Festbier Water Profile

[schmahly]

Hey all, so I'm looking into doing a Festbier and fermenting it under pressure. But, I have this water profile that I'm hoping is good enough. Any feedback?

Ca 11
Mg 5
Na 8
SO4 22
Cl 21

I'm using RO water FYI. Targer pH of 5.3.

 

[VikeMan]

What's your grain bill and mash thickness (strike water qts per pound of grains)? If we know that, we can predict the mash pH (unless you've already done that). But this is likely going to need some acid to hit a 5.3 pH.

Also, in general for a lager like this, I would probably get calcium up to at least 20 ppm, and I wouldn't add any magnesium at all. And probably more Cl and less SO4.

 

[schmahly]

Yea I didn't add the grain bill or my acid additions. I was thinking on keeping the calcium low but getting the SO4 from the Epsom salt. I thought I read somewhere that you want to keep the calcium very low and maybe get the CaCl2 higher for this style.

 

[VikeMan]

I was thinking on keeping the calcium low but getting the SO4 from the Epsom salt. I thought I read somewhere that you want to keep the calcium very low and maybe get the CaCl2 higher for this style.

IMO, 20 ppm is pretty low, but adequate. I don't think a beer like this benefits in any way flavor-wise from magnesium. If you're trying to keep calcium low, you can also increase Cl by adding NaCl in place of some CaCl2.

 

[cactusgarrett]

My festbier is a point of pride for myself - by far my most fav beer I make. I usually shoot for this profile by diluting my hard water 75% with RO and adding back gypsum and CaCl2. Good calcium to encourage good flocculation, and a 5.3-5.4 pH.

 

[mabrungard]

You don't want flocculation in a lager and you don't want a lot of calcium in the water for that reason. Lagering is for removing yeast and suspended solids. But oxalate removal is a benefit to having enough calcium in your mashing water. I find that adding all the calcium salts calculated for the entire water batch to ONLY the mashing water, can boost the Ca content in the mash. This assumes that you're brewing with really low TDS water like RO or distilled. The unmineralized sparging water dilutes the overall wort mineralization down to the nice low levels needed to let the malt shine through.

 

[schmahly]

So utilizing the bru'n water spreadsheet... I should add the mash additions and the sparge additions in the mash. I can see this changing the pH a bit so I'm assuming the acid additions may have to be reduced. I am using RO water as well.

 

[VikeMan]

So utilizing the bru'n water spreadsheet... I should add the mash additions and the sparge additions in the mash. I can see this changing the pH a bit so I'm assuming the acid additions may have to be reduced. I am using RO water as well.

I don't use Bru'nWater, but yes, more calcium in the mash means a smaller acid addition to hit a given ph.

 

[Beermeister32]

Brewer’s Friend has this great page which shows historic brewing water profiles. They also have a calculator so you can import these values to modify your source water:

https://www.brewersfriend.com/brewing-water-target-profiles/

 

[Conehead]

I add my sparge additions to the boil kettle, good so far.