Chlorine - Is 'any' too much?

Novice brewer here (3 batches, 1gal, 2.5gal, 5gal, all still in some point of bottle aging) with a CL2 question. (To avoid wordy post, skip below to bold :cross

I didn't read about chlorine until I started looking up 'Green Beer' flavors, since my beers are all obviously still young, so like any new brewer I freak out because of this one odd flavor all my test bottles have had, and it is probably yeasty / green beer Im tasting but I stumbled over chlorine discussions as well.

I will be using campden in future batches (since I ordered it already...new brewer amazon prime member over reactive ordering syndrome)...but my local water report show a low level of CL2, which I assumed was present but I couldnt taste it, and my water taste good, so I was told to use it.

SOOO, question is, is there a threshhold of chlorine that typically will not put out off flavors, or will ANY CL2 produce off flavors?

 

I'm guessing that any off flavors are not caused by chlorine...it dissipates within 24 hours. Look for other reasons why you have off flavors like ferm temps and type of yeast used. You're not going to find many public water sources that do not use chlorine.

 

And different people have different taste thresholds.

 

If you can't taste it in the water, you won't taste it in the beer.

 

Relying again too much on Charlie P.- God Bless him, but there are many members of HBT that have deeper scientific knowledge than he shares in his books.

Why is it that chlorophenols are more evident in beer? Is it the carbonation, which can enhance flavor? Do they bind with the malt in some way? Reason #1 to troll this site is to learn from the jedis who have been doing this for so long.

 

Sorry, but you are quite wrong. Chlorine in water is typically present between 1 and 3 parts per million. Most people can taste the chlorine, although not too many object strongly. The taste threshold for chlorophenols in beer is around 30 parts per BILLION. So, roughly a hundred times more sensitivity to chlorophenols. And there is a one to one production of chlorophenol per hypochlorite ion or chloramine ion.

The bottom line is that regardless of your ability to taste, all municipal water supplies are REQUIRED BY LAW to put a disinfectant residual into their distribution lines. In most cases, that will be chloramine or chlorine. Be sure to remove that residual prior to brewing or you are very likely to have chlorophenol in your beer.

 

Mea Culpa! As previously stated, maybe I put too much faith in Charlie P, who says "If the water tastes fine, then brew with it" (The Complete Joy of Homebrewing, 3rd Ed Page 13).

 

Following what Charlie P may have said 30 years ago is like relying on what Darwin said about evolution. Things have advanced a long way since then. eg. Darwin died before the discovery of DNA and Charlie said "relax, don't worry, have a homebrew" - I think everyone now can agree the path to good tasting beer is to "Freak out and worry about every tiny detail".

 

Thank you, the humor is appreciated. I am totally anal retentive, and charcoal filter my bottled water. OTOH, I have had comments when I have promoted my brewclub that too many brewers are so scientific and oriented towards getting gold medals that new brewers are intimidated and turned off from this hobby. My club is about having fun, and maybe getting tipsy overcomes achieving medals. Not everyone is a BJCP Honorary Grand Master.

I mean, just today, some guy posted an article on how he cheaply made cider. Was it the cheapest possible method, no. Was it the best possible cider, no. But this poor guy got blasted, again and again, because he felt a passion and excitement about his new hobby. There is constructive criticism / learning, then there are those that are out to dis people and be cruel. We need more fans, more members, more kindness.

Sometimes, a beer is just a beer, and pleasure trumps perfection

After all, we're brewers, not wine snobs:rockin:

 

As you already know, my water and everyone elses water on here tastes different. I assume concentrations differ as well so its tough to give a straight answer on the impact of your water on the flavor of your beer.

But, when I brew I use my tap water and dont worry about getting the chlorine out. I try to use as few additives as possible also. I can taste the cholrine but I dont worry that much about it in the finished product. Im not a expert on flavor profiles like Michael Jackson (not the gloved one) but all of my batches have come out tasting great. Also, all of my beers have that distinct green taste after 3 or 4 weeks but given time they mature and the flavors just get better and the off ones just go away.

Some may criticize me but do what you can with what you have and try not to over think it. Brewing is an experience that should be fun and enjoyed. If you are REALLY worried about the chlorine, just let the water sit out in a bucket or two and it should be gone the next day.

 

I'm guilty of nerding it up to much as well which is why I love my homebrew club - there is always someone there who shares whatever nerdy obsession I have about some aspect of homebrewing but has taken it 1 step further and I don't feel as bad

..and the competitive brewing thing...it gets pretty obnoxious sometimes. Last year I brewed a 6% golden promise/EKG SMaSH and took it to a club meeting:
BJCP guy: "what style is this supposed to be?"
Me: "Sort of an IPA I guess. I just bought a sack of Golden Promise and 3lbs of EKG and I wanted to brew with them"
BJCP guy: "Its too light to be an English IPA or an ESB, definitely all wrong in hopping, yeast and malt character for an American IPA or Pale Ale."
Me: "Is there anything wrong with it? Off flavours or anything?"
BJCP guy: "Nothing obvious, I just don't know what category you could enter this in. It only really fits in category 23 but it wouldn't do well there."

 

With over a decade of judging experience, I've been amazed when I get an obviously chlorophenolic beer set in front of me. But I recently attended a Scotch and Irish Whiskey tasting event. I enjoy Bourbons, but had not had Scotchs...especially peaty Scotchs. There were 2 other BJCP National judges with me at that event and all of us came to the conclusion that those phenols that are omnipresent in a peated Scotch would be considered flaws in a beer. But it made me realize that there are probably plenty of people who don't know that a chlorophenol flavor (which is similar to the phenols in Scotch) in a beer is a flaw. So its not a surprise to me (now) that some brewers think there is nothing wrong with their beers even though they aren't removing chlorine or chloramine from their brewing water. To each his own.

I agree with the sentiment above about a beer not fitting a style very well. Sometimes its best to brew for yourself and learn from the experience...and hopefully enjoy the resulting beer. That conversation that GBX relates is typical. But that is for competition. However if that beer was really great, it would still rise to the top. Finding the category that best accommodates it may be the greatest difficulty.

 

Gbx - your post makes me want to avoid home brewing clubs absolutely. Seems like my favorite beers, commercially and home brewed, don't fit BJCP categories. I can't imagine for one second even considering style categories in my brewing. Thx for the warning!

 

Oh, please don't lay that on homebrewing clubs. Lay that on geeks like me that judge and evaluate everything they drink now. There are plenty (if not a majority) of homebrew club members that couldn't care less about style. If it tastes the way you want, then its perfect.

PS: there are ultra-competitive clubs that enter all their beers in competition. I'm not a fan of that. It certainly takes away from the happy-go-lucky homebrewing feeling that I appreciate. Don't take any HOBBY too seriously!

 

The lesson here is that some beers shouldn't be wasted by giving them to judges!

 

There are members of the club who are super into competitive brewing but there are a ton of people who could care less. Like I also said, I love my homebrew club. There is always somebody there who has a similar philosophy when it comes to brewing. There are people who over science everything and people who just want to get drunk on cheap homemade beer.

..but despite their faults, the competitive types are the ones who get things done. If it wasn't for their drive to compete and organize things, there wouldn't be a homebrew community to the extent it is now. We'd all be too busy relaxing, not worrying and get pissed on ****ty homebrew.

 

and yes...i have never entered my best beer (a 3rd old baltic porter) because I hate the thought that it isn't going to be enjoyed. I only have 15 bottles left and the biggest fear I have is that it won't make the BOS round and the second bottle will be thrown out.

 

Though it looks like we've meandered a BIT from my question...I think you convinced me to try campden for my next batch

 

My beer improved remarkably when I started carbon-filtering my water. Just one data point, but there it is.

 

I’ve posted several times about this. Apparently no one knows.

Our local water supply contains 3ppm chloramine. Most brewers use a five micron carbon filter inline with a garden hose. Some don’t even do that.

I’ve used Campden before with no apparent effect.

My best guess is that while free chlorine is highly reactive, chloramine is pretty stable. Sometimes you get bit, but mostly you don’t.

Purely based on my observation.

 

Do most of you either filter or campden tap water or both?

 

Yeah so back to the question... I live in Atlanta and the LHBS tells me the water here is good for brewing. That said, if I have a glass of straight tap and a glass of filtered (just the cheap carbon filter in the fridge water dispenser, its a Pur), I can definitely tell the diff. I don't mind the tap but my wife and daughter hate it, they won't drink it.

Doesn't boiling for an hour remove it? Or a lot of it? Talking about the wort boil.

I've been using a campden tab in my strike water for a 5 gal AG batch but then forget to add more when I add more water to the HLT for sparge so I guess I'm not removing it all.

Plan on getting a carbon filter to run my water hose through and mount on my rig.

 

Also meant to say I want a filter because really trying not to add anything unnatural to my beer. Not worried about organic but want it only pure natural ingredients. Is whirfloc natural? I know it's from Irish moss which I natural but do they add anything?

 

I think they add sodium bicarb to it for 'dispersal'. You can look it up pretty easily.

 

I have a few questions..

1) How much Campden is correct in a 5 Gal batch (seems from the Water Chem thread it would only be 1/4 to 1/2 a tab)

2) Will too much Campden cause problems

3) Could a slow kick off to fermentation be a byproduct of Camden in a Lager..?

I just had a lager take forever to start and its still slow.. the ONLY thing I did different this time is add 5 tabs of Campden (Obviously too much) to my water (in the end I think I fished out 2 or so because instinctively it seemed like too much to me).

 

Then there you go.. that explains why my Lager took for frigging ever to start.

Wonder if that's not a problem with a few people that have slow starting beers. Maybe Campden is more harmful to Lager yeasts than Ale ones..?

I know its supposed to outright kill wild yeast (at least according to the directions)

 

I don't think this is correct, but perhaps someone can expound on it further. I haven't been able to find any reference to chlorophenols being a fermentation product.

As I understand it chlorine + organic compounds (phenols) = chlorophenols. Which means that this likely happens during the mash.

 

I agree with Yooper...the water here is chlorinated and I've only ever tasted chlorophenols (or what everyone believes is cholophenols) in partial boil batches that were topped up with tap water.

 

Those extract beers did not use chlorinated water either? Some yeast do make phenolic compounds, but if there's no chlorine then they couldn't be chlorophenols. I also remember reading that similar flavors can also come from contamination.

A.J. wrote a whole paper on removing chlorine from water, maybe he can explain.

 

I filter highly chlorinated tap water and add some campden. I've used double the recommended amount of campden with no apparent penalty.

I use chlorinated tap water and oxyclean or PBW for clean up. I could easily use filtered water for clean up, but haven't needed to.

The only band aid beers I've drank have been commercial beers.

 

There are phenols in the mash/wort (for example tannin). It could also be a combination of mechanisms through which they are formed.

 

I had been struggling with some persistent off-flavors in my beers for some time, especially in my lighter beers. I never could quite call it medicinal or band aid like, but plasticky. In some of the beers it was only noticeable in the burp. Anyway, chlorophenols sounded like the culprit. I had been filtering my city water through an activated carbon filter thinking that would do the trick. Further research said that while activated carbon can work, it can take an absurdly long contact time especially with chloramine which is quite stable ( the whole reason it's used).

I started adding campden at the typical 1/ 20gal rate and so far (6 beers) no trace of the off flavor.

My wife is an environmental scientist at the local water district - She borrowed the chlorine meter from work and we ran a few tests a couple weeks ago:

Tap water total cl2: 1.7 ppm
Post carbon filter at full flow: 1.44 ppm
Post carbon filter at 0.6 gpm: 1.46 ppm
Post carbon filter at 0.16 gpm: 1.55 ppm

So the carbon filter did remove some cl2 but no mater how slow we ran it we couldn't come close to removing it all.

One final test with campden at 1tab / 20 gal after 1 minute of contact: 0.00 ppm

I 100% recommend that anyone using tap water use campden... They are simple, cheap and will improve your beer immediately. No brainier.