An experimental mead made using Ube Halaya and wildflower honey.
Originally Posted: Dec. 7, 2021
Table of Contents
Quick Specs
- OG = 1.105
- ABV: 14.3%
- Taste Profile: Like a plain mead, but richer, and mildly earthy
- Time: about 4.5 months
- Yield: 27 bottles
Intro
After doing many simpler melomels and metheglins, I began looking into more unconventional brewing ingredients. I started off with canned pumpkin for my Harvest Pumpkin Spice Metheglin (although pumpkin spice is a popular flavor in brewing, working with canned pumpkin is difficult, so that’s probably why it isn’t very common).
As I began thinking about other unconventional ingredients, several ideas for future meads came to mind: a mushroom-garlic cooking mead based on a Jereme Zimmerman recipe (from Make Mead Like a Viking); a beetroot mead based on beet country wines I’d read about; and finally, a mead using Ube yam.
Ube (Dioscorea alata)
The tuber Dioscorea alata—commonly called Ube in the Philippines—is a yam with a long history of culinary use. It is used in dishes from East Asia to India, across the Pacific Islands, and eastern Africa. I’ve been seeing it more commonly along the West Coast of the US the last few years as well.
In Filipino cuisine in particular, ube is used to make a variety of desserts and baked goods. One common form of ube is Ube Halaya, which is mashed ube mixed with condensed milk or coconut milk until it has the consistency of jam.
Ingredients
- 2 jars, Florence Halaya Ube Spread
- 15 lbs. Kirkland wildflower honey
- Step-fed 10 lbs. at the beginning
- Added 5 lbs. about a week later
- 5 gallons spring water
- 2.5 tsp. Pectic Enzyme
- 5 tbsp. Fermax (by mistake, see note)
- Note: I was sleep deprived and meant to only use 5 tsp. of Fermax but added three times as much. Doing so made the fermentation go into overdrive, and the first 10 lbs. of honey were completely turned into alcohol in little over a week with no off-flavors. Total accident, but might be worth experimenting with.
- ½ tsp Glucoamylase (just in case the ube contained too-complex sugars, but it’s probably unnecessary)
- Lalvin D-47
Equipment
- Sanitizer
- Fermenter (I used a 7-gallon wide-mouth glass carboy for most of this project)
- Airlock and stopper
- Stock pot for mixing
- Hydrometer for taking gravity readings
- Optional: Sous vide for warming honey
- Optional: Filtration Pump (I like to use the Buon Vino Mini-Jet, and I’ve written a previous article on how to use it)
Instructions
- Warm 10 lbs. of honey via your preferred method. I use my Anova sous vide circulator to heat the honey to 94°F (34°C) for at least an hour (~95°F is the temperature where honey varietals begin to lose their delicate aromatic compounds).
- In a large pot or stock pot, heat a decent amount of your spring water. Try to keep the temperature from going above 94°F (34°C). Once the water is heated, add the Ube Halaya, the warmed honey, and all of the powdered ingredients. Stir to combine all the ingredients. If you want, you can also add the yeast at this time (though you can also add it to the fermenter later).
- Pour the pot’s contents into a sanitized fermenter. Top off with the remainder of your spring water. Add yeast if you haven’t already done so, then take a gravity reading and write it down.
- Allow mead to ferment until it slows in activity. I accidentally added three times the Fermax that I meant too (thanks a lot, sleep deprivation), and my initial fermentation was done in about a week. It might take longer for you if you put a sane amount of Fermax in; alternatively you can experiment with my mistake.
- Once initial fermentation has subsided, add the remaining (warmed) 5 lbs. of honey and stir with a sanitized tool (spoon, degassing wand).
- Continue fermenting until activity slows and gravity readings level off. I like to degas my meads regularly during this time because it speeds up the process a little, helps the yeast stay healthy, and can prevent a stuck fermentation.
- Allow sediment to form in the bottom of the fermenter before racking into secondary. Repeat process for tertiary if needed.
- After I’d racked off of the worst of the sediment, I decided to run this mead through my Buon Vino Mini-Jet filtration pump. I ran it through a Number 1 course filter to extract most of the haze, then ran it through a Number 2 fine filter to get it crystal clear and rose gold.
- Bottle, age, and enjoy!
Primary 
Secondary 
Tertiary
Before 
Filtering 
After
Final Thoughts & Tasting Notes
Ube is mostly known for its natural sweetness; this is what makes it such a popular ingredient in desserts and baked goods. And while the airlock smelled like candy during fermentation, I was a little disappointed in how little ube flavor came through in the end.
There was definitely a mild earthiness to it, and it was definitely richer-tasting than a traditional plain honey mead. However, I think that the defining flavor of ube, sweetness, all seemed to ferment out with the rest of the sugars. Keep in mind that I only used two 12oz jars of Ube Halaya, so perhaps the mead just needed more ube.
I need to experiment with adding more Ube Halaya as well as other forms of ube, like frozen grated ube, ube extract, and ube syrup in order to see if I can get more of that ube flavor. I also want to experiment with adding these ingredients at different stages of the fermentation process, or even after stabilizing the mead.
Another possibility to consider in the future: This mead was fermented out as dry as possible (most of my meads are; just a matter of personal taste), but perhaps it would do better in a sweet mead. Stabilizing the mead and then adding more ube to it would be the way to go in this case.
Aside from making a straight-up Ube Mead in the future, I also think that ube shows great promise as a sort of flavor enrichening ingredient. Mixed with other ingredients such as fruits and vegetables, I think it would round out all the flavors and add a layer of complexity.
A final (slightly humorous) anecdote that leads me to believe Ube makes a great enrichening ingredient, one that might bring other flavors out into the forefront. I often bring bottles of mead to my friend Jake’s house for him and some other friends to try. When he tried this mead, he looked at me in amazement and asked (in all seriousness):
“Is there honey in this mead?!”
—Jake, mead hype-man
Tips & Tricks
Like I said in the previous section, try this one out with various forms of ube and at different stages of the brewing process.
Possible Culinary Uses
I picked up an amazing ube cheesecake at the Uwajimaya in Bellevue, WA one time when I was searching for ingredients. I bet an ube reduction syrup on top of cheesecake or other baked goods would be delicious.
