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Summer festival season is upon Paganistan... which also means it's time to uncork the mead.
Mead is possibly mankind's oldest alcoholic beverage, a simple concoction of water, yeast, and honey left to ferment for a year or longer. There is documented evidence of mead's brewing for thousands of years by ancient cultures.
Mead is everywhere at Pagan festivals; it is typically the sacred drink of ritual communion, but it's also enjoyed around campfires by attendees and used as libations to the gods and local native spirits. But mead is not typically in stock at the corner liquor store; certainly not the variety of flavors and styles that show up at a Pagan gathering. Over time, there has grown a flourishing mead-brewing culture in Paganistan and other Pagan communities, to the point that it may be a favorite Pagan pastime, both sacred and secular.
Meads can be sweet or dry, fizzy or still, and come in different categories depending on what ingrediens are added to the honey mixture for flavor: melomels (fruit), methaglyns (spices), and hydromels (quick-brewing mead that uses ale yeast). I have been a sampler of many of Paganistan's finest homebrews -- ah, the perils of research -- and have enjoyed concoctions involving pomegranate, peach, lavender, and pumpkin pie spice. (More disappointing projects have included curry, hibiscus, and a watermelon mead so putrid that it has become the stuff of legend in Paganistan.) The blank slate of basic mead has allowed for some creative brewing and deliciious results.
But it does beg the question: why Pagans and mead? Sure, the occasional beer or bottle of wine pops up at festivals, but nothing spreads the joy like mead.
I got some perspectives from some of Paganistan's brewers. Dragonmyst, of Shades of Grey Circle, shared that he began making mead a little over a year ago, inspired by reading about its history in ancient Europe, Egypt, and Greece. "The fact that mead was drank at the time and in the cultures that my personal Deities flourished makes it a perfect choice for me to create and libate to my Gods," he said. "I see myself carrying on a tradition that has been done in my pantheon for thousands of years."
Yunion, of the Wiccan Church of Minnesota, has been brewing and helping friends brew for five years, after his one-time roommates -- also Pagan -- got him interested. He offered: "I think the fact that honey doesn't spoil may speak to an everlasting presence and may have given early man reason to think that honey was somehow divine." He added a practical view as well. "Brewing mead is inexpensive and is easier than brewing wine or beer. I brew up 24 bottles for the cost of two decent bottles in the store."
Dragonmyst also gave practical reasons for mead in Pagan culture: "I think another reason that mead is a choice of Pagans is because of simplicity. Water, honey, yeast, and patience are all that is required to make mead. It's also relatively cheap to make and because of the efforts of Louis Pasteur we are now assured some consistency in results."
The Earth House Midsummer Gather, occurring next week, has attracted such a large influx of brewers in attendance that they have an annual brewing contest. Attendees sit around the campfire swirling meads of all types in paper cups and vote on best in category. Newly uncorked mead is practically the taste of Midsummer in Paganistan.
Dragonmyst added, "I continue to make mead because it fits neatly into my Pagan beliefs and I love to share the results of my labors with my friends. There are few Pagans that will turn down a glass of mead."
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