Water for great German Pils

Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum

Help Support Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

brettwasbtd

Awesomeness Award Winnner
HBT Supporter
Joined
Apr 20, 2010
Messages
1,793
Reaction score
165
Location
Damascus, MD
Planning to brew a German Pils on Presidents day (Next Monday) and was hoping some others could weigh in on their experience with style and water. From research it looks like this water can have a higher content of sulfate and chloride than say a bohemian or czech pils. How important is hardness/alkalinity here? I am trying to decide if I should dilute my existing water source or just go all RO and build it up. If I build it up from RO I guess I would go with Kai's Pilsner Water profile. Made a helles last year with my existing water and it just wasn't right -not bad, but not great. Looking to make improvements :rockin:

So i guess the real question is, if you have moderately hard water, do you just build up from scratch or try to work with what you got?

My water averages below.
Calcium (Ca) - 38ppm
Magnesium (Mg) - 9ppm
Sodium (Na) - 21ppm
Chloride (Cl) - 41ppm
Sulfate (SO4) - 40ppm
Hardness/Alkalinity - Alkalinity (CaCO3) 82ppm

Recipe would be Weyermann Pilsner malt for the majority, possibly a few ounces of carapils. Acid malt for pH adjustment based on the ez water calculator and my decided water. Magnum for bittering and Hallertau for flavor/aroma hops. ~350-400 billion cells of WLP830.
 
Was talking to some other brewers and they seemed to feel that pH was more important than the alkalinity/hardness. I am using the EZ Brew water calculator and will be doing 50% distilled and 50% tap water for the mash, 100% tap for sparge. Total mineral content should be around what brukaisers pilsner water is. pH should be 5.4-5.43 range. Will let everyone know how it turns out!
 
Back
Top