How does this look for a sweet stout

[h22lude]

I'll be brewing a pumpkin spice latte stout (I know, pumpkin beer, gross). Saw it on NB and thought it sounded good for a colder fall night. Plus my wife said she wanted to try it.

Anyway, I've been reading about water profiles for a sweet stout and it seems like a chloride to sulfate ratio of 2:1 or even 3:1 will give a nice creamy mouthfeel (which makes sense since that is what I use for my NEIPAs). It also seems like a higher sodium level is used to round out the beer.

Here is the recipe

5 lb 2-row
5 lb Maris Otter
8 oz Carafa II
8 oz Crystal 80
4 oz Black Patent
4 oz Chocolate Malt
1 lb lactose

I use RO water from my tap which is usually coming out around 4ppm on my TDS meter. I had a hard time trying to get the sodium around 100ppm. I had to use baking soda but that brought my mash pH way too high so I had to use a lot of lactic acid to bring it back down. I do full volume mash (no sparge). This batch will be 8.56 gallons for my mash and end up with 5.5 gallons in fermentor.

Right now I have

4.3g gypsum
8.6g CaCl
11.1g baking soda
6mL lactic acid

Ca 126
Na 94
SO4 74
Cl 169
Mash pH 5.59

Any recommendations?

 

[makisupapolice14]

I just did my first all grain sweet stout and used the following profile based on a good deal of research. The beer is tasting spectacular and after a night of drinking other world class
Beers the group I was with said it competes with anything on the table.

Ph 5.5

The resulting ion profile:


Ca 75


Mg 0


Na 45


Cl 107


Sulfate 37


Chloride/sulfate 3:1 (jives with first article, but cl/so4 values I have are lower than suggested)

 

[h22lude]

I just did my first all grain sweet stout and used the following profile based on a good deal of research. The beer is tasting spectacular and after a night of drinking other world class
Beers the group I was with said it competes with anything on the table.

Ph 5.5

The resulting ion profile:


Ca 75


Mg 0


Na 45


Cl 107


Sulfate 37


Chloride/sulfate 3:1 (jives with first article, but cl/so4 values I have are lower than suggested)

We were probably reading some of the same article (http://www.madalchemist.com/archives/mashing-the-perfect-sweet-stout/)

The problem I'm having is the high mash pH. If I bring down my Cl, my mash pH jumps and then I'll need to use more lactic acid.

Made a few changes...

2.6g gypsum
6.4g CaCl
9.4g baking soda
5.6mL lactic acid

Ca 90
Na 80
SO4 44
Cl 127
Mash pH 5.6

 

[Yooper]

You've got lactic acid to bring DOWN the pH and baking soda to bring UP the pH. That's crazy.

Get rid of both of those and see what your pH is and go from there.

A mash pH of 5.5 would be perfect.

Forget about chloride and sulfate ratios- a 2:1 ratio or whatever is meaningless. Think of it this way- if you have 4 ppm of sulfate and 8 ppm of chloride, your ratio is 2:1 but it is so low as to be 0. But if you have 200 ppm of sulfate and 400 ppm chloride, that's the same ratio, but it's so high in the amount as to be undrinkable. Forget you ever heard any ridiculous phrase as "chloride to sulfate ratio" or is it "sulfate to chloride ratio". Anyway, pretend there is NO such phrase.

Get rid of the gypsum, as you don't need any added gypsum in a stout. Shoot for a chloride of 50-100 ppm or so and keep the mash pH at 5.5. That will get you a great beer. You have too much sulfate in the beer, and too much chloride, and the calcium is too high. "Less is more" really applies here.

If you must increase the sodium you could use table salt. I wouldn't, but you could if you want.

 

[h22lude]

You've got lactic acid to bring DOWN the pH and baking soda to bring UP the pH. That's crazy.

Get rid of both of those and see what your pH is and go from there.

A mash pH of 5.5 would be perfect.

The only reason I have baking soda is to bring my sodium up. The article I linked stated 100ppm of sodium was recommend for this style. I could use canning salt but that would bring my chloride up so then I bring CaCl down but now calcium is too low. It was a never ending battle.

 

[Yooper]

The only reason I have baking soda is to bring my sodium up. The article I linked stated 100ppm of sodium was recommend for this style. I could use canning salt but that would bring my chloride up so then I bring CaCl down but now calcium is too low. It was a never ending battle.

Then lose the calcium chloride and the gypsum. You want to ditch the gypsum anyway, so you could use the calcium if you want but it's not necessary.

 

[Yooper]

The article is not a great one in some ways. First, it's quite dated so all of the current water knowledge has been made available to everyday brewers like us is ignored.

Some of the big miscues:

"The reason I want to keep the pH up in the 5.4-5.6 range is because I use diastatically weak base malts for sweet stouts (like Munich or Maris Otter), and it’s better for enzymatic activity in that range"

- both maris otter and munich malt can self convert. They aren't diastatically weak. But I think roasted malts TASTE better when mashed at a pH of 5.5 or so, less dry and astringent.

The higher the Chloride to Sulfate ratio, the more malty the final beer is going to be. You need about 100ppm of Chloride before it has significant impact, and the same generally goes for Sodium (which rounds out the beer at that level, and I find that desirable in a sweet stout). You also, of course, need at least 50ppm of Calcium. The problem with the Calcium is that it lowers pH, but you really don’t want too much Bicarbonate in beer (some people believe it creates undesirable flavors, even though a lot of it will precipitate out, so I err on the side of caution here).

- pretty much BS here. You don't need 100 ppm of chloride OR sodium, the chloride:sulfate stuff is nonsense, and you don't need 50 ppm of calcium. And the bicarbonate stuff is bunk too- so.................you can negate every single word.

Don’t mash your roasted-and-kilned grains (e.g. chocolate and black malts). Roasted grains will drive the pH down considerably, so it’s difficult to keep the pH high no matter what fancy solution you use during the mash. Roasted grains have the wonderful benefit of not needing to be mashed. So, the best solution, in my opinion, is to mash everything except for your roasted grains in your MLT, and steep your roasted grains in a separate vessel (below 170 F) simultaneously at around 2 quarts per pound. Then, combine the wort created by the roasted grains with the mashed wort in the brew kettle.

- you could do that. OR, you can mash it all together and deal with the pH. Either is valid but you don't want the "pH high" anyway- you're targeting 5.5 or so, and you can get that with the grainbill and your water without much trouble.

You could definitely follow the article, but you're asking about mash pH and additions and adding contrary ingredients (things to raise the pH and things to lower the pH) without a real reason here so I thought I'd point out a few of the fallacies in the linked article.

 

[55x11]

The only reason I have baking soda is to bring my sodium up. The article I linked stated 100ppm of sodium was recommend for this style. I could use canning salt but that would bring my chloride up so then I bring CaCl down but now calcium is too low. It was a never ending battle.

maybe I missed a memo, but the >100ppm Na sounds like way too high for me for this style. I have never seen such high values recommended (unless it's a Gose or something like that).

Sodium helps with the flavor, especially balancing/enhancing the sweetness in this style, but I would keep it at more reasonable 40-60 ppm which I think is plenty.

Malty styles like this one often calls for higher mash pH, around 5.5-5.6, which maybe why some people used baking soda to keep it from falling (depends on their water) and then decided that sodium is crucial. Or maybe it's just some city water profile.

I would argue that mash pH is your #1 priority.
Getting Calcium over 50, and getting your desired balance of Cl to S is the next two goals.
For the next set of goals, I would adopt "first, Do no HARM" approach. Minimalism may be helpful here, especially since Na only (slightly) affects the final product taste, not mash or fermentation.

If I am wrong, just add a few pinches of salt to your finished beer. Should keep increasing your Cl:S ratio anyways.

 

[h22lude]

Thanks for all the help. This is my first time really playing around with sodium. I just usually leave Mg and Na at 0 but wanted to try something new.

After reading both posts I changed a few things. Tried to keep my additions from contradicting each other.

Here is what I changed it to.

2.1g gypsum
3.9g CaCl
1.7g baking soda

Ca 58
Mg 0
Na 14
SO4 37
Cl 76

Mash pH 5.53

I was going to use salt to get a little sodium but I actually had to use baking soda to bring my mash pH up from 5.4 to 5.53. Now I don't need lactic acid.

Is this any better or am I still adding stuff that really isn't needed?

 

[mgr_stl]

Did you end up brewing this beer with the additions you mentioned in your last post? If so, how'd it turn out? I'll be brewing a sweet stout in a few days.