Isn’t it fun when the newest discovery turns out to be the most ancient? While corporations are busy inventing the latest beverage craze, a handful of iconoclasts head in the other direction and explore the oldest fermented drink in the world: mead.

Before grapes and hops and spirits, people in India, the Middle East, and Europe were drinking this honey wine. Hipsters are now turning to the drink that Aristotle enjoyed. (Can it inspire one of them to write their own version of Aristotle’s lost book on comedy?)

On Main Street, in the newly revived downtown of Carnegie, David Cerminara has opened Apis Mead & Winery in a former record store. He came from a craft beer background, having previously been the cellar master at Penn Brewery. He opened the business less than a year and a half ago, but had been making mead for 10 years before that. “When I started making mead, there were no American options,” he says. “I developed an idea of what I wanted a meadery to be for people. I was never in one myself before I opened my own.”  Since then, he’s visited others, such as Brothers Drake Meadery in Columbus, Ohio.  He feels his style of mead is ”more modern than some; lighter, slightly carbonated.”

He sources almost all of his ingredients locally, with rare exceptions.  As he points out, “People don’t grow pineapple here.”  He sells to dozens of restaurants in the area, doing it all himself, from making the product to delivering it in his truck. He has one employee, Joe Deck, who does the artwork on the walls as well as on the label.

One surprise for the first-time mead drinker may be that it’s often fermented dry.  Expect the rich flavors of honey, but not necessarily the sweetness.  He offers a variety of meads, including a delicious raspberry/blackberry blend, as well as “Lemon Bourbon,” whose citrusy acidity awakens the palate. The name comes from the fact that it is aged in bourbon barrels from Kentucky, used only once before. There is no bourbon in the mead itself.

Not only does Apis have a comfortable, rustic atmosphere in which to sip one of Dave’s creative flavors, it also has a library and game area, where you can read about Pittsburgh-born artist Mary Cassatt, or play Pictionary or Monopoly with your friends. More fun than re-writing Aristotle? Probably.

Apis Mead & Winery, 212 E. Main St., Carnegie. apismead.com

Curbside pick-ups scheduled regularly. The next happens on May 30, so call ahead and reserve your mead!

Story by Philip Real //  Photography by Adam Milliron

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