Thought I might have go at a water treatment for my next project which is a clone of the classic Bluebird Bitter from Coniston Brewery in the Lake District (England). For those of you that have never had the pleasure of tasting Bluebird, the following is a description from the Campaign for Real Ale (CAMRA).
“It is, quite simply, a wonderful beer. It is exceedingly pale (21-22 units colour), with just a hint of colour in its cheeks from the dash of crystal malt. It has a massive orange fruit aroma from the challengers, balanced by biscuity malt. Juicy malt and tart hops vie for attention in the mouth while the finish is tart and hoppy but well balanced by creamy malt. The bitterness rating is a substantial 36-38. The tangy fruit lingers on the back of the tongue until it develops a hint of orange liqueur”
Anyhoo, slightly off track there. I’m considering water treatment but not quite sure where to start to get the perfect water for this brew. My first step has been getting a copy of the water make-up from my local water company.
Your water is high in bicarbonates which is a problem with pale beers. Pre-boiling and/or dilution with distilled water are methods to get the CO3 down to acceptable levels but it will take a lot. It might be simpler to consider starting with purchased water, either distilled, RO, or spring water and then make the desired ion adjustments with brewing salt additions.
My tap water is fairly soft. The first numbers are my starting ppm and in parentheses are my numbers after addition of 6g Calcium Sulphate (gypsum) and 4g Calcium Chloride per 10 gallons. The recipe below is my Bluebird takeoff. Its a bit bigger than the original but very nice and respectful to the original in flavor.
Thanks for the input Brian. I’ll have to consider whether it’s worth my while using some bottled water, either for the whole volume or just to dilute. Bottled water tends to be quite expensive in the UK so I need to weigh up how far I want to go to acheive perfection!
The grist ratio I have for Bluebird was a bit higher on the crystal. I think I had 3kg MO/300g Crystal which works out at about 91%/9%. According to Brewsmith this should give me 22 IBU. The hop schedule was very similar but with 3 additions at 60, 30 and 10.
I think I read somewhere that the cask version and the export version of Bluebird has different ABV, with the export being slightly higher. I’m shooting for a session style beer at about 4%.
I would never recommend using “Bottled water” here in the US, either. Most grocery stores in the US have machines where you can refill 1-gallon or 5-gallon jugs with reverse-osmosis water, usually for $0.30 to $0.40 per gallon.
