Black Fox Meadery
Producers of Saint Bartholomew’s Mead
By Bob Lasseter, Proprietor
It’s not beer! It’s not wine! It’s mankind’s oldest known alcoholic beverage! It’s MEAD – the Beverage of Kings. Mead uses honey as it’s fermentable base and can provide hundreds of varieties from dry to sweet, still or sparkling and can be fermented with fruits such as cherries, strawberries, blueberries, etc. (mead with fruits is called Melomel), spices such as cinnamon, vanilla beans, cloves, etc. (mead with spices is called Metheglin). A mead using apple cider is called Cyser and a mead using grapes is called Pyment. Mead has an average alcoholic content slightly higher than wine at about 12-14%.
I made my first batch of mead in 1990. I had previously brewed beer and hard cider but became interested in mead after discovering various recipes for it so decided to give it a try. I experimented with the various mead types and probably produced over 150 five gallon batches between 1990 and 1992. To reach its maximum flavor potential mead needs to age at least 12 months but it is worth the wait. I even briefly pursued the idea of opening a meadery in Tennessee where I resided at the time but got involved with some other business projects and put the meadery idea aside.
Twenty-three years later and now residing in Florida I am back to making mead again and once again pursuing the goal of opening a licensed meadery here in Florida – it would be the only licensed meadery in the state. Presently I am making a sample batch of mead every Saturday and have set up a schedule to produce a dry mead, a traditional mead and a sweet mead as well as producing the following: melomels, metheglins, cysers and pyments. I rotate the varieties of honey using Wildflower, Orange Blossom, Palmetto, Clover and Brazilian Pepper and use only raw unprocessed honey, real fruit and spices (no concentrates) to maximize the flavor profile. These meads will be ready for sampling early in 2014.
Our mead is branded as Saint Bartholomew’s Mead. Saint Bartholomew (image below) was one of the twelve apostles of Jesus. He was the Patron Saint of the Honey crop. Our goal is to gain national exposure for this brand.
We want to aggressively market our meadery as a family run business producing a wide variety of premium priced hand-crafted mead in small batches paying close attention to each individual batch. I envision something like Jack Daniels Distillery in Lynchburg, TN that has the marketing concept for high quality spirits with limited production creating high demand and a premium price.
Sales will be wholesale thru wine and liquor distributors and retail thru in house sales as well as internet as Florida does permit wines and meads to be sold online and we will pursue internet sales by establishing an aggressive internet marketing campaign including a “Mead of the Month Club” as well as a “Custom Mead” whereby customers can order a case or cases of custom blended mead where they select the honey type, dry or sweet, melomel (select the fruit) or metheglin (select the spice) and a custom label with their name.
