Mead adventure!

I went to Wasteland Weekend (Mojave Desert in California) and have brought a bottle of mead for my tribe for the past years. This year there was going to be a Mead Contest so I brought All Rise Up (Quince bochet) for the contest and Jove (apple mead) for the tribe.

I've never before had the opportunity to drink other people's homebrew mead, or share mine with experienced drinkers, so I was excited about it. I generally like my own meads, but it was fun to see how they weigh up against other people's mead. Which turned out to be pretty good, at least to my palate. I feel like my stuff balances flavours well; there were a bunch of things others were happy with that I would have considered too sweet or too acidic (notably coffee mead and Earl Grey mead - both smelled amazing but were too astringent. Good thing I got to taste them because beforehand I was considering bartering for bottles)

Sadly in the contest the judges were apparently looking for 'the most typical mead' and the prize went to a decent if to my taste over-sweet sack mead. Would've been good to know the brief beforehand; I figured plain was too plain for experienced mead drinkers and brought something to show off with. One of the judges told me he vehemently disagreed with the pick and really liked mine, and everybody I poured it to love it, so eh.

....Now what do I want to make for next year. Or rather, since it's unlikely anything that young will be good, what am I saving to bring. I was tempted to bring the Sage or Thyme honey mead for the contest and I think in hindsight that would have been a better choice, but next year there will be categories, so...