So I've finally decided to try mead for the first time. I'm only making two one gallon batches. The only honey I could get locally is the pasteurized kind from the grocery store. I think this is frowned upon, but it's all I could get. Will it really be horrible? I based my recipes on the JAOM, on one, I used just 100% orange juice and 1.5 kg of honey. I chose not to use the spices, don't think I would like that. The other I used 2c of extracted raspberry juice from frozen raspberries and 1.5 kg of honey. I used nutrient, energizer and enzyme in this one. I haven't taken the TA reading just yet, will wait until I check it before adding acid blend. I did check the ph though. Orange is PH 4.5,Rasp is PH 3.98, both have a SG of 1114! I haven't pitched the yeast yet, but have K1-V1116 to use. Should I adjust the PH any? I really wasn't hoping for that high of SG, will it be ok?
From my own experiences, raspberry on it's own can be a rather over powering flavour i.e. when fermented. If made sweet, then it gets back some of the original taste that we like about the fruit in the first place. K1V will likely take both batches dry as it's capable of 18% ABV, yet presuming "finished" as 1.000 a drop of 114 points of gravity equates to about 15.5% ABV.
While the "sweet spot" for yeast is considered in the 3.5 pH region, your numbers are certainly low enough to accomodate the often seen pH swings during mead type fermentations and should be fine.
You should really follow a mead recipe, from all that I have heard, Joam is more a right of passage for some mead makers, but not a recipe to base your future meads on.
Actually ? No. JAO is a recipe that seems to be designed to help new mead makers get started as all of the ingredients are available in grocery stores (generally). It can be made as variants with different fruit - some successful others not so, but that's generally to do with personal preference for taste (other citrus can be fine, but lime was one that I didn't like).
The basic method invariably works out fine, as bread yeast seems to go to about 12% ABV, but if any technique modifications are used (aeration, staggered nutrients etc) then it's often better to use a bucket as bread yeasts are designed for CO2 production and early stage foaming/eruption can be a problem.
adjust the PH now set it at about 3.5.If PH isnt set it can stop/stall your fermentation. Honey can be a pain to get going so make a starter. I have different opinion , I never use a recipe. I set SG to about 2, set PH about 3.5 keep at about 73 degrees, make sure to add nutrients, I have become real found of D-47 yeast for mead.
It can stop/stall the yeast if it drops too low, higher pH is less of an issue. I don't tend to follow recipes either, just method/technique that might be needed depending on what fruit I'm gonna use. I generally just try to leave the must "as is" if possible only changing acidity too taste - but generally take a pH reading to make sure it's not too low, where the swings can drop the ferment into the danger area.
Not sure what you're alluding to with the "I set SG to about 2" comment as pure honey is about 1.200 from what I've read (haven't got measuring facilities to measure that high, but it doesn't ferment anyway as the osmotic pressure of the sugars in pure honey is too high).
D47 is considered a good yeast for meads, but it does come with the caveat that it can produce fusels in honey musts when fermented at temps over 70F/21C (but as ever YMMV).
I'd have thought that there may be flavour issues with the concept of the pure juice idea that Winegirl alludes to, but that's a personal choice thing IMO. "On paper" she should be good to go. After all, the use of juice would make it easier to get accurate numbers, whereas trying to use whole fruit/pulped fruit can make it harder to get good, accurate SG figures.