If you don't have alkaline enough water for dark brews, would there be a benefit to adding the dark roasted grains in Stouts/Porters toward the end of the mash?
I’m not sure if that will always work that well. The roasted grains will pull down your wort pH and you may end up with a boil wort pH that is too low for good protein coagulation and hop utilization. I believe that, if they are necessary, the salts are needed one way or the other.
Thanks Kai. I'm making an Oatmeal Stout very soon (hopefully Sunday) so I'll try it again and be sure to measure the pH after the dark grain addition. If it goes too low I'll add some chalk (or baking soda?).
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One quick question about measureing pH of dark beers. I have the paper pH strips. Every time I measure a dark beer, it just stains the strip dark brown. Is there something I'm missing, or is a meter a must?
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One quick question about measureing pH of dark beers. I have the paper pH strips. Every time I measure a dark beer, it just stains the strip dark brown. Is there something I'm missing, or is a meter a must?
If you are using the colorpHast strips try blotting them with a paper towel.
I am brewing a big RIS tomorrow (~1.100 & 2# black barley) via partigyle... I was hoping to get the RA up to ~200, I am concerned with your comments about undissolved chalk; how exactly do I dissolve it? I thought the mash ph would help to dissolve it during the mash, is that incorrect?
I am brewing a big RIS tomorrow (~1.100 & 2# black barley) via partigyle... I was hoping to get the RA up to ~200, I am concerned with your comments about undissolved chalk; how exactly do I dissolve it? I thought the mash ph would help to dissolve it during the mash, is that incorrect?
This is an odd thing that I found when I evaluated how undissolved chalk reacts in the mash to raise mash pH. I have no explanation for that but once you add more than 300-400 ppm (0.3 – 0.4 g/l or 1.2-1.6 g/gal) it won’t raise the pH anymore. In addition to that, the mash pH rise that I could get from chalk was only about 0.2 pH units above the distilled water mash pH of the tested grists. This lead me to the comments about dissolved chalk which. A few brewers actually reported something similar where they kept adding chalk but the pH was not moving.
As a result I started advocating using more baking soda until the sodium levels start to become a concern. I think as long as you stay below 50 ppm Na+ you should be fine. Baking soda didn’t show the pH raising limit that I saw with chalk.
The same goes for dissolved chalk. But here you have to keep in mind that most water spread sheets out there are not able to correctly account for dissolved chalk. When chalk is dissolved it has twice the alkalinity power of undissolved chalk. My spreadsheet (http://braukaiser.com/documents/water_calc_v15.xls) has been updated to include support for dissolved chalk and will also give you the CO2 pressure needed to dissolve it if you enter the volume of water you are going to dissolve it in.
How much crystal vs. roasted malts are you using in the RIS. If you are using mostly roasted specialty malts I’m inclined to say that you may not need a RA (residual alkalinity) of 200 ppm.
Over the weekend I want to take some pictures and write a tutorial on practical ways of dissolving chalk in the brewing water. It’s not that complicated, but seeing pictures helps.
Total Grain Weight: 34.05 lb
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Name Description Step Temp Step Time
Mash In Add 42.56 qt of water at 165.9 F 154.0 F 60 min
I am only putting 2# of the Black Barley into the primary mash, I was planning to add the .75# after the first runnings were drained. I am not sure if "Special B" counts as a crystal malt... if it is not then the crystal malt additions are rather low in the grand scheme of things.
If this looks weird for a RIS, the first 5G of runnings will be the RIS and the second runnings will go into another smaller beer. This probably makes the mash pH more manageable due to the reduced SRM... or maybe it doesn't affect it at all; I have no idea!
I am only putting 2# of the Black Barley into the primary mash, I was planning to add the .75# after the first runnings were drained. I am not sure if "Special B" counts as a crystal malt... if it is not then the crystal malt additions are rather low in the grand scheme of things.
If this looks weird for a RIS, the first 5G of runnings will be the RIS and the second runnings will go into another smaller beer. This probably makes the mash pH more manageable due to the reduced SRM... or maybe it doesn't affect it at all; I have no idea!
Special B is indeed a Crystal malt. Usually in the 115-130 range.
With the many subsequent runnings involved in partigyle brewing I would think you are going to get increasing pH with the more water you run through, since the mash will be losing it's buffering ability if you will against the extremely high volume of water.
I've had several conversations with Mike McDole on this topic.
I was brewing his Brown Ale and he gave me his water profile:
Me - "I got my water pretty close. I just can't get my Sodium down to your target. Yours is 17 and mine's 58 ppm. Are you using straight RO water or dilluting?:
Mike - "RO"
Me - " how in the world do you keep your sodium down? I've got the NaHCO3 jacked up to bring up my RA, which is where I'm getting all my Sodium from. My RA is 129. I'm not using any Chalk to raise the RA because my Calcium's so high from the Gypsum to reach the 350 ppm you have. Is your RA lower than mine?"
Mike-"That's the difference, I don't adjust the carbonates. My only Na addition is from NaCl. So yes, my RA is probably much lower than yours."
Me - "So no matter your SRM you don't adjust the carbonates?"
Mike - "I don't adjust the carbonates but that in no way says I shouldn't. I always check the Ph of the mash for dark beers, including the Janet's Brown, and it's always 5.1 or 5.2. Your results may vary."
No matter how much I wanted to believe him, I couldn't adjust the salts to bring my RA down below the suggested SRM of the beer. I did bring my sodium down.
So how important is it?
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Originally Posted by Denny's Evil Concoctions
I think you are confuisng circle k with a reach around.
I've had several conversations with Mike McDole on this topic.
I was brewing his Brown Ale and he gave me his water profile:
Me - "I got my water pretty close. I just can't get my Sodium down to your target. Yours is 17 and mine's 58 ppm. Are you using straight RO water or dilluting?:
Mike - "RO"
Me - " how in the world do you keep your sodium down? I've got the NaHCO3 jacked up to bring up my RA, which is where I'm getting all my Sodium from. My RA is 129. I'm not using any Chalk to raise the RA because my Calcium's so high from the Gypsum to reach the 350 ppm you have. Is your RA lower than mine?"
Mike-"That's the difference, I don't adjust the carbonates. My only Na addition is from NaCl. So yes, my RA is probably much lower than yours."
Me - "So no matter your SRM you don't adjust the carbonates?"
Mike - "I don't adjust the carbonates but that in no way says I shouldn't. I always check the Ph of the mash for dark beers, including the Janet's Brown, and it's always 5.1 or 5.2. Your results may vary."
No matter how much I wanted to believe him, I couldn't adjust the salts to bring my RA down below the suggested SRM of the beer. I did bring my sodium down.
So how important is it?
I've been reading some of A.J. Delange's posts and lately he's been telling brewers to just adjust water for your sulfate/chloride ratio and worry about mash ph when you're actually measuring it. If it needs to go down, then add lactic acid/sauermalz. If it need to go up, then add chalk. From what I understand, the relationship between SRM and mash ph is not as black and white as popularly perceived. IIRC, even some of Kai's experiments have shown that crystal and higher kilned base malts(Munich and such) pull down ph more than roasted grains do. So I would believe Tasty.
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SRM to RA analysis
Linear Mode
