Lurgashall Reserve / Special Reserve Mead

Brewed by Lurgashall Mead
Style: Mead
Lurgashall, England

(2002 Vintage) Clear light apple juice body. Aroma is moderately sweet, whisky, vanilla, light rum -- the overall effect is strongly alcohol, and not particularly inviting. Taste is light whisky up top, quickly overtaken by an incredibly strong honey sweetness, finishing honey and whisky, some wood, light rum. Once I can convince my hand to pick up the glass again, the tongue does adjust its threshold to handle the treacly sweetness. Still, the key here is tolerate, not enjoy. I assume there is a market for this beverage -- to each, his/her own.

2004 vintage. No head (still). Body is clear light yellow. Aroma is notes of paint thinner, turpentine, gasoline, acetone, hints of honey, lime, and spruce. Flavor is heavily sweet, lightly acidic. Finish is moderately sweet, moderately acidic, unclean. Full body, syrupy texture, flat carbonation, moderately alcoholic, lightly astringent. Hope you like fusel alcohols, ’cause this is full of ’em. It’s meads like this that make me thankful that a world class meadery like Medovina is right down the road. Embarassing, awful, drain pour.

2004 Bottle. Since this was my first mead, I wasn’t sure what to expect. Clear yellow color. Floral, honey aroma. Tasted pretty much what I expected fermented honey to taste like. Sweet, but not overly so with a strong honey and floral flavor. Could not believe the alcohol content of 16.5%. Would have guessed much lower. I am willing to try other meads after this one.

Christ on a crutch! I don’t know what to make of this business... Nose is incredibly floral, kinda dusty. It has a very distinctive smell, can’t quite put my finger on exactly what it is... Maybe some type of air freshener I remember from my youth. It pours very yellow and clear--looks like white wine. Taste follows aroma with some sweet fruity notes as well. Light bodied, slightly sticky, with a bit of burn in the finish. There’s a lot going on here and not all of its good. Drinkable, I suppose but definitely not something I’m gonna be trying again any time soon.

This was bad enough that in the end, I gave the last 2/3 of the bottle to my roomate who, attempting to force it down, mixed it with Sprite and still couldn’t drink it.

Sweet smell along with a wine smell greet your nose. First taste and the honey pops out but is finished with a stron alcohol finish. I drank the bottle by my self and was feeling buzzed then rest of the night. Whoops! My notes suffered as the bottle was being finished.

This smells just like molasses with alcohol, but not too much to make it bad. A pale yellow white appearance is nice. Drank on the rocks, so sweet, so smooth. tastes like honey water and you can't tell how strong it is! fantastic. Only its price precludes me from buying it regularly

Shared this one with Matta and thedm in Tampa, FL. Cork marked W1532. No head and fine sized bubbles that completely dissipated. The body was uncarbonated and transparent with a yellow hue. The nose was that of honey with a sweet, acidic, sour and honey flavor. The mouthfeel was tingly and bubbly and dry. This Mead was medium bodied with no lacing.

TheDM and Hotstuff vacation brew 94. This bottled sake was sampled in our motel room with Matta in Tampa Florida. This was our second mead on this trip. Cork marked W1532. This liquid poured a transparent golden yellow orange colored body with some white colored fully diminshed bubbles. Its sweet golden hoeny aroma was very pleasing and interesting. The mouthfeel was tingly from start to finish and the flavor was mostly sweet honey with an alcohol bite in the finish.