Eruption!

So I was reading how bentonite can be used to clear mead on the Joy of Mead website. So I took out the sack mead I was working on and added 1/4 tsp of bentonite and stirred. All of a sudden it just erupted into a fizzing mess,barely contained by the kitchen sink. I barely had enough time to pick it up by the neck and move it. I only lost about an inch worth of space, but it did tell me one thing: Something is alive and still kicking in this mead. Hopefully, there's enough life that won't be stunted by the addition, and I can go ahead and prime/bottle ferment this next week. Who knows I might get more life out of this one than I expect to get out of the braggot. I'm going to have to try the ol flashlight through the jug to test how clear it is because it's hard to tell because it's so dark.

The muscat (pictured above) is fermenting nicely. I stirred it just a bit today and probably won't stir it again until I think it's almost done fermenting. A good week should be enough if the weather holds like it is.

I went to the farmers market this morning and picked up a box of large mangoes for like 6 bucks, there were like 8 in the box. I don't know if that's a good deal or not, but I think because mangoes are kind of expensive, it must be a good deal. Anyway, I have to swing by the store tomorrow morning and get some freezer bags and the mangoes aren't completely ripe, so I popped them in the fridge. I'll cut them up and add them to the bags and toss them in the freezer and next week when I go back t the market I'll pick up some more. I also found a place that had 12# of basswood honey for 35.00. I was all set to buy it but I was a little suspicious. I had just been to the vendor from Ames Farms, and they said they didn't have basswood yet and what they did have was from last year, and that 12# was going to be pretty expensive. Plus when I looked at the honey, it looked just like the picture from the Honey.com website. The honey from this other place had a kind of reddish hue not a milky white. I wasn't going to spend 35.00 on something I wasn't absolutely sure was basswood.

Today is suppose to be 85 and I think it might have already reached by the time I'd left work at 7am. Well at least when I wake up again tonight to go to work it'll a lot cooler. I debated on taking my pappa-san chair onto the porch, grabbing a trashy novel or one of my wine books, cracking open a beer, New Glarus' 'Organic Revolution' and just kicking back until 4pm when it's time to go to sleep. Instead, I'm in my office with the lights off, because it's damn cooler that way, looking up books for school, updating my wine notes and blog. Sounds like a productive afternoon for an aspiring academic.