New wine today – this one is called Orpheus. It’s the last strong mead for a while, until I come up with something else. It’s a chili mead with rose hips, ginger, black tea, orange peel, and heather. It’s real nice – the chilis (I used poblanos for this batch) are pretty mild but have a lot of that real nice peppery flavor. The ginger goes in there very well too to give you a little warm tingle in the back of your throat, and the rose hips come out almost apple flavored.
Being the last big crazy mead for a while, this is also the last one with a commissioned label for a while. The art for this one was done by Kath Yarkosky. The labels aren’t quite ready yet, but I’m really looking forward to seeing this on a bottle, I think it’s going to look awesome.
So most of my big strong wines have a story, this one does too. Sometimes I can’t sleep, and when that happens I make wine. A year ago, Bowie died and I couldn’t sleep. That was kind of weird, because a celebrity dying doesn’t affect my life in really any way, but whatever, I couldn’t sleep. This is the recipe I came up with when I came down to make wine that night. I assume you see the reference in the label and can draw the lines to the name.