Split batch for water additions?

[sloescher]

I'm just now starting to very slightly understand how to determine what to add/dilute my water with. I'm still very new to this, but I was wondering if there was a way that I could split a batch and test the additions that I'm calculating vs. no additions, etc.

Do they make the most difference during the mash/sparge, or can I add them later? If it's remotely possible, I'd like to have the same mash/sparge/boil for the batch, and only have water addition changes to note the difference.

Is this even possible?

Thanks for your help.

 

[ajdelange]

Yes, absolutely. The trick is to obtain ceteris paribus i.e. to have the only differences between the two batches be the water they were made with. Obviously, you have to brew 2 beers and you have to do them either in series or in parallel. I can't think of any way to do them in parallel in my brewery so have done them serially.

I did exactly what you propose for a couple of water classes I gave from which I learned that you can make a better Burton ale without gypsum than you can with. Not more authentic mind you but more drinkable. The QA guy from the local regional (sounds like a contradiction in terms - it was a regional brewery that was close by) did a batch w/o 'terra alba'.