by definition, a fermented grain, it will contain gluten unless brewed specifically to avoid it. Those do exist, but they are rare. However, you are in luck, as many other types of beverages do not generally contain gluten.

Mead

As this is primarily a mead site, I’ll begin there. As a general rule, Mead does not contain gluten. The main ingredient in mead is honey. Honey is made from the pollen of flowering plants. Grains belong to the grass family which are wind pollinated, so generally don’t attract bees. Even if they did, I have not seen any evidence that pollen even contains gluten. As a rule, honey is a gluten free food.

So a with a traditional mead, you’re in luck. But what about a flavored mead? Fruits don’t contain gluten. So just like most wines, a melomel, cyser, pyment or other fruit mead will be okay for you to drink. Herbs and spices also do not contain gluten. So any metheglin is also a drinkable alternative.

That leaves us with the braggots. These are essentially mead and beer hybrids, as they contain some form of grain fermented along with the honey. These will usually contain gluten, and should be avoided if you are sensitive to it. The one exception to these is if the braggot is merely hopped, without any grains. Hops, being a flower, does not contain gluten.

Wine and Cider

As mentioned before, wines, being made from fruit should be gluten free. Obviously there’s an exception for any additives that may contain gluten themselves. But again, the general rule is that wine should be safe to consume. Note that despite the name, barley wine, being brewer from grains instead of fruit is actually a beer. It will gluten.

Cider is really just a specific type of wine. Apples being a fruit, contain no gluten. So the vast majority of ciders are gluten-free. However, there are some ciders that make use of barley for enzymes and flavoring. These are also potential wine ingredients, so as pay attention to the labels.

Distilled Drinks

This leaves us with the spirits. The process of distilling will remove any trace of gluten from the beverage. So unless a gluten containing ingredient is added after distillation, then it will contain no gluten. According to US labeling laws, however, if a gluten containing ingredient is used anywhere in the brewing process, even before distillation where it could not make it to the final product, they are not allowed to advertise as being gluten free. Gin is an example of this. Most gins are brewed with gluten containing ingredients, but the final product contains none. Many celiac sufferers have been able to drink these without negative effects. If you are still wary, there do exist some officially gluten free brands.

Rum, being made from sugar cane is also gluten free. Do be aware that some mixed drinks made with rum could contain gluten. Pina Colada mixes are an example of one such mixture.

Sake is an interesting drink. It is brewed from rice, which, while a grain does not contain gluten. However, it is fermented with an organism that is cultivated on miso which is made from barley. There should be enough of a separation in this process that it is safe for celiacs to consume.

Tequila is made from agave cactus. It is a gluten free product. Again, be careful of any mixes that one would use tequila with.

Vodka is made from a wide variety of different sources. These range from gluten free potatoes to gluten containing cereal grains. But as long as nothing containing gluten has been added back in after distillation, all vodkas should be gluten free, even if they are not allowed to advertise as such.

Gluten-free vodka brands include:

• Corn Vodka—Deep Eddy, Nikolai, Rain, Tito’s, UV
• Grape Vodka—Bombora, Cooranbong
• Potato Vodka—Boyd & Blair, Cirrus, Chase, Chopin, Cold River Vodka, Cracovia, Grand Teton, Karlsson’s, Luksusowa, Monopolowa, Schramm Organic, Zodiac
• Rice Vodka—Kissui
• Sugar Cane—Downunder, DOT AU

Brewed with Gluten containing ingredients prior to distillation:

• Barley Vodka—Finlandia
• Grain Vodka—Absolwent, Blavod, Bowman’s, Fleischmann’s, Orloff, Polonaise, SKYY, Smirnoff, Stolichnaya,
• Wheat Vodka—Absolut, Bong Spirit, Danzka, Grey Goose, Hangar One, Ketel One, P.i.n.k Vodka
• Rye Vodka—Belvedere, Biała Dama, Platinka, Sobieski, Starka, Wisent, Wyborowa, Xellent Swiss, Żubrówka

Whiskey is in a similar tough spot to many vodkas. They are all brewed with gluten containing ingredients, however, these do not reach the final product and should be safe for those with a sensitivity to drink. But again, they are unable to advertise this in the US.