MrMalty late hopping article: Can someone clarify this statement?

[BuzzCraft]

An article on late hopping on the mrmalty website (http://www.mrmalty.com/late_hopping.htm) states the following:

"High wort pH can emphasize the hop bitterness and result in a harsh bittering perception, so hold off on Burtonizing your water or other similar mineral additions."

My understanding of "Burtonizing" is the addition of salts which include, to a large extent, calcium sulfate. Since calcium additions lower mash pH, I'm confused about this statement. I'm making the assumption that there would be a similar effect on wort pH during the boil from calcium salt additions (i.e. that it would also be lowered), but maybe that's where I'm falling short on understanding this.

Can someone clarify?

 

[smizak]

Your thinking is right, calcium in the form of sulfates(Gypsum) or chlorides reacts with phosphates and carbonates from the grist/water and lowers ph. The only think I can think that Jamil meant was the assumption that the reader was to brew the Evil Twin recipe, which contains some dark grains. I've never heard any real science about high ph making hop bitterness more harsh.

 

[BuzzCraft]

I can see hop "harshness" potentially related to high pH due to more tannin/polyphenol extraction from hops at higher pH, but still can't make sense of the statement!

 

[Bensiff]

"When hops are added to wort and boiled the pH is around 5.2 and there is protein present to precipitate much of the polyphenols extracted from the hop leaf. Boiling time is important and most beers that have hop aroma use late additions. During the boil, hop acids undergo numerous chemical changes and the resultant mix has a profound influence on beer bitterness and the quality of bitterness. When the pH of wort boiling is increased by adding alkaline buffers, hop utilization increases but bitterness is reportedly unpleasant. If you boiled hops in water as opposed to wort, the pH would be higher and the flavor would lack."


http://***********/stories/article/...partial-mash-recipe-until-the-end-of-the-boil

Simply stated, if you add salts that raise the PH you will get a poor quality hop bitterness. This is not because of the salts (yes I realize certain salts do have a significant impact on hop profile, just ignoring that for the point) it is because of the salts impact on the PH.

 

[BuzzCraft]

Yes, but my point is that "Burtonizing" salts would lower pH, not raise it. This is why the statement doesn't make sense to me.

 

[homebrewer_99]

From previous recipes I know that adding gypsum accentuates the bittering harshness.

 

[Bensiff]

Yes, but my point is that "Burtonizing" salts would lower pH, not raise it. This is why the statement doesn't make sense to me.

I see what you are saying now. I would guess it is either a mistatement on his part or he meant it to be an 'or' statment. Such as Burtonizing additions or salt additions that raise ph will give a harsher bitterness. But, then again that would only really make sense if he discussed something like the impact of high SO4 just before making that statement. I haven't read it for some time so I don't know.

 

[smizak]

I've seen some stuff Jamil wrote around the same time as the article and he mentioned not treating his water at all. That was 2007, so I'm guessing he wasn't super keen on water treatment back then.