Mr. Strong's advice, avoiding dark grains in mash.

[p_p]

I understand that Mr. Strong recommends adding caramel and roasted grains after mashing in order to improve the quality of the flavors obtained from these grains.

So let's say you are making a recipe that takes base and crystal malt and your water is such that, after dough-in using all the grains, the pH is bang on 5.4.

Now, if you follow Mr. Strong's advice using the same grain bill and water as above, you'd be mixing only your base malt with water. You would still want your pH at 5.4, so you would add a bit of acid. The color malts would be added after taking your first running.

So, looking at those two methods, unless you take in consideration the amount of acid the dark grains contribute towards your sparge water and therefore back-down your sparge water acidification, Mr. Strong's method will yield a more acidic beer ... Is that right? What are your thoughts and experience?

 

[orangehero]

If I remember correctly in his book Brewing Better Beer he only mentioned using this technique on darkly roasted malts to reduce "harshness". I don't remember any more specific details but certainly the results are debatable and personally I just do the whole grain bill at once.

If using this technique, I would use less acid in the sparge as the dark roasted malt will contribute acidity. Certainly the wort will be more acidic, but it doesn't necessarily follow that the beer will be more acidic. Besides optimizing enzyme activity and preventing tannin extraction, a lower pH in the boil contributes to better hop utilization and break formation. In the fermenter the yeast actually do a good job of regulating pH and small variations in the wort acidity will probably not significantly affect the final beer pH.

In general you are correct that the beer will be more acidic if you use more acid to decrease the pre-dark malt pale wort pH.

 

[p_p]

Thanks for your reply orangehero

I am very new to brewing and still trying to settle on what my process should be.

I am particularly interested in this method because by reducing the variety of grains in the mash I can probably dial in and be consistent predicting mash pH in a shorter space of time. For example if my base is UK Golden Promise from the same maltster for all my UK PAs & IPAs and my water is consistent or I measure it's hardness and alkalinity prior brewing, it will take me a couple of beers to get quite good at setting my mash pH where I want it (I don't plan to adjust on the fly, it is too stressful).

I know I am over thinking this, but I can't brew very often so all I can do for beer when I am not brewing is drink it, reading or thinking about it :]

Now, you mentioned that the yeast will regulate the pH. Would you elaborate a bit more on this, please?
I read the experiment published in the water book where they compare beers with, no additions, salt additions and sparge water acidification and if I recall correctly, yes, the beer pH was pretty much the same for all of them.

Based on that, should I not shy away when acidifying my sparge water even if I plan to dump some caramel and roast malts on it? After all, a lower wort pH helps clarity and hot break formation .. I don't really care if hops utilization diminishes, I will just put more hops.

 

[mabrungard]

That advice can get you into trouble quickly. It's all dependent upon your water quality and most specifically, its alkalinity. You can read more about when and when not to avoid dark grains in the mash by reading the article: Reserving your Roast on Bru'n Water's Facebook page.

 

[p_p]

mabrungard thanks for pointing me to the article.

I understand that the key point is knowing your water and also being aware of the flavour implications of using this method.

On the sparge water acidification page, Bru'n Water calculates how many mEq are required to move the water to end-point pH.
It then calculates the volume of acid required to supply that much acidity, based on your acid of choice.

On the mash pH page, it calculates the amount of mEq contributed by the different malts.

I am going to acidify my sparge water to ~5.5 anyway so I may as well do it using the acid supplied by the roast added to the tun after first run off, in addition to other acids if required.
This should be ok provided the acid given by the reserved grains is not above what I need to reach end-point pH of ~5.5. Hence the advice that reserving grains may not be a good idea if brewing with low alkalinity water in the first place.

Now, what can you tell me about the yeast ability to regulate pH? Have not read the yeast book yet! :]]
The Bru'n Water article advices to exercise care and avoid going below 5.3 - 5.6 kettle pH, depending on style.
So, does the yeast regulates pH or not?? (reading the "post your pH", I guess it is not a simple straight answer!!)

I take notes of the mash, pre-fermentation and post-fermentation pH... Perhaps I should also start measuring pre-boil?

Thanks again.
I am just trying to learn, often the answers experienced guys give to these kind of hypothesis are very enlightening.

 

[philosofool]

It sounds like you're worrying too much. Perfect beer is really hard, good beer isn't. The difference is not usually something that can be taught, but has to be learned from experience (guided with understanding, which can be taught, to know what to change when it's not perfect.)

Figure out your water profile and treat it for the beer you are brewing: this advice applies to all sorts of beers. I've brewed a lot of good dark beers and I really think that tinkering (along with some understanding of water to guide that tinkering) is the way to go. Because of the many variables in water, it's hard to use other people's experiences as a guide--they probably don't brew with the water that you do. You can try Gordon's advice, and if you do, well, that's just another thing you have to tinker around.

 

[UberHasselhoff]

Hello P_P. I can only speak to my experience here using hard water.

I follow Strong's methodology regularly and have good results. Any steeping grains I add to the last 15 minutes of the mash. I know Strong isn't a huge fan of brewing water spreadsheets, but I use the EZ Water Calculator and it's worked. In terms of mash pH, I think at your stage I wouldn't go too far down the rabbit hole. There's a lot of variables there and it seems like you have a good enough understanding of the processes to give it a shot.

My recommendation is that you brew a batch and keep those test strips (or meter if you have the means) handy. Be a stickler with your notes and go from there on the next batch.

 

[Gerry_P]

I only have 13 a.g. batches under my belt, so I'm not the foremost authority on this by any means. Having said that, I don't bother adding the darker malts at vorlauf as Strong always does, mainly because none of my beers have been harsh from failing to do so (as far as I can taste anyway). He always uses reverse osmosis water, so idk if that has anything to do with his method. I just read that r.o. water has a pH between 5 and 6, so maybe someone who knows more about chemistry can tell us if that makes a difference. My gut feeling (for what it's worth) is that if your water pH and mash temperatures are good, and you don't go overboard with your roasted grains, you probably won't get astringent flavors.
I would (and did) start mashing as simply as possible, which would be to add all the grains in the mash at once, and go to Plan B if a problem arises. There are many variables to consider and it can get overwhelming if you try to fix every problem before you even know if they're a problem...if that makes sense.
Yeast lowers the wort pH during fermentation, so I would imagine that wouldn't make a difference as long as your pH has been in the ballpark prior to the boil. It also drops during the boil, I believe.
You're definitely going to want to know the mineral content of your water, which you can get by sending a sample to Ward Labs, checking your water company's website, or asking someone at your local homebrew shop. I use a water calculator (Brewer's Friend) and have found it to be invaluable. Bru'n water is supposed to be very good too, but I don't have any experience with it. Brewer's Friend has a list of user submitted water records, so you can see if your area's water is listed and use that as a starting point. Here's the link:
http://www.brewersfriend.com/homebrew/water-profiles/

 

[snow16]

There are many variables to consider and it can get overwhelming if you try to fix every problem before you even know if there's a problem...if that makes sense.

+1 on this.

You've definitely done your reading, and that's wonderful. You don't have a lot of time to brew and want to make the very most of brew days - and that's completely understandable. But I would suggest trying a handful of different approaches, taking solid notes each time, and taking it from there. Tweak things as they need tweaking.

Troubleshooting for the infinite number of potential problems that could arise during a beer's lifespan will only drive you insane.

(FWIW, I always mash my dark/crystal malts for the entire mash and have never had a problem with astringency/harsh flavors)

 

[p_p]

Thank you all for your advice.

 

[deepbluegroove]

I use Bru N' Water. If you have a PH meter or strips you can measure your tap water. Pick a brew water profile in Bru N' Water and then it will tell you what your mash PH is. If you are like me and have a tap water ph of about 9; then depending on the grains the PH will need to be adjusted. This is also very helpful in determining the salts/minerals to add to the water. This is the biggest improvement in my beer so far.

When I brew a saison or something with little crystal malt I have to add acidulated malt to bring the PH down; from about 6 without the acidulated malt to 5.3. It's 1% of the total grain bill to bring it down .1 ph. Last time I put in 1/2 pound of the acidulated malt. No lactic acid. I have heard from lhbs employees they have some issues with lactic...

Anyhow when I make a pale ale; I usually put a pound of crystal malt or victory malt to bring the ph down as part of the recipe. This gets my water to perfect 5.4.

However I can imagine if I do a dark beer I imagine with all the crystal and dark malts my ph would be too low. That I can either add minerals to raise the ph; or as I am seeing in the recommendation in this thread and others; that I can put the dark malts in the last 15 of the mash?? Or is this to reduce the astringency and tannins from the dark grains?

More on treating water.
https://www.morebeer.com/articles/treating_homebrew_water

 

[Vandulus]

I just read this the other night and what I got out of it was:
Dark grains (100+ Lovibond) can leech tannins if left to sit too long in the mash potentially giving the beer a harsh or astringent taste. Plus caramel malts and darker don't have much, if any, enzymes to break down the starches due to the malting process so using them at mash time doesn't buy you anything sugar wise.

 

[Jhenjum]

This advice is assuming you are using his approach of 100% RO water for both mash and sparge. If you are only mashing base malt then the acidification is easy and he adds minerals based on style to the kettle.

I understand that Mr. Strong recommends adding caramel and roasted grains after mashing in order to improve the quality of the flavors obtained from these grains.

So let's say you are making a recipe that takes base and crystal malt and your water is such that, after dough-in using all the grains, the pH is bang on 5.4.

Now, if you follow Mr. Strong's advice using the same grain bill and water as above, you'd be mixing only your base malt with water. You would still want your pH at 5.4, so you would add a bit of acid. The color malts would be added after taking your first running.

So, looking at those two methods, unless you take in consideration the amount of acid the dark grains contribute towards your sparge water and therefore back-down your sparge water acidification, Mr. Strong's method will yield a more acidic beer ... Is that right? What are your thoughts and experience?