reasons for winemaking 31

On 7-22-2006 7:47 PM, alien

Not to derail the topic, but I very much enjoy the Bowmore 17 year old offering. It's just lovely.

I've found that it's really very difficult to get a true appraisal from friends-family-acquaintances. They don't want to say negative things about something you've hand crafted, regardless of how they really feel. I've had friends take two sips from the glbutt, rave about a mead of mine, and then leave it on the counter. It's a matter of taste, as mead is not like most wines. I don't take it personally when friends don't enjoy my mead, and I take it with a large grain of salt when they heap praises on my meads. Blind judging is the way to go for an unbiased appraisal, but even then the number of decent mead judges are limited. Case in point, I recently entered my mead in my homebrew club compebreastion for the AHA COC. I took second place, and was very happy with that result. I myself judged the winning entry and gave it a 19 on a 20 point scale. It was excellent. But a significant portion of those who had judged my mead offered the advise that it would be better once it was not so young and had aged a while. Given that fact that this was a three year old mead, and (if I may be so bold as to judge my own mead) it is very well integrated and not at all likely to improve with further aging, I strongly disagree with the judges on this point. I'd far rather receive judging remarks that say that the judge felt that my mead was not well integrated, or which point out a flaw or a perceived deficiency, rather than a judging remark that attempts to guess at some facet of the mead making process or history and which may be just a wild guess with no basis in reality.

Cheers, Ken