It all started in the summer of 2005. Dan was encouraged by his Aunt Nancy to head to Denmark for 10 days with his 2 cousins to do some "on the ground research" regarding the family genealogy. He left Deb back in Massachusetts with infant twin girls just over a year old. He on vacation, Deb in baby work world. So, he, being the thoughtful husband, brought back for Deb a ceramic bottle of "Viking Mead." "Viking Mead??" She scratched her head. Very romantic (??). Never heard of mead. He (being testosterone laden) thought it looked cool. Deb (being full of estrogen) thought it a waste of money (She would have loved a lovely old vine zin at that point being by herself with 2 "busy" babies to look after while he was gone "researching.") So, there it sat on the liquor shelf along with all the other half used weird booze one buys for a specific cocktail you only use once.
Fast forward several months...
"Hey, what is this?" as he dug deep into the pantry. There is was, no worse for wear, a bit dust coated, but "well aged." We opened it, lacking that lovely old vine zin of which Deb spoke, and poured 2 glasses. We sniffed. We sipped. We were HOOKED. Mead was amazing! It was not the sweet syrupy drink we assumed it was! Delicious. "We can make this!" He said with a smirk. The rest, as they say, is history.
We had always been beer brewers - started that in grad school as a hobby and to save some money. But mead and wine was to follow. Dan tried his hand at all sorts of wine, some good, some okay, some, well, good for cooking. Mead creating soon followed the wine. Neighbors came to sample and give feedback. "This smells like dirty socks." "Wet sponges?" "Nice fruit overtones." These are some of the comments overheard on our deck among or many friends. Dan became the "mad scientist," keeping dutiful log notes about quantities , measurements, temperatures, and fermentation activity. Honey was ordered by the bucketful. Spice racks were gone over and perused and spices chosen. Kids were shooed out of the basement. We waited. We watched the bubbling. We waited some more. And then we sipped. Pure bliss! He did it! The hard work had paid off!
So, now many years down the road, we are ready to share our passion for mead with others. We hope you will come and check us out, come tour the production room, partake in the tasting room, and hopefully support our honey nano-winery!
Here is our list of our own and customer supplied cocktail recipe:
THE 1634 BRIGHT AND SUNNY
- 4 oz Devil’s Footprint mead, chilled
- 2 oz ginger beer, chilled
- 1 slice lime, for garnish
- 1. Fill a highball glass with ice. Pour mead over ice. Top with ginger beer.
- 2. Garnish with lime.
Optional: Turn this into a Devil Mule by adding vodka and more lime!
THE 1634 MEADMOSA
- Here the traditional mimosa’s orange juice is switched up with Orange Elation mead, made with
- orange flower honey. In fact, any fruit mead will work to create a festive cocktail.
- 4 oz Orange Elation mead, chilled
- 2 oz Prosecco or Champagne, chilled
- 1. Pour mead into a chilled Champagne flute.
- 2. Top with Prosecco or Champagne.
1634 PEACH LEMONADE recipe credit: abbigail hickey , c . k . pearl restaurant, essex, ma
- 1 sprig fresh lemon balm
- 1 oz 1634 peach mead
- 2 oz Kettle One Citroen vodka
- 1 oz brewed tea
- 1 oz lemonade
- 1 lemon wedge, for garnish
1. In a Boston shaker, muddle lemon balm.
2. Fill shaker 2 ⁄ 3 full with ice. Add all liquids; shake.
3. Fill a highball glass with ice. Strain cocktail into glass; garnish with lemon wedge.
HONEY SIMPLE SYRUP :
½ cup local honey, ½ cup water
- 1. In a small saucepan, combine honey and water. Warm over medium, stirring to dissolve honey.
- 2. Continue to heat liquid until mixture reduces. Refrigerate in a tightly closed container up to 1 week.
CRANBERRY 75 recipe credit: abbigail hickey , c . k . pearl restaurant, essex, ma
- A “meadified” French 75.
- 2 oz 1634 cranberry mead
- 2 oz gin
- ½ oz freshly squeezed lemon juice
- ½ oz honey simple syrup (recipe follows)
- 1 oz Champagne
- 3 cranberries, for garnish
- 1. Fill a Boston shaker with ice. Add in mead, gin, lemon juice and honey syrup.
- 2. Shake and strain into a chilled Champagne glass. Top with Champagne.
- 3. Garnish with cranberries.
The Back porch CRANEBERRY SIPPER:
Equal parts of our Craneberry mead mixed with a great local vodka, like Ryan and Woods, on ice, splash of soda, lime. Lots of lime!
1634 Raspberry Lime Rickey:
Equal parts Raspberry Dream mead and spiked (or regular) lime seltzer with an extra squeeze of lime.
1634 Lambic:
Add one ounce of raspberry or blueberry mead to your favorite chilled wheat beer!
Mead Toddy #1: Warm Winter’s Knight
4 ounces of homemade dark hot chocolate mixed with 2 ounces of Raspberry Delight mead! Heaven! Top with whip cream!
Mead Toddy #2: The Warm Up
Hot brewed tea of choice (6 ounces) with 2 ounces of any of our traditional meads such as BEEwitched, Wicked Wench, or Orange Elation!
Mead Toddy #3: Beyond Valhalla :
Add 3 ounces of Viking Victory spiced mead to 3 ounces warmed apple cider or apple juice. Garnish with lemon twist.
1634 Sangria: The Crowd Pleaser
1 bottle Strawberry Fields mead with 1 bottle of sparkling wine. Add sliced apples and / or pears.
*Can substitute any 1634 fruit mead and any in season fruit to change the sangria for the season!
1634 Deacon Giles Peachy Mule: credit Jesse Brenneman, Deacon Giles Distillery, Salem Ma
- 1 Friendship's Bounty Spiced Rum
- 1 1634 Peaches Point mead
- 1/2 Lemon Juice
Top up with Ginger Beer
1634 Deacon Giles Raspberry Daiquiri: credit Jesse Brenneman, Deacon Giles Distillery, Salem Ma
- 1 Liquid Damnation White Rum
- 1 1634 Raspberry Delight mead
- 3/4 Lime Juice
- 1/2 Simple Syrup
1634 Deacon Giles Mead Fashioned: credit Jesse Brenneman, Deacon Giles Distillery, Salem Ma
- 1.5 Solera Costera Amber Rum
- 1 1634 Wicked Wench mead
- 1/4 Honey Simple Syrup
Creations by Erica Yeomans, Aloha Mobile Bartending Services
1634 Appletini: 1634 Mother Clucking Mule:
- In the Orchard Apple Cinnamon mead Gooseberry Red Currant mead
- Lemon Bitters Fresh Lime
- Dehydrated cinnamon sugar apple slice Spicy Ginger Beer
- Mint garnish
1634 Mead-a-rita: 1634 Just Peachy
- Mooncusser Jalepeno mead Peach Vanilla mead
- Fresh Sour Androstora Bitters
- Simple Syrup (honey preferred!) Soda Water
- Hickory Smoked Sea Salt for rim Pineapple Wedge garnish
- *Can also add a fine tequila!
The Covid Victory of 1634 (or 2020) – sent in by a mead fan John LeJeune
3 Parts Viking Victory 1634 Mead https://www.1634meadery.com/buy-online
1 Part Royal Rose Saffron Simple Syrup https://royalrosesyrups.com/collections/all/products/saffron-syrup
1 Part Cinzano Sweet Vermouth https://www.cinzano.com/int/en/vermouth/aperitif-classics/rosso/
I Mead Ah Diffusion Brett Henderson The Poynt
- 1 oz. 1634 Strawberry Fields Mead (Ipswich)
- 1 oz. Yellow Chartreuse
- 1/2 oz. Bully Boy Vodka
- 1/2 oz. House Lemon Cordial (see recipe below)
1 wheel of lemon - 1. Combine all ingredients in a shaker with ice and shake vigorously.
- 2. Strain over a coupe-style glass heaped with freshly crushed ice.
- 3. Center a straw through the ice to the bottom of the glass. With a squirt bottle pour 1/4 oz. Giffard Cassis through the straw.
- 4. Garnish with a large sprig of lemon balm.
+ To enjoy with friends, quadruple the recipe, heap a scorpion bowl–style glass with ice, and serve with four straws. A martini glass or a beer goblet is a good alternative if no coupe is available. The recipe will fill an 8- to 10-ounce glass when strained over crushed ice. Henderson says crushing is easy at home with a blender.
House Lemon Cordial
- 1 c. fresh lemon juice
- 1 c. Demerara sugar
- 1/2 c. Limoncello
- 2 c. warm water
1. Combine ingredients
Mead Cocktails below from Clint Petersen, Ginger, Salem
The Midwinter Warmer:
- 1½ oz Minuteman
- ½ oz Viking's Victory
- ½-¾ oz maple syrup
- 2 dashes black walnut bitters
- Build in a mug and top with boiled water
- Garnish with a dehydrated bitter orange island with cloves and a star anise on the island.
Oaken Pride
- Build and muddle blackberries, an orange swath,
- 2 dashes of Angostura bitters,
- ½ oz maple syrup
- add a splash (read: very little) of sparkling water in a tumbler
- Add a large ice cube or sphere (or fresh standard sized ice if you don't feel like making those)
- Pour 2oz Puritan's Pride Garnish with a sprig of thyme or a small stick of vanilla and some berries.
Tall Black Maple
- 2 oz B100
- 1 oz Orange Juice
- ½ oz maple syrup
- Shake with ice and pour into a Collins glass over new ice
- Top with sparkling water
- Slap the glass with sprigs of thyme and rosemary and garnish with those and a couple violets.
Maine Sea breeze – by Marissa Scarano
- 2 oz Blueberry Dream mead
- 2 oz Short Path Gin
- 4 oz Stirrings Simple lemon drop mix
A New Hot Blonde – by Marissa Scarano
- 2 oz Stinger lemon ginger mead
- 2 oz Espolon pure agave
- 4 oz Agalima margarita mix
Mommy’s Time Out
Equal parts Blueberry Dream mead (or Raspberry Delight mead) and Santa Cruz organic lemonade over ice, top with seltzer or soda water.
Lemon Berry Fizz:
Equal parts Raspberry Delight mead with lemon seltzer over loads of ice! Lemon wedge to garnish.
We are fully open! You can do an indoor tasting at our bar, or sit outside on a beautiful patio and have a glass of mead! We do not have any food service, but you are welcome to bring your own food!
We serve a "flight of mead", which is a sampling of six pre-selected meads that best represents the styles that we make here at 1634 Meadery. Going from dry meads up to sweeter, you will sample many styles of meads - plain, fruity and spiced. All made with locally sourced fruit and honey.
We also sell full glasses of mead, in addition to selling our bottles for offsite consumption. Come check us out!
This multi-berry mead (blackberry, raspberry and blueberries), all locally sourced, are fermented dry with local wild
flower honey. A slightly tart berry first mead, combines with a hint of honey for this almost red-wine tasting mead.
This mead was named in honor of the legend of the "Devil's Footprint" here in Ipswich. So the story goes:
The famous Rev. George Whitefield was traveling thoughout New England giving sermon to thousands of people.
His stop in Ipswich was no different - he was preaching atop the town hill, at the location of the First Church of Ipswich.
So impassioned was his speach, in front of thousands of listeners, that the Devil himself showed up, as he did not like
what was being said about him. A wrestling match ensued, with the Reverend and the Devil going at it! They chased
each other around the pews a few times, and eventually made there way to the the top of the steeple. There, the preacher,
in all his glory, knocked the Devil of the top of the church. The Devil found him falling to the ground, and when he landed, his
feet hit the ground, sending sparks everywhere. He had left his footprints embedded in the rocks. We do not know what
happened to the Devil after this, but his footprints can still be found!
