german pilsner water

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+HopSpunge+

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I have one of those home house water filters with a charcoal filter in it. Will runing my water threw that be good enough to make a german pilsner. Or will I have to add R.O. Water to make it softer? I make a regular lager about once a year and that comes out ok. But want to try and make a german pilsner this time. Something like the victory prima pils. Thanks in advance HS
 
Oh poop. That web site is complicated :( :( .. ... .. .

I know! But try again, and again and again. It's worth it. I gave up at first, because I'm no chemist. But through many posts, and talking it out, and doing lots of reading, I get it now. And trust me, if I can get it, anybody can!

A big help to me was reading Kaiser's website, with a very similar spreadsheet: http://braukaiser.com/wiki/index.php?title=At_home_water_testing to start.

Then, http://braukaiser.com/wiki/index.php?title=How_to_read_a_water_report

Trust me. Read them both (even though you don't have a test yet), and then read them again, and you'll start to get it. I promise. Soon, it'll seem easy (or at least easier!).
 
No, a charcoal filter doesn't touch the inorganics (minerals).

I analyzed Victory's water for them back in '98 and as luck would have it it's on this machine. I found:

Water Sample - Collected 20 JUN 98

pH 6.86

Alkalinity
26 mg/L as CaCO3

Sodium - By ISE
8.3 mg/L

Magnesium Hardness
27 mg/L CaCO3
6.7 mg/L Mg2+

Calcium Hardness
51 mg/L CaCO3
20 mg/L Ca2+

Chloride

27.92 mg/L Cl- Dil X: 2.0000

Sulfate
17.6 mg/L SO4-2 Dil X: 1.0000


Total Iron
0.065 mg/L Fe

Fe(II) - Ferrous (Clear water) Iron
0.003 mg/L Fe2+ Dil X: 1.0000

Manganese

0.009 mg/L Mn Dil X: 1.0000
Note: EDL 0.005 mg/L

Copper
0.064 mg/L Cu Dil X: 1.0000

Potassium
2.25 mg/L K+

Nitrate
1.2 mg/L NO3--N

Silicate
8.9 mg/L SiO2


Nitrite
0.0047 mg/L NO2--N

Zinc
0.169 mg/L Zn Dil X: 1.0000

Don't know what, if anything, they do to their water but they wouldn't have to do anything to brew a pretty good pils (which their Pils is) from this water.
 
ajdelange said:
No, a charcoal filter doesn't touch the inorganics (minerals).

I analyzed Victory's water for them back in '98 and as luck would have it it's on this machine. I found:

Water Sample - Collected 20 JUN 98

pH 6.86

Alkalinity
26 mg/L as CaCO3

Sodium - By ISE
8.3 mg/L

Magnesium Hardness
27 mg/L CaCO3
6.7 mg/L Mg2+

Calcium Hardness
51 mg/L CaCO3
20 mg/L Ca2+

Chloride

27.92 mg/L Cl- Dil X: 2.0000

Sulfate
17.6 mg/L SO4-2 Dil X: 1.0000

Total Iron
0.065 mg/L Fe

Fe(II) - Ferrous (Clear water) Iron
0.003 mg/L Fe2+ Dil X: 1.0000

Manganese

0.009 mg/L Mn Dil X: 1.0000
Note: EDL 0.005 mg/L

Copper
0.064 mg/L Cu Dil X: 1.0000

Potassium
2.25 mg/L K+

Nitrate
1.2 mg/L NO3--N

Silicate
8.9 mg/L SiO2

Nitrite
0.0047 mg/L NO2--N

Zinc
0.169 mg/L Zn Dil X: 1.0000

Don't know what, if anything, they do to their water but they wouldn't have to do anything to brew a pretty good pils (which their Pils is) from this water.

Wow. Thanks ajdelange. This will help lots. I googled prima pils clone, and could not find any really solid info. A few people tried to clone it but could not figure it out. But i'm not that pickey if can come up with something close I will be more than happy.
 
Oh poop. That web site is complicated :( :( .. ... .. .

Fortunately, for a Pils you don't have to worry about all or any of that stuff. Get some low mineral content water (like RO or DI) and add half a tsp of calcium chloride to each 5 gallons treated. Use 3% sauermalz in your grist. You will, provided you do everything else right, get a very good Pils.
 
ajdelange said:
Fortunately, for a Pils you don't have to worry about all or any of that stuff. Get some low mineral content water (like RO or DI) and add half a tsp of calcium chloride to each 5 gallons treated. Use 3% sauermalz in your grist. You will, provided you do everything else right, get a very good Pils.

This will help alot. This is what i am going to do. Plus a water report from the city wont work. I run it threw the charcoal filter to get rid of the chlorine smell. I would have to send my home filtered water off to be tested somewere. Thanks again...
 
This will help alot. This is what i am going to do. Plus a water report from the city wont work. I run it threw the charcoal filter to get rid of the chlorine smell. I would have to send my home filtered water off to be tested somewere. Thanks again...


Yes, you can brew a good pils (particularly a Czech Pilsner) with RO/Distilled water with a couple small additions.


Overall I think you're putting to much weight into your charcoal filter - it will remove some nasty/smelly organics but will have zero effect on the alkalinity and hardness of your water. Therefore your city's water report will work just fine, no need to test your water after filtering because the filter doesn't remove or alter the key items you'd be looking for in the report.
 
That makes sense. I emailed the municapil water authority and asked for a water report to be sent to my address. However, I live in NY so it will take a few months to get. And I will have to pay all kinds of astronomical fee's..
 
I googled prima pils clone, and could not find any really solid info. A few people tried to clone it but could not figure it out. But i'm not that pickey if can come up with something close I will be more than happy.

Northern Brewer offered a kit a while back that was inspired by Prima, though they did it as a hybrid with a limited release Kölsch yeast. The recipe is still up on the NB website:
http://www.northernbrewer.com/documentation/allgrain/AG-VictoriousPrimoPseudo-Pils.pdf

I never brewed it and therefore can't attest to its fidelity or lack thereof. But it can be another data point in your search for clone information.
 
Northern Brewer offered a kit a while back that was inspired by Prima, though they did it as a hybrid with a limited release Kölsch yeast. The recipe is still up on the NB website:
http://www.northernbrewer.com/documentation/allgrain/AG-VictoriousPrimoPseudo-Pils.pdf

I never brewed it and therefore can't attest to its fidelity or lack thereof. But it can be another data point in your search for clone information.

Prima Pils is one of my favorite beers, so I did quite a bit of research on finding the recipe. Here's everything I could find:


----------------------------------------------------------------------
From Zymurgy:
1.053, 51 IBU (all whole hops), 3 SRM, 75% eff., 90min boil
9.25lb German Pils
Double decoction w/mashout (20@122, 40@145, 20@155, 10@165F)
1oz Tradition 6% @60
1oz Tett 4.5% @30
1oz Mittelfrüh 4.5% @20
2oz Saaz 4.3% @10
German lager @50F, lager 10-13wks @35F

----------------------------------------------------------------------
From HBTer who spoke with brewery:
"The brewhouse was designed to
perform decoction mashing for continental lagers (but works great for
American and Belgian ales too) but also using whole flower hops. Its
my opinion that the wonderful aromatics evident in HopDevil and Prima
are a result of using whole hops and a hopback as well as the careful
watching of Ron and Bill. BTW, Victory is located in Downingtown,
Pa, about 35 miles west of Philly. Directions are on the web site.

Heres some pointers on making a homebrewed version of Prima Pils:

Prima is slightly higher OG than the traditional German pils, aim
for around 13P. A grist of 100% pils malt from Germany or the Czech
republic would be good. Perform a multi step mash or decoction
according to the malt specs, ie if needed. Take care to avoid oxygen
pickup during mashing and lautering. Hopping is around 50-60 BUs,
you can choose to use all noble hops if you can fit all the hops in
your kettle, or start with a higher alpha kettle hop like German
Perle or Northern Brewer and follow up with the traditional flavor
and aroma hops such as Hallertau and plenty of Saaz. Do not dry hop
pils and be sure to boil the last hop addition for at least 5-10
mins. Use a huge starter of clean lager yeast, a one gallon starter
can be allowed to complete and take the slurry from that for 5-6
gals. Oxygenate to saturation by injection/bubbling pure O2.
Ferment cool, keeping below 50F. Lager 5-6 weeks at 31F. "

----------------------------------------------------------------------
From HBT:
"I just got a clone kit from Austin Homebrew, 9.5 lbs of German Pils, and 1 oz each of Tradition, Tett, Hall, and Saaz at 60, 30, 20, 10 minutes."
 
I think I found my water info. Online. I was looking in the wrong place. Buffalo does not test thier own water the county does it, and its an average of a bunch of places within the county. It said that the Alkalinity is 95 mg/liter. The Calcium Hardness is 93 mg/ liter. And total Dissolved solids is 153 mg/liter. Is this hard water or soft? And thanks for both the recipes. I am going to try and combine all the recipes i've read so far on the interweb into one basic one. And hopfully make a pilsner that is like prima. If I get somewhat close i will be happy.
 
Prima Pils is one of my favorite beers, so I did quite a bit of research on finding the recipe. Here's everything I could find:
...


Cool, thanks for sharing! That's all great information. I might have to try brewing one of these myself soon (Prima is one of my faves, too).

HopSpunge, keep us posted. I'm curious to see how your clone attempt goes.
 
No problem at all.

When I brewed it I just used that Zymurgy recipe and skipped the decoctions as I didn't think it was worth it (I don't taste much melanoidinin in PP - you could add a little melanoidin malt without decocting if you wanted to). Used 50% distilled water and 50% of my hard local water. I also only used pellet Mittelfruh and Tettnanger as that's all I had. Came out quite tasty.
 
ajdelange said:
No, a charcoal filter doesn't touch the inorganics (minerals).

I analyzed Victory's water for them back in '98 and as luck would have it it's on this machine. I found:

Water Sample - Collected 20 JUN 98

pH 6.86

Alkalinity
26 mg/L as CaCO3

Sodium - By ISE
8.3 mg/L

Magnesium Hardness
27 mg/L CaCO3
6.7 mg/L Mg2+

Calcium Hardness
51 mg/L CaCO3
20 mg/L Ca2+

Chloride

27.92 mg/L Cl- Dil X: 2.0000

Sulfate
17.6 mg/L SO4-2 Dil X: 1.0000

Total Iron
0.065 mg/L Fe

Fe(II) - Ferrous (Clear water) Iron
0.003 mg/L Fe2+ Dil X: 1.0000

Manganese

0.009 mg/L Mn Dil X: 1.0000
Note: EDL 0.005 mg/L

Copper
0.064 mg/L Cu Dil X: 1.0000

Potassium
2.25 mg/L K+

Nitrate
1.2 mg/L NO3--N

Silicate
8.9 mg/L SiO2

Nitrite
0.0047 mg/L NO2--N

Zinc
0.169 mg/L Zn Dil X: 1.0000

Don't know what, if anything, they do to their water but they wouldn't have to do anything to brew a pretty good pils (which their Pils is) from this water.



If I take values from the above water sample. And I add 20 calcium to 6.7 magnesium I get 26.7 subtract this from 26 alkalinity and I get a residual alkalinity of .7 is this correct or wrong?? If i'm wrong I am going to have to go back and hit the books.
 
Ah. I understand now. I read the formula for figuring out the RA wrong. I did not divide the calcium by 3.5 and the maganesium by 7. Plus I was using the wrong ones from the report. This will help me alot in figuring out my own water and greatly improve my beer. Your wisdom and knowledge is once again appreciated.....
 
Made my kinda, sort of, maybee, I hope it taste something like prima today. Had to make do with what was available from lhbs. Went with 1/2 D.I. Water and 1/2 charcoal filtered local water. Until I can finish figuring out my own water exactly. Well here is what i decided to try.

14 lb. German Pilsner
8 oz. Munich malt
7 oz. Acid malt

Mash for 120 min. @ 149°
(No Sparge)

90 min. Boil
1 oz german tradition @ 60
1 oz us tettnang @ 30
1 oz hallertau mittelfruh @ 20
2 oz czech saaz @ 10
1 oz czech saaz @ steeped

O.G was 1.055

3 packets of nottingham
14 days @ 58° primary
7 days @ 68° secondary
7 days @ 38° lager

Will report back when carbonated..
 
Why did you use Notty? It's not a lager yeast.

Using an ale yeast instead of a lager yeast will have far greater impact on flavor than water treatment will.

You'll end up with a good beer but it won't taste like Prima.
 
Because some other guy on this site said he tried it , and fermented it low and said he had good results. Time will tell. If not I will just have to brew another batch....
 
Because some other guy on this site said he tried it , and fermented it low and said he had good results. Time will tell. If not I will just have to brew another batch....

You will undoubtedly make a good beer but it won't be a lager, it won't taste like a lager. Lager yeast is widely available, why didn't you use the excellent saflager W-34/70 dry yeast?
 
Because I have a.d.d. And I have to always experiment. I have'nt made the same recipe ever. And I did not want to make the above recipes exactly as perscribed. Because then they would call me a copy-cat and what not.
 
But worrying about water chemistry for a Pilsner is pointless if you're just going to ferment with ale yeast.

That's like worrying about what spices to use for a Chinese stir fry then dumping marinara sauce on it.
 
Ya ya ya. I just started lagering it. Couple weeks and i'll taste it and see. Next one I will use a different yeast strain. One of the pubs in buffahole that I goto got in a keg of prima pils. A cask of vicrory pale ale. And a bunch of other victory kegs last night. So the victory representative guy was there. He said it started out as a german lager strain but mutated into thier own over the many years. Cool guy, talked beer with me and my parents for a good hour. But he would not divulge very much information about their pilsner. I'm afraid I will have to do this cloning project the old fasioned way. One keg at a time.
 
+HopSpunge+ said:
?..So the victory representative guy was there. He said it started out as a german lager strain but mutated into thier own over the many years...
maybe a resident commercial brewing expert can chime in, but I'd have to think that as a professional brewery, they would be using yeast from cultures (for consistency/control) instead of simply letting their yeast just wildly mutate. So I'm not sure I believe that Victory rep.
 
What he meant was that is was a well known lager strain (which I expect he had been using at Baltimore) that they continued to use which, as is often the case when breweries do this, developed 'house character'. Yes, it's caused by mutation but you can be sure the selection is controlled.
 
He wasn't one of the brewers. Just a guy they pay to promote the brewery. Make sure the beer is served correctly. Hand out free beer and t-shirts. Hang out and drink beer. I think I could really enjoy this type of job.
 
Pretty close. More bittering hops needed. Yeast experiment I would say worked; however I will switch out to bevarian lager on next batch. Color dead on . Flavor dead on (dank). Bittering off needs alot more bittering hops . Water a hair too soft. Close very drinkable as it is.
 
Batch #2 I switched to a built up starter of bavarian lager yeast. And doubled bittering hops. It is lagering now, too early to tell. I went ahead and brewed batch #3 without tasting batch #2 whitch was a radical revamp of both recipes using even less distilled water and moving all the hop additions early in the boil. Time will tell.
 
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