Dry Irish Stout Water Profile

Hey all,

I’m going to be brewing a Dry Irish Stout tomorrow and was looking for a little input with my water additions. My base profile is as follows:

My base water profile is:
Calcium 33 ppm
Magnesium 9 ppm
Sodium 12 ppm
Chloride 21 ppm
Sulfate 24 ppm
Bicarb 122 ppm

There will be 6 lbs. of Maris Otter, 2 lbs. of Flaked Barley, and 1 lbs. of English Roasted Barley in the grain bill with a touch of acid malt (.5 lbs.) for pH adjustment.

I plugged in the Black Balanced profile into Bru’n Water and it suggested adding:

Mash:
0.5 grams of Gypsum
0.3 grams of Baking Soda
0.5 grams of Calcium Chloride

Sparge or Boil:
0.8 grams of Gypsum
0.8 grams of Calcium Chloride

Final profile:
53 ppm calcium
19.2 ppm sodium
47.1 ppm sulfate
40.1 chloride
141 ppm bicarb
Total Hardness: 170
RA: 74

Any recommendations or does this look pretty good?

Thanks :cheers:

[quote=“TFrankMac”]Hey all,

I’m going to be brewing a Dry Irish Stout tomorrow and was looking for a little input with my water additions. My base profile is as follows:

My base water profile is:
Calcium 33 ppm
Magnesium 9 ppm
Sodium 12 ppm
Chloride 21 ppm
Sulfate 24 ppm
Bicarb 122 ppm

There will be 6 lbs. of Maris Otter, 2 lbs. of Flaked Barley, and 1 lbs. of English Roasted Barley in the grain bill with a touch of acid malt (.5 lbs.) for pH adjustment.

I plugged in the Black Balanced profile into Bru’n Water and it suggested adding:

Mash:
0.5 grams of Gypsum
0.3 grams of Baking Soda
0.5 grams of Calcium Chloride

Sparge or Boil:
0.8 grams of Gypsum
0.8 grams of Calcium Chloride

Final profile:
53 ppm calcium
19.2 ppm sodium
47.1 ppm sulfate
40.1 chloride
141 ppm bicarb
Total Hardness: 170
RA: 74

Any recommendations or does this look pretty good?

Thanks :cheers: [/quote]

You don’t need acid malt, a dark beer mash already has a naturally low pH. Your water has starting bicarb of 122ppm so I think all you need is a little more Calcium to get up to 50+ppm Ca+ using Calcium chloride. IMO the use of baking soda is not a good idea. Sodium is not needed. If you want to add alkalinity Calcium carbonate is a better choice.

[quote=“BryanH”][quote=“TFrankMac”]Hey all,

I’m going to be brewing a Dry Irish Stout tomorrow and was looking for a little input with my water additions. My base profile is as follows:

My base water profile is:
Calcium 33 ppm
Magnesium 9 ppm
Sodium 12 ppm
Chloride 21 ppm
Sulfate 24 ppm
Bicarb 122 ppm

There will be 6 lbs. of Maris Otter, 2 lbs. of Flaked Barley, and 1 lbs. of English Roasted Barley in the grain bill with a touch of acid malt (.5 lbs.) for pH adjustment.

I plugged in the Black Balanced profile into Bru’n Water and it suggested adding:

Mash:
0.5 grams of Gypsum
0.3 grams of Baking Soda
0.5 grams of Calcium Chloride

Sparge or Boil:
0.8 grams of Gypsum
0.8 grams of Calcium Chloride

Final profile:
53 ppm calcium
19.2 ppm sodium
47.1 ppm sulfate
40.1 chloride
141 ppm bicarb
Total Hardness: 170
RA: 74

Any recommendations or does this look pretty good?

Thanks :cheers: [/quote]

You don’t need acid malt, a dark beer mash already has a naturally low pH. Your water has starting bicarb of 122ppm so I think all you need is a little more Calcium to get up to 50+ppm Ca+ using Calcium chloride. IMO the use of baking soda is not a good idea. Sodium is not needed. If you want to add alkalinity Calcium carbonate is a better choice.[/quote]

Thanks for the recommendation. I guess the only reason I was using the acid malt was to bring the estimated room temp mash pH down to 5.4 without that it was pushing 5.6/5.7.

You’re chasing your tail with the proposed additions. Acid malt and baking soda neutralize each other’s effect. So either one or both of those additions are not needed. I would remove the baking soda first and then see if the acid malt can be removed. The tap water alkalinity should be fairly capable of handling that stout grist.

Thanks Martin. I removed all of the baking soda and reduced the acid malt down to .2 to get it into the 5.4/5.5 pH range at room temp.