Hi – I am trying to brew a clone of a beer I used to drink a lot of in England and have tried the recipe several times, but it has missed the mark. I decided to delve more into the water profile and managed to get a profile from the brewery and I have entered the characteristics into Bru’n Water to try to match the water by adding minerals. My base water is RO so I have a lot of latitude.
The data I got is: Calcium 200 mg/l, Chloride 200 mg/l, Sulphate 250 mg/l, Alkalinity 40 mg/l. Yes, it’s hard British water.
Now from what I have read, these numbers are equivalent to ppm, and I do not have the complete profile in terms of the Magnesium, Salt or Bicarbonate, but I looked at the profiles in John Palmer’s book and came up with:
Calcium 200ppm
Magnesium 12ppm (My data - is this reasonable?)
Sodium 24ppm
Sulphate 250ppm
Chloride 200ppm
Bicarbonate 100ppm (My data - is this reasonable?)
The question I have is that I am having difficulty in meeting these numbers in Bru’n Water, and achieving a mash pH target of 5.4. Bru’n water has me adding 10.4g of Gypsum, 9.6g of Calcium Chloride, 3.6g of Epsom Salts and 2.6g of Baking soda to come close to the profile. I also find I need to add 0.5g of Pickling Lime to raise the pH to 5.4. I am doing a 5 gallon batch with 8.2 gallons of RO mash water.
Bru’n water also flags that the Sulphate should be less than 150 and that the Chloride should be less than 100ppm, especially when the Sulphate is more than 100ppm.
I haven’t seen a water profile with a Chloride value that high. Do I ignore the warnings and RDWHAHB? 25g of minerals in 8 gallons of brewing liquor sounds a lot - then again British water has a lot of minerals in it. Maybe that is what I have been missing in my other attempts to brew this beer.
Paul
