mead!

[arethinn]

I now have oak blossom, star thistle, and rhodomel meads from Kevin-Murphy-who-is-not-THE-Kevin-Murphy (although there is a certain very vague resemblance) that digitalsidhe and lysana tipped me off to having sold meads at BayCon. He lives reasonably close to me so it was no trouble to pop down and blow $90 on mead (some of which will likely end up in the feywine). Woo! Support your local mazer.

I didn't get to taste any of the ones I actually bought, but the Toyon holly was good. He also sampled me some artisanal gin from Oregon that tastes positively of juniper resin (as opposed to the sharp, almost menthol nose of London dry gins -- I would say "usual London..." but I don't know if this stuff is really London dry style to begin with), which was rather weird, and I'm almost not sure that I liked it, or at least it would take some getting used to; and also some blackberry liqueur that was meh, it was blackberry liqueur, tasty, but nothing special.

I appear to have gotten him a bit intrigued by mentioning an idea of trying to brew a mead-like beverage from birch syrup/sap, like he says he knows some people attempting maple or half maple half honey, so maybe there's a future there. :)

Comments

[dragonzuela.livejournal.com]

Yellow star thistle? I'm in a lab that studies invasive weeds, so that made me think "invasive mead..."

[arethinn]

Yes, probably. He did talk about how it is considered invasive in CA, takes over land, blights other plants, and punctures the stomachs of ruminants that try to eat it, and thus is considered "noxious" -- although apparently, its tendency to take over makes it good for beekeeping, because then you can get a consistent "vintage" of honey, thus mead. *shrug*

[dragonzuela.livejournal.com]

I believe it's one of the worst in the state. The California Invasive Plant Council uses it as a backdrop for their webpage.

Darn, I forgot mead was made from honey, and was hoping that he was out chopping off all the flowering heads for his brew.