I hadn’t really thought about it like that, but there would be a reason that this is true. Unfortunately if you are invoking this reason, you have other problems with high mash pH.
The reason it may be factual is that as the high bicarb water is heating, it is driving off the CO2 and the chalk is precipitating. If a substantial amount of the remaining bicarb and particulate chalk could actually make it into the tun and the decarbonation reaction proceeds, then there could be more mash acidity consumed and the resulting mash pH ends up a little higher than desired. That particulate chalk is not necessarily redissolved by the mash acids and it would be left behind in the tun.
When you have high calcium associated with sulfate or chloride, it cannot precipitate as chalk and it stays soluble in the wort. Then the primary thing taking it out is the calcium phosphate reaction.
But beside those reasons, I don’t really see any reason to think that there would be a big difference in calcium in wort with high or low bicarb waters.
This is the case with Guinness. The south side of Dublin has fairly low mineralized water with low alkalinity. The Guinness method includes a split mash where the pale malt and barley are mashed separately. They then steep the roast grains separately and add that Guinness Flavor Extract to the main wort. This way, they keep the main mash pH intact where most of the sugars and body are formed. That acidic GFE charge does still reduce the overall pH of the kettle wort and its important that they have that large percentage of raw barley to help with the resulting beer body.
Many of you will recognize Guinness’ method as the method that Gordon Strong mentions in his book. He didn’t create it, he adopted it with good effect for his RO-based brewing.
All of this is mainly focused on the effect of alkalinity in the mashing water and not on the overall ion content. But a proper level of mineralization can be an important component in beer flavor. Those of you that have tasted a beer that is normally brewed with moderate to high mineralization (like a Pale Ale) and then tasted a version that was made with nearly RO or distilled water quality should have no problem stating that the latter beer was probably less fulfilling. Ionic content is important.
Everyone, please remind me to send Martin my firstborn. Oh wait, she is now 17 and that would probably be illegal so let’s just move on.
Thank you agian Martin. Your description is what I was thinking… what I did was make a darker beer with low ion water and there was ‘less-flavor’. Those AG brewers who somehow got the idea that they should brew with RO or DI but not make any additions soon realized that those ions are there for a reason. Cheers & thanks again.
I didn’t really understand why Strong would want to the separate the roasted grains but the way you describe it is a thing of beauty, especially for a guy like me who doesn’t brew dark beers much. The next dark beer I make will have to try steeping roasted grains in my sparge liquor (acidifying) and then sparge with them. Thanks for sharing!
With regard to beers with high water mineralization, I wonder if the opposite is true as well. Beers like lagers with less water mineralization brewed with too much… I always wondered if the reason why American craft brewer examples of german beers are less exacting was due to overuse of water salts. IE - SA Noble Pils wifey brought home for me is a great beer, but sure ain’t no Jever to me…
[quote=“zwiller”]
With regard to beers with high water mineralization, I wonder if the opposite is true as well. Beers like lagers with less water mineralization brewed with too much… I always wondered if the reason why American craft brewer examples of german beers are less exacting was due to overuse of water salts. IE - SA Noble Pils wifey brought home for me is a great beer, but sure ain’t no Jever to me…[/quote]
Absolutely! The level of mineralization is quite dependent upon the style brewed. There are beers like Pils and Am Light Lagers that benefit from the clean palate that you create with few minerals. On the other hand are Pale Ales, Stouts, and Porters that might benefit more from higher mineralization. However, keep in mind that overdoing mineral additions is likely to be more detrimental than underdoing. When in doubt, leave it out.
[quote=“zwiller”]
With regard to beers with high water mineralization, I wonder if the opposite is true as well. Beers like lagers with less water mineralization brewed with too much… I always wondered if the reason why American craft brewer examples of german beers are less exacting was due to overuse of water salts. IE - SA Noble Pils wifey brought home for me is a great beer, but sure ain’t no Jever to me…[/quote]
I agree. I make a lot of lagers and light-to-medium beers, in general. This may be one of the reasons that I keep thinking I need to fine-tune my water… because the beers I make won’t hide blantant water issues like a huge IIPA might. I remember asking a local brewer for a tour of his brewery when I was a new brewer and I asked him what he did with his water (I may have told this story already) and he pointed to a filter and said, “We just filter it”. That would not be sufficient for a pilsner because I know they use my same water. Later I was out in the pub area and had some of their beers. Their amber and pale ale were nice but their pilsner was not. I just don’t think that American brewers look into making a beer like the Germans do and there is almost NO German beer I won’t drink (I don’t care for the banana & clove of Hefeweizens). I love Oktoberfest, Vienna, Kolsch, Altbier, Helles, Munich Lagers, Bocks, Dunkels and the like and I’m still looking for that BEER-HEAVEN recipe that I make in my own brewery.
Okay peeps… I have one other question for the panel.
What about the levels of sulfate and chloride that you add to a beer (I’m thinking mash here) but you keep the cl:SO4 ratio the same… what difference will you detect in a beer? If I made a beer where the chloride was 42ppm overall and the sulfate was 41ppm and the ratio was 1.03 (balanced), what would happen if the chloride was 71, sulfate 69 (ratio still 1.03) or chloride was 109, sulfate 106 (ratio still 1.03)? Clearly the pH and residual alkalinity are dropping at this point so to have levels of chloride and sulfate that high, you would need bicarbonate to offset it, correct? When I hear of people getting their sulfates and chlorides very high in a beer (150ppm, etc.), does that mean that they’re using calcium carbonate to raise the alkalinity as well? If my 138ppm of bicarb is something that I wish to keep low, would that suggest that for almost any beer I make under SRM 20 (or so, I’m winging this), my chloride and sulfate levels should be low as well, right? Was that line of questioning clear?
I was talking with another local brewer and he said that he recently made an English Bitter. For the water, he cut it 50/50 to reduce the bicarb and boosted the sulfates to make the hops pop a little bit. Seems reasonable but you could easily overdo the sulfates if it started to lower your pH too much, correct?
Although technically pH and residual alkalinity may be reduced by increasing sulfate/chloride, it is due to the additional calcium of each salt introduced which causes this. I suspect brewers who make large additions of any salt add it to the boil rather than the mash so there is no need to offset with additional alkalinity in the mash.
For lagers I prefer to keep mineralization low but use CaCl to Ca 50ppm. I cut my water only to reduce the amount of lactic acid I use. I am sensitive to the stuff. Also, I agree with AJ and was taught by Dave Miller to keep SO4 low for lagers with continental hops. All that said, my most recent IPA is like 7 SRM and I used a ton of gypsum to hit mash pH with side benefit of high sulfate. SRM is not the key. The style is.
Unless that dude has massive alkalinity I think there is no reason to cut water for British beers.
As zwiller says, when high amounts of minerals are desired in the wort, but they will depress the mash pH too much. Adding them directly to the kettle is a decent workaround.
And Ken, the effect of increasing the sulfate and chloride while keeping the ratio between them constant will eventually result in minerally tasting beer. From my review of the data and results, elevating chloride and sulfate above 100 ppm is when you might begin noticing a minerally character in the beer. By the time both ions are about 150 ppm, it is likely to be minerally tasting. In my opinion, the ratio is most useful when the chloride concentration is kept between 25 and 100 ppm.
Okay, good point about adding things to the kettle… that slipped my mind. So earlier in this thread (or was it in the HBT thread? :oops: ) when Denny was talking about getting his sulfate up to 150ppm for IPAs, he was probably talking about some amount in the mash and the rest in the BK, right?
So I am excited to brew now armed with this information and I have a wide variety of beers that I just made and have coming up… the 90% distilled water Czech Pils (2124), a sort of Red Lager (2308) similar to Two Women Country Lager (I used 25% distilled on that one), a West Coast Lager (2112) that I made over the weekend, an APA I’m making tomorrow (1056), a Mexican Dark Lager (2124), an Oktoberfest kind-of-thing (2124), a hoppier pilsner with Vienna and Munich (2308) and a few others of ranging colors, hop profiles and expectations.
[quote=“Ken Lenard”]when Denny was talking about getting his sulfate up to 150ppm for IPAs, he was probably talking about some amount in the mash and the rest in the BK, right?[/quote]That’s what I do - I’ll use as much gypsum as I can in the MT, adjust the resulting mash concentration for the final wort volume, then figure out how much extra gypsum I need in the kettle to hit the desired concentration in the fermenter.
Got it. I had a piece of the puzzle missing there as I played with EZ_Water and saw what happened to the pH and RA when I added that much sulfate. Thanks again to everyone who helped out in this thread. Should be required reading for all who want to futz with their water! Cheers.
I wanted to throw one more question out there… this popped into my brain today. When adding things like calcium chloride or gypsum to the kettle, I understand that you might do that more for ‘flavor’ than anything else. My guess is that it lowers the pH of the wort in the BK. But when you add CaCl or gypsum to the mash to effect mash pH, you’re still getting some amount of flavor from those additions, correct? If I used a bunch of CaCl in one mash and in another identical mash I used a bunch of CaSO4, you would be able to tell the difference, right? One would be smoother, rounder, maltier while the other one was brighter, crisper, etc. I don’t make kettle additions, just mash additions and I wonder how much ‘flavor’ carries over from the mash based on what you used in the mash. Thoughts?
This is a terrific thread! I just recently started adding gypsum to my mash and BK (a half a teaspoon each). From doing this, I have noticed a stronger hop bite and very little maltiness in my APAs/AIPAs. I have been getting my water up to about 118 ppm of sulfate by doing the gypsum additions, while my chloride is around 10 ppm.
Recently, I was starting to think I was using too much gypsum by getting a bigger sulfate to chloride ratio because my beers were becoming almost too unbalanced and almost harsh. After reading how much sulfate others are adding, I may dial back my sulfate for my next batch to see how it changes the character of the final beer.
Thanks again to all for this great insight into brewing water, which has been my most recent adventure towards brewing improvement!
Both sulfate and chloride are very soluble ions and they don’t complex too easily with any components in the mash. Therefore, those chloride and sulfate ions you add to the brewing water are pretty much going to all make it to the kettle. Altering those levels in brewing can have a noticeable effect on flavor.
For a beer that has very modest chloride and/or sulfate, you can test your perceptions of the beer by adding doses of either CaCL2 or gypsum directly to the glass. The CaCL2 dissolves very easily, however the gypsum takes a few minutes. Try it out.
For that water above, 10 ppm chloride is very low. Chloride has a profound effect on flavor and it substantially improves malty perceptions. However, the chloride level should be kept moderate when you are boosting sulfate well above 100 ppm. I like a chloride level of about 50 ppm in hoppy ales with very high sulfate (300ppm). I do suggest that a future brew bump the chloride up and keep the sulfate in the current 118 ppm range. I think you may note a substantial improvement in that malt perception. That beer is still likely to be a bit less dry on the finish, but bumping the sulfate can be a future experiment. I guarantee that boosting the chloride level will be a welcome change.
Thank you for mentioning getting my chloride ratio up, I just added a little to a sample of my kegged Rye PA which had a strong bitterness and this balanced it out nicely! Is there a way to add this to a kegged beer to get a little more malt flavor to balance the hop bitterness?
I also have a double IPA which I have been conditioning because the hop flavor is way too harsh, maybe a little calcium chloride would balance it out.
[quote=“mabrungard”]Both sulfate and chloride are very soluble ions and they don’t complex too easily with any components in the mash. Therefore, those chloride and sulfate ions you add to the brewing water are pretty much going to all make it to the kettle. Altering those levels in brewing can have a noticeable effect on flavor.
For a beer that has very modest chloride and/or sulfate, you can test your perceptions of the beer by adding doses of either CaCL2 or gypsum directly to the glass. The CaCL2 dissolves very easily, however the gypsum takes a few minutes. Try it out.
For that water above, 10 ppm chloride is very low. Chloride has a profound effect on flavor and it substantially improves malty perceptions. However, the chloride level should be kept moderate when you are boosting sulfate well above 100 ppm. I like a chloride level of about 50 ppm in hoppy ales with very high sulfate (300ppm). I do suggest that a future brew bump the chloride up and keep the sulfate in the current 118 ppm range. I think you may note a substantial improvement in that malt perception. That beer is still likely to be a bit less dry on the finish, but bumping the sulfate can be a future experiment. I guarantee that boosting the chloride level will be a welcome change.[/quote]
Thanks Martin. I thought that somewhere in these threads was a comment about how ‘very little calcium, chloride or sulfate’ that is added to the mash makes it to the kettle. I may have misinterpreted or misapplied that comment but that made it sound as though additions made to the mash will effect pH but not much else. I know from experience that you DO get different flavor perceptions from mash additions so what you say makes perfect sense. Also, I have used a glass of beer as a test facility by adding small amounts of gypsum or whatever to get a feel for how they impact flavor. Doing that would be more like adding to the kettle, correct? Cheers.
by adding small amounts of gypsum or whatever to get a feel for how they impact flavor. Doing that would be more like adding to the kettle, correct? Cheers.