Ugh. Some how I managed to add 0.75 lbs acid malt, not 0.75 oz. What is this going to do to my milk stout

[Christoff]

I haven't used acid malt before and some how I managed to read 0.75 oz as 0.75 lbs. Needless to say, I messed up my milk stout. What is this going to do to my beer? It dropped my pH to 4.72 according to brewfather. I also put it in with the base malt for apx 55 min (but before steeping grains). I have read that it will provide a sour, slightly nutty flavour but I can't imagine that much sour is going to be very good. I made a 2.5 gal batch

5 lbs English Pale Ale
0.38 lbs Crystal 60
0.5 lbs Brown
0.135 Chocolate (i think its 350)
0.75 lbs acid malt (which puts it ~10.7% of bill)

4.2 oz powdered oat milk (I can't eat milk products)

US Golding 0.75 oz
S-04

This was intended to be a Peanut Butter Stout and I was planning on adding PB2 and real peanut butter ( in secondary as I want to compare to the beer without PB).

My pH is usually a little high even with my mineral additions (gypsum and calcium chloride). My chocolate porter, according to the calculator, was around 5.74.

Is this even going to be drinkable? I can't find a lot of information online. Should I add some DME when it cools down? It's currently in knock out with my oat milk powder. Thanks a lot

 

[dmtaylor]

Whew baby! It actually might resemble some of the stouts from 200 years ago which would have soured in barrels with age. Might turn out OK. Though I do have my doubts.

You could try to neutralize it somewhat using pickling lime, which is available in the canning section of any grocery store, and a little goes a long way, a teaspoon or two might be all you really need to take the edge off the acidity. I'm not saying you should necessarily try this, but you could if you're not willing to let it ride and taste it after it ferments.

Good luck to you.

 

[Christoff]

Ha. I chuckled out loud (and cried inside a little) at that thought!

I'm letting it ride at this point but am kind of thinking I may be able to reduce the tartness with a quick 1 gallon batch of dme and steeping some extra brown and chocolate malt to even it out a little, but no idea if that would actually work.

 

[dmtaylor]

Adding more wort at this point won't dilute the acid by very much, and might just be making a dumper more expensive. Or maybe not. Who knows. My 2 cents.

 

[Christoff]

that's good to know. I just gave it a taste and it's actually not bad. Who knows once it's carbonated but I am not as disappointed as I was when I realized my mistake.

 

[MaxStout]

It might give it that sour tang like Guinness.

 

[huckdavidson]

What does your water calculator say when you put .75 lbs vs. .75 oz?

Whether you taste the lactic in the final product depends on your taste threshold but in general 300 - 400 ppm is required to taste.

Before boiling, use the calculator to estimate how much baking soda or pickling lime is needed to bring it up to a minimum of 5.4 pH.

The final pH (after fermentation) of this style beer is in the 4.0 - 4.3 range.

 

[Dland]

I over did it with acid acid malt a few times when I first got acquainted to it. In two out of three batches where this happened, they improved from possible dumpers judged on early taste, to beers I quite appreciated, once given time to age, generally cold crashed for at least a month.

In the other case, where it was just too acerbic for me, I blended with some batches that were a bit too cloying for my taste, and enjoyed some great pints of beer.

 

[hottpeper13]

That's quite low! The ones I make that have a 5.0-5.2 pH just take longer to condition,8-12 months instead of 2-3. I think making a beer for blending is the way to go. Keg this one and picinic tap it at 2 month intervals. If it's improving let it ride. Make a blender if you think it will make it not drinkable ,but awesome,anything less it's a dumper.

 

[Christoff]

What does your water calculator say when you put .75 lbs vs. .75 oz?

Not a clue. I am using Brewfather and it's calculation was 4.72 but I actually don't know if that's mash pH or wort. And beyond that, no idea. I am still trying to figure out all the sciensy parts of water.

 

[Christoff]

I over did it with acid acid malt a few times when I first got acquainted to it. In two out of three batches where this happened, they improved from possible dumpers judged on early taste, to beers I quite appreciated, once given time to age, generally cold crashed for at least a month.

Given I am wanting to make this a peanut butter stout, should I let it sit in secondary for a few weeks before I add the PB? If I understand it correctly, the PB flavour will dissipate with time otherwise.

anything less it's a dumper.

That's where I am getting to at this point in my beer brewing. Life is too short to drink bad beer. I just don't have a lot of time to brew these days so it feels like a wasted day if I dump it. But like my other mediocre endeavours, they just sit in my closet for years taking up space otherwise. I have my beer geek breakfast stout still sitting in the Keg because I don't have the heart to dump it. It's actually good, but I hate how much roast character came out of the roasted barley. Serve's me right for following the recipe to a T.

 

[Dland]

Given I am wanting to make this a peanut butter stout, should I let it sit in secondary for a few weeks before I add the PB? If I understand it correctly, the PB flavour will dissipate with time otherwise.

I've never added peanut butter to my brew, but I would think that you might want to add it when you normally would, and give the acid time to react and neutralize with it.

 

[huckdavidson]

Not a clue. I am using Brewfather and it's calculation was 4.72 but I actually don't know if that's mash pH or wort. And beyond that, no idea. I am still trying to figure out all the sciensy parts of water.

Same difference for all intents and purposes.

If you've already pitched your yeast then it's too late, otherwise you could use a water calculator to determine how much baking soda or pickling lime is needed to bring the the pH back up to 5.4-5.5 pH and add that amount to correct the error.

 

[Christoff]

Same difference for all intents and purposes.

If you've already pitched your yeast then it's too late, otherwise you could use a water calculator to determine how much baking soda or pickling lime is needed to bring the the pH back up to 5.4-5.5 pH and add that amount to correct the error.

It's pitched. I tasted it and it didn't seem half bad at this point so figured what the heck.

 

[youngdh]

Are you hitting your target gravity numbers? It’ll be interesting to how the yeast performs. Read on as to why.

I accidentally over acidified my mash water with phos acid. I’d calculated my acid addition based on 10% acid but forgot a buddy from my brew club borrowed my 10% bottle and later refilled with 85% phos acid. Whoops. I hit my OG end of mash and end of boil. The much lower mash pH caused less fermentable sugars coming out of mash even though I hit the OG. My yeast started strong but ran out of fermentables very quickly and stopped fermentation after about 12 hours. This was to have been a 5% ABV beer. It ended up around 2%. I was planning to run with it as a new approach to low alcohol brewing however I forgot to pull my blow off tube out of my bucket of Star San when I cold crashed. Ended up sucking about a pint of Star San into my 2.5 gallon batch. At that point I had to dump it :-(.

 

[Clint Yeastwood]

New style. Own it.

 

[mud1070]

Have you sampled your beer and tested for the actual pH?
also, 5-Star makes a pH stabilizer, so you can hit those numbers. I haven't tried it, but seems like a good idea if you want to be certain.

 

[Clint Yeastwood]

 

[Brewdog80]

I'll bet it'll be fine. Btw I don't know who's flavoring you have, but I bought some last year and it was horrendous. I used half what was called for, and it was just gross. First batch I've dumped in years. And the rest of the extract was trashed also...

 

[Witherby]

This thread might be helpful.
Pinch of Baking Soda to reduce acid

 

[beren]

Yeah there are a lot of possible issues with super low mah/ferment ph.

 

[beersk]

Gotta be an update on this... I'm curious because it's probably pretty lactic-acid-sour.

 

[Yesfan]

New style. Own it.

He could call it a Greek Stout.

Works for yogurt.....

 

[VikeMan]

Have you sampled your beer and tested for the actual pH?
also, 5-Star makes a pH stabilizer, so you can hit those numbers. I haven't tried it, but seems like a good idea if you want to be certain.

Unfortunately, 5.2 pH Stabilizer doesn't work, i.e. it will not move most mashes to 5.2. No single buffer mix can. It would have to be magic. Five Star makes some great products, but this isn't one of them.

 

[beersk]

Unfortunately, 5.2 pH Stabilizer doesn't work, i.e. it will not move most mashes to 5.2. No single buffer mix can. It would have to be magic. Five Star makes some great products, but this isn't one of them.

And it'll make your beer taste weird and salty. I used it for a while back in 2010 and "ruined" a couple batches because of it.

 

[mud1070]

Unfortunately, 5.2 pH Stabilizer doesn't work, i.e. it will not move most mashes to 5.2. No single buffer mix can. It would have to be magic. Five Star makes some great products, but this isn't one of them.

And it'll make your beer taste weird and salty. I used it for a while back in 2010 and "ruined" a couple batches because of it.

I haven't tried the 5.2 stabilizer myself. Seems to good to be true. I have a half container from a used brew setup I bought years ago.

After a stuck mash in my brew session yesterday, I do wish I had some magic pH stabilizer... over roasted adjuncts sat for way too long and dropped my pH well below where I wanted.

 

[mac_1103]

Unfortunately, 5.2 pH Stabilizer doesn't work, i.e. it will not move most mashes to 5.2. No single buffer mix can. It would have to be magic. Five Star makes some great products, but this isn't one of them.

And it'll make your beer taste weird and salty. I used it for a while back in 2010 and "ruined" a couple batches because of it.

I haven't tried the 5.2 stabilizer myself. Seems to good to be true. I have a half container from a used brew setup I bought years ago.

Didn't Five Star develop the pH 5.2 stabilizer for a particular customer's specific situation? I've never understood why they would sell it to anyone else, but maybe I heard that wrong?

 

[Bassman2003]

It is amazing after all of the flak they have received it is still on the market...

 

[VikeMan]

Didn't Five Star develop the pH 5.2 stabilizer for a particular customer's specific situation? I've never understood why they would sell it to anyone else, but maybe I heard that wrong?

I've heard that too, but have seen no evidence of it. But I've personally seen that it doesn't work! (As if the chemical impossibility of it isn't enough.)

 

[mac_1103]

I'm not sure that I'd say it was chemically impossible. I bet that I could whip up a high molarity buffer solution that would maintain pH 5.2 even in the face of varying water chemistry and grain bills. I doubt that it would be anything you'd want to drink though.

 

[Bramling Cross]

It is amazing after all of the flak they have received it is still on the market...

Or that shops continue to stock it and willingly swindle new brewers.

Sorry, this product's existence has been pissing me off for decades. Everyone in a position of accountability knows that it's a scam, yet it still continues to be sold and we've certainly lost a few beginning AG brewers because of the lousy results it delivers.

 

[day_trippr]

To quote Martin 'Bru'n Water' Brungard: "Works great for brewers that don't check mash pH. Doesn't work at all for brewers that do check mash pH."

Cheers!

 

[An Ankoù]

I haven't used acid malt before and some how I managed to read 0.75 oz as 0.75 lbs. Needless to say, I messed up my milk stout. What is this going to do to my beer? It dropped my pH to 4.72 according to brewfather. I also put it in with the base malt for apx 55 min (but before steeping grains). I have read that it will provide a sour, slightly nutty flavour but I can't imagine that much sour is going to be very good. I made a 2.5 gal batch

5 lbs English Pale Ale
0.38 lbs Crystal 60
0.5 lbs Brown
0.135 Chocolate (i think its 350)
0.75 lbs acid malt (which puts it ~10.7% of bill)

4.2 oz powdered oat milk (I can't eat milk products)

US Golding 0.75 oz
S-04

This was intended to be a Peanut Butter Stout and I was planning on adding PB2 and real peanut butter ( in secondary as I want to compare to the beer without PB).

My pH is usually a little high even with my mineral additions (gypsum and calcium chloride). My chocolate porter, according to the calculator, was around 5.74.

Is this even going to be drinkable? I can't find a lot of information online. Should I add some DME when it cools down? It's currently in knock out with my oat milk powder. Thanks a lot

It's a bit late, but the maltsters say can use up to 10% in a mash to get a "sourish" beer. Think Guinness; they're said to add soured beer back to the wort and this contributes to it's unique flavour. Also, the sweetener (I don't know how sweet oat milk is) will help balance the sourness. (I guess you can't use lactose).
The trouble is that acidulated malt is sour because of lactic acid. I that going to be an issue for you? Must confess I know very little about milk product intolerance.

 

[VikeMan]

The trouble is that acidulated malt is sour because of lactic acid. I that going to be an issue for you? Must confess I know very little about milk product intolerance.

Lactose intolerance is a problem for some people. Milk protein allergy is a problem for others. But I've never heard of lactic acid being an issue for anyone, beyond not liking the taste at high enough concentrations.

 

[Christoff]

Are you hitting your target gravity numbers? It’ll be interesting to how the yeast performs. Read on as to why.

I accidentally over acidified my mash water with phos acid. I’d calculated my acid addition based on 10% acid but forgot a buddy from my brew club borrowed my 10% bottle and later refilled with 85% phos acid. Whoops. I hit my OG end of mash and end of boil. The much lower mash pH caused less fermentable sugars coming out of mash even though I hit the OG. My yeast started strong but ran out of fermentables very quickly and stopped fermentation after about 12 hours. This was to have been a 5% ABV beer. It ended up around 2%. I was planning to run with it as a new approach to low alcohol brewing however I forgot to pull my blow off tube out of my bucket of Star San when I cold crashed. Ended up sucking about a pint of Star San into my 2.5 gallon batch. At that point I had to dump it :-(.

I am close, just depends on the equipment I used. This one was a little low.

 

[Christoff]

Have you sampled your beer and tested for the actual pH?
also, 5-Star makes a pH stabilizer, so you can hit those numbers. I haven't tried it, but seems like a good idea if you want to be certain.

I have tested the pH before yeast, never after. I am kind of a lazy brewer in some ways.

 

[Christoff]

Gotta be an update on this... I'm curious because it's probably pretty lactic-acid-sour.

It was not great. Definitely a dumper but could have been worse. I am letting it age to see if it gets any better but I doubt it. You can definitely taste the sour aspect from the malt. I would not recommend it for a peanut butter stout. I am planning on having another go at it when the weather warms up a bit.

 

[Christoff]

For some reason I didn't get any notices there were responses on this thread. Thanks everyone who responded. The beer isn't the worst thing I have tasted but not worth drinking unfortunately. I wasted a lot of peanut butter on it. I am going to attempt it again next month and am wondering if I can use oats to mimic the creaminess and just scrap the oat milk powder. That stuff was half the problem. Or maybe even brew with soy milk and reduce water. Given I don't eat dairy not sure how to get the milk sweetness part of it without lactose. I was thinking of waiting for the yeast to do its thing and then add a liquid sugar. Thoughts? if the yeast is tired will it ferment out all the sugar?

 

[mac_1103]

Given I don't eat dairy not sure how to get the milk sweetness part of it without lactose.

Eleven non-fermentable sugars - ten of them aren't lactose.

 

[Christoff]

Eleven non-fermentable sugars - ten of them aren't lactose.

Thanks. Unfortunately, I am trying to avoid the artificial sweeteners. Monk fruit is the only one I haven't tried because I haven't been able to find it. I am a bit of a health nut so I try to stick to whole foods where I can. Beer is my one vice.