Discover Delmarva: Brimming Horn Meadery
SEAFORD, De- Brimming Horn Meadery in Seaford is worth all the “buzz.” We met up with the Owner and Head Mead Maker Jon Talkington and Vice President Robert Walker to learn about this fast-growing product. Talkington tells us, “Mead is the oldest alcoholic beverage, and it’s made from the fermentation of honey water and yeast.”
The history of mead dates back thousands of years and is often found preserved in clay containers among the earliest members of civilizations. Brimming Horn has a modern terracotta amphora that they use to make some of their select meads, which brings out a variety of flavor notes. The process of mead-making starts with the sweet stuff. They get drums of honey delivered from all over the United States. That goes from one sweet liquid to another sometimes, according to Walker, “I think people get a misconception getting made from honey that it’s all going to be plain sweet, where ours runs the gamut. Like Jon was saying, from dry to semi-sweet to sweet to dessert sweet. There are a lot of different flavors and different things for people to try here.”
The flavor profile hits all the notes for visitors. Whether you like a sweet taste, or if you like something drier and even bubbly variations. Talkington tells us, “It’s a wide range. You can have a bone-dry mead, carbonated almost like a champagne, or you can have a dessert sweet mead, or you can have something in the middle. Something fruit flavored, something spiced, something wood aged, we can pretty much do anything with mead, it’s a blank palette.”
Creating a mead for everyone, no matter their taste buds, is important to Brimming Horn. Talkington tells us these different flavor notes take a different process to be pulled out “We use a lot of different fruits, different spices a variety of barrels to age. Add oak chips and staves to some of the meads.”
Some of the barrels used can unlock flavors of their past life. One of their award-winning meads was aged in old gin barrels that gave a higher alcohol content — but a unique flavor you can *only* get using this aged barrel. This small operation is beneficial when it comes to innovating new flavors. They do, however, always keep the fan favorites around for visitors.
Talking says you can expect something new during every visit. “We do rotate a lot, but we also have core brands. Our Freya’s Kiss and Golden Tears are two traditional meads that we usually have.” This process involves a lot of science but is much more crafting and creativity to bring new meads to life.
They also tell us they plan to have some new brews for this summer, with loads of special events planned in the near future. For more information on their products, hours, and upcoming event schedule, you can check out their website.
