Best of Show Gold: Fortitude, Specialty Dry - Bears Bluff Meadery, Wadmalaw Island, South Carolina
Mead Maker: Mitchell Simpson
With notes of butter, sweet oak, vanilla and brown sugar, Fortitude is perfect for any bourbon connoisseur—so perfect that it’s this year’s Best of Show Gold medalist. Made with wildflower and orange blossom honey, Fortitude was aged in bourbon barrels from Firefly Distillery for over nine months.
“I’ve only been making mead for two to four years, and meaderes are making incredible meads. The quality of the mead world has blown up, and the industry is trending in the right direction. People are dialed in.”
Simpson describes Fortitude as a “COVID baby.” It was the first bottled mead from Bears Bluff. He says in the past couple of years he’s learned a lot, and he’s continuing to learn with each batch.
“We are close to the winery (Deep Water Vineyard), and honestly, we were thinking what else we could do under our wine license. We’re too far south for cider—no apples. Mead was brought up, and we gave it a shot. We knew it was going to take a lot of fortitude to get through the pandemic, and that’s where Fortitude was born.”
It started with a jar of honey, which turned into several buckets. Now, Bears Bluff is buying pallets of 650-pound drums of honey. Simpson and the team also maintain about eight to 10 beehives.
“We take care of our girls out here, and that honey is very special to us. Obviously, a lot of work goes into it, and Fortitude was showcasing so well that a lot of our honey that our girls made went into that particular one. Fortitude became very close to my heart.”
Fortitude is also special because it’s a collaboration between Bears Bluff Meadery and Firefly Distillery. The day Firefly dumps the barrels is the day the meadery fills them. So, they’re super wet, fresh barrels, and they have a lot of love to give.
With the convergence of mead/wine at Wadmalaw Island, Simpson waxes poetic about terroir as an expression of a sense of place.
“It encompasses soil, the climate, biography, plants, rain, sun, etc. Honey—and in turn mead— is the most terroir-driven product that you could possibly have. Bees are feeding off all these plants. That is the definition of terroir in my opinion—even outweighing wine. People tend to overlook that in the mead world, especially as we start becoming like the craft brewery industry. Mead can also be a very serious drink that encompasses the terroir, more like any alcoholic beverage I've ever had, and that is really special to me.”
View the list of Best of Show Mead Crafters Competition medalists per category: https://meadcrafterscompetition.com/.