Just need some opinions...water for stout

Just for fun though...let's say that theoretically speaking that Guinness uses the Dublin water profile. Whether its true or not I don't know...but...my continuing question is this...with such high bicarbonates shown in the different profiles floating around the web and in various software, how can they not have high as hell alkaline brewing water? Also, the calcium is over 100ppm, how does or how would that change things?

Pugs13 said:

I will have to just experiment. I didn't mean to stir up such a ruckus...

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Yes, that's the bottom line. You don't know where your tastes lie in this space. We can give you the scientific facts: alkalinities near 100 will give you a pH of about 5.5 (depending on malts) but we can't tell you whether you'll like the beer.

ajdelange said:

Carbonic acid is an acid and clearly the more you dissolve the lower the pH is going to be but it is a weak acid with first pK = 6.38. This is more than 2 units from the pH of all but two of the beers Lewis studied. Thus the pH of the beer will be determined mostly by the acids secreted by the yeast and less so by the carbon dioxide.

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Also, like mentioned before that out of the fermentor the beer tasted awesome, but once carbonated there is sometimes flavors that are now accentuated and the beer tastes a little dull. How does carbonation play a role in taste if at all? I know it accentuates flavors and aroma from the head of the beer and obviously serving temps are crucial, but can CO2 cause off flavors? What are your thoughts on quick carbing by using 20-30lbs. vs. slow carbonation based on the chart guidelines for styles of beer?

ajdelange said:

Yes, that's the bottom line. You don't know where your tastes lie in this space. We can give you the scientific facts: alkalinities near 100 will give you a pH of about 5.5 (depending on malts) but we can't tell you whether you'll like the beer.

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And see that's where I believe I am chasing my tail with all this. So its going to be experimentation time.

ajdelange said:

But that's sensory. The pH's of the beers made with more alkaline water were higher (that's a note to Kai if he is reading this).

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That’s possible. I only stated that a lowe mash pH can lead to a higher beer pH but it doesn’t have to be like that. There are lots of factors that go into beer pH.

Hermit said:

How much of the pH in the final product is related to carbonation? Doing a quick google I see references to bicarbonate playing a buffering roll in the process. Would this play a role in what volume of CO2 you wished to carb at?

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To add to A.J’s comments, I don’t see a pH difference between a fully carbonated and somewhat carbonated beer. If that was the case we would have to be a bit more careful about measuring beer pH since stirring it with the pH probe could change its pH.

Pugs13 said:

So...back to the old saying...I will have to just experiment. I didn't mean to stir up such a ruckus...but definitely some good insight into Stouts and most importantly I have learned some things as well.

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yep. There is lots of room for experimentation here. And if you want to tweak your stout, definitely look at changing the water alkalinity regardless of what you know about the relation between beer color and RA.

Kai