Episodes

4-28-20 Tonight at 9PM ET we're talking with Matt Weide, a long time homebrewer and meadmaker. We'll be chatting on interesting things including alternative sugars in mead (like inverts, maple syrup and the like) and how they can be used in fermentation, bochet tips and tricks, making rhubarb mead, playing with honeyberries, the AMMA Home Governing Committee elections and the Valkyries' Horn competition. Matt has been home brewing for over 20 years. He began making mead in 1998, but didn't get s...

4-21-20 Tonight at 9PM ET we're talking with Kevin Meintsma, a prolific and talented meadmaker who is quite humble about his very well made meads. Kevin has been making mead since 1995, his first one being with a very dark honey that he later learned was eastern buckwheat (it had also been sitting in the workshop for 12 years!). It also had cloves, nutmeg, cinnamon, allspice and used champagne yeast. And no temp control or nutrients. That turned out, not surprisingly, poorly, lol. Kevin then opt...

4-14-20 Tonight at 9PM ET we're talking with Scott Schaar, head brewer at Crawford Brew Works and former distiller at Mississippi River Distilling Company. He is a BJCP beer and mead judge. Scot was the 2017 AHA Meadmaker of the Year (MMOTY) and shared the 2019 MMOTY award with Michael Wilcox and Carvin Wilson. He was the 2015 East Coast MMOTY; has won multiple mead, beer, and cider bests of show; and has had his recipes professionally made by Moonlight Meadery and Prairie Rose Meadery. Scot and...

4-7-20 Tonight at 9PM ET we're happy to have the opportunity to hang out with Ken Schramm, owner of Schramm's Mead in Ferndale, MI. If you're new to the mead world, you may not be familiar with Ken (I'm sure there are one or two of you, lol). Ken, oft referred to as 'The Godfather of Mead' and is the author of The Compleat Meadmaker, arguably the book that launched a mead making revolution. Many meadmakers learned a lot about mead and meadmaking from Ken and his book. “The Compleat Meadmaker,” i...

We're back from a break that *should* have been because of MeadCon and Mazer Cup, but sadly we did not get to celebrate either of those events because of postponements. Make sure you're online or doing pickups to #buymead! We are tickled to have Pete Bakulic back tonight, it's been quite a while since we've been able to get him on the show. If you don't know of Pete, either you're new to the mead scene, or you've been hiding under a rock! Pete is President of the Mazer Cup International and a me...

3-31-20 We're back from a break that *should* have been because of MeadCon and Mazer Cup, but sadly we did not get to celebrate either of those events because of postponements. Make sure you're online or doing pickups to #buymead! We are tickled to have Pete Bakulic back tonight, it's been quite a while since we've been able to get him on the show. If you don't know of Pete, either you're new to the mead scene, or you've been hiding under a rock! Pete is President of the Mazer Cup International ...

3-3-20 Tonight at 9PM ET GotMead Live will be talking with Steve Patik, an accomplished and award winning mead maker who will be speaking at the AMMA MeadCon in two weeks on braggots, along with Andy Brewer from Locavore Beerworks. Steve discovered mead over Thanksgiving dinner in 2012, and a year later was making it. Since then, Steve has been making mead in unconventional ways, yet successful. Steve is a regular entrant in mead competitions all over the country, and he consistently does really...

2-25-20 Tonight at 9PM ET GotMead Live will be talking with Roger Wanner and Joe Abruzzo, owners of W A Meadwerks on Long Island in New York. These guys are truly passionate about their mead, and managed to open a meadery in a place that's pretty darn expensive, and do it on a shoestring. Roger will be speaking at MeadCon this year on how they managed to open their meadery with very little up front. W A Meadwerks started in Roger's basement in West Islip after being lucky enough to try commercia...

2-18-20 Tonight at 9PM ET GotMead Live will be talking with Marina Marchese, the Honey Sommelier. Marina will be speaking at MeadCon 2020 this year, talking about honey sensory analysis and dong a live honey tasting. Carla Marina Marchese is a member of the Italian National Register of Experts in the Sensory Analysis of Honey, where she received her formal training as a honey sensory expert. Her book, The Honey Connoisseur co-authored with Kim Flottum (editor of Bee Culture Magazine) parallels t...

2-4-20 Tonight at 9PM Eastern we're talking with Keith Seiz, who works with the National Honey Board, and he'll be speaking on Mead Perceptions; On Consumers and Mead Makers at the AMMA MeadCon in Broomfield, CO March 17-19. He'll be talking on whether consumer perceptions of mead match mead maker perceptions. The National Honey Board set out to find the answer to this question and more. This seminar will detail the findings of two surveys the National Honey Board Conducted with consumers and me...

1-28-20 Tonight at 9PM we are tickled to have on the show Laura Angotti, keynote at the 2020 MeadCon, and author of "Wellcome Mead: 105 Mead Recipes from the 17th and 18th Century English Receipt Books at the Wellcome Library" and "Cider and Perry in Britain to 1700: A Collection of Material from Primary and Selected Secondary Sources". She is also the owner of the Mystery of Mead website, where she discusses mead in history. Laura Angotti has been making mead for over 25 years, focusing on find...

1-21-20 Tonight at 9PM ET we're talking with Tony Qualls, owner of Manic Meadery and speaker at the 2020 MeadCon, where he'll be giving a seminar on Maximum Fruit: Big Berry Bombs and Other Melomels. Tony is not just a meadery owner, he's also a musician. He toured in the band Groovatron for 12 years, doing over 1500 shows in 12 years (makes me tired just thinking about all that travel!). Tony is a lifelong entrepreneur, having run a vinyl record company, painting company and a bunch of other bu...

1-14-2020 Tonight at 9PM EST we're kicking off our featuring of speakers at MeadCon, and opening with Sergio Moutela, owner of Melovino Meadery and the president of the AMMA. Sergio opened Melovino just over 5 years ago, and during that time he's learned a ton about operating a meadery, making better mead and what people like in a mead. He's wrangled with his state to allow meaderies to even exist, and juggled the need for space to expand with the reality of how hard it can be to find an ideal l...

1-7-20 We're back from our December break, and off with a bang! Join us at 9PM Eastern tonight for the first 2020 episode of GotMead Live. Tonight's guest is Carvin Wilson, mead maker, mead industry supporter, and owner of Carvin Software. If you haven't heard of Carvin, you're not hanging out with mead folk. Carvin, who lives near Phoenix, AZ, is a long time mead maker, started getting involved nationwide with the mead scene several years ago. Carvin makes incredibly well done mead. Like amazin...

11-26-19 Tonight we're talking with Annie Zipser and Amy Olsen, Annie and Amy are both award winning home mead makers, and are now involved with the Michigan Mead Coalition. The Michigan Mead Coalition is a group of meadmakers who are looking to create a shared environment where they can talk mead, share their skills, and even have shared equipment and supply buys. We'll be talking more about that in the show. We'll also talk meadmaking, things we've learned, and generally just geek out on meadm...

11-5-19 9PM EST Tonight we're talking with Mike Faul, owner of Rabbit's Foot Meadery in Sunnyvale, CA about several things. Mike has been in the mead industry for over 20 years, and has been a mead maker for much longer, having been involved in mead since the beginning of the resurgence of mead in the US. We'll be talking about Mike's adventures in Ireland, creating an Irish mead with Irish honey, peak honey in the US (and the world) and what Mike's been up to in creating a more efficient meade...

11-5-19 9PM EST Tonight we're talking with Mike Faul, owner of Rabbit's Foot Meadery in Sunnyvale, CA about several things. Mike has been in the mead industry for over 20 years, and has been a mead maker for much longer, having been involved in mead since the beginning of the resurgence of mead in the US. We'll be talking about Mike's adventures in Ireland, creating an Irish mead with Irish honey, peak honey in the US (and the world) and what Mike's been up to in creating a more efficient meade...

11-5-19 9PM EST Tonight we're talking with Mike Faul, owner of Rabbit's Foot Meadery in Sunnyvale, CA about several things. Mike has been in the mead industry for over 20 years, and has been a mead maker for much longer, having been involved in mead since the beginning of the resurgence of mead in the US. Mike is not just owner of one of the largest meaderies in the country, he's also an IT and automation geek, a student of honey in America, and an all-around pretty smart guy. And he's been acti...

10-29-19 We're back after a break due to some scheduling conflicts. Tonight we're talking with Sergio Moutela, owner of Melovino Meadery and President of the American Mead Makers Association. He is also the guy who created the TOSNA protocol for mead making which he hosts on Mead Made Right. And he's launched a mead podcast that is excellent. which you can listen to on the MMR website. You can tell Sergio has been up to a lot of mead stuff, and he never seems to slow down. We're not even sure he...

10-8-19 We're talking tonight with Adam Crockett, owner of Haymaker Meadery. Before starting Haymaker in 2015, Adam worked in the barrel industry for 4 years selling barrels to breweries, wineries, and meaderies all over the US and Canada. He has worked with large breweries like Allagash and Jolly Pumpkin and small local breweries in every corner. He has worked directly with distilleries and wineries to provide the best barrels available. He has helped many breweries build up their barrel progra...

10-1-19 - Tonight we're back in mead building mode again, and have Ryan back to talk about picking the yeast and honey and other ingredients to achieve specific flavor profiles. This is continuing from last week's discussion. Get your questions in to us! Post on Facebook or Twitter, or join us on the chat channel tonight! We all have the flavors and tastes we like, and it's different for everyone. Too much for one is not enough for another. Yeast and honey contribute a fair amount to what you en...

9-24-19 - Tonight we're back in mead building mode, and have Ryan back to talk about picking the yeast and honey and other ingredients to achieve specific flavor profiles. We all have the flavors and tastes we like, and it's different for everyone. Too much for one is not enough for another. Yeast and honey contribute a fair amount to what you end up with, and what you start with may not be where your mead finishes, flavor-wise. There are tons of ideas out there: fermenting temperatures, to stir...

9-17-19 9PM EST: Tonight we're talking with women who make mead. Award winning, bitching good meadmaking women. We're talking with Traci Kuhfuss and Amy Olsen. If you've been paying attention, these ladies are tearing it up out there with their meads. Traci Kuhfuss comes to us from Texas by way of Arizona and Hawaii. She’s been active as a homebrewer and mead maker for many years, participating in brew clubs and competitions in all the places she’s lived. Traci is a professional photographer and...

9-3-19 Tonight we're winging our way to Poland to talk with Mateusz Blaszczyk and Krzysztof Jarek with the Kings of Mead. We will not be live tonight, as our friends in Poland cannot do the live time slot. Kings of Mead is three home meadmaking friends, Mateusz, Krzysztof and Rafal Gorecki, who have a website and do a video cast about mead. They're passionate about spreading the word of mead. They do mead reviews on their site and video show, talk about the meads they're making and drinking, and...