Mindsculptor - let me add my non-scientific 2-cents.
Most of us started on old advice, old books. Papazian didn't spent a great deal of time on the importance of water in homebrewing - and I think helped to propagate the myth of good drinking water making good beer. To be fair - Palmer spends more time on water, but in the bulk of content in How to Brew - until the Water book - his focus on the Residual Alkalinity nomograph was really the only innovation (now dated) in home brewing water treatments for many years (along with budget priced pH strips and meters, and home RO filters). Also - their goal was primarily to o increase awareness of homebrewing, so water was the afterthought. While I had a basic understanding of water, it took some brutally honest judging sheets - and good advice from a friendly professional brewer - for me to focus on my brewing water. So if the focus is to make homebrewing accessible and simple (which is a great goal!) - then perhaps better advice can be given than use your tap water because it tastes good. I think the Primer is that starting point, and an intro to brewing would be well served to make those recommendations and incorporate the exceptions into example recipes. The danger, again, is that some people prefer chlorides and sulftates low - while others high - it's extremely subjective and personal - and add confusion to the recipes. People seldom follow instructions anyway. Someone mentioned earlier that water adjustments aren't important as they aren't part of recipes. I wholeheartedly disagree, however, also understand that everyone's water profile is a moving target, as is their crush, their system, utilization, fermentation capability, etc. Of course, then, any recipe will provide different results brewed by different people on different systems in different environments.
Water is absolutely a key component, as someone said earlier; water, yeast, malt and hops. AJ and I may subjectively disagree on this point - but I have had success building my RO water up to match (decarbonated) local profiles in achieving something close to my memories and notes from sampling beers overseas (particularly UK, Belgium, France and Germany) and domestically. I still absolutely respect his input, but I like a bit of sulfate it turns out in my hoppy beers. I don't blindly accept that every beer needs 50 ppm Calcium and at least 300 ppm Sulfate. I do accept that my mash pH MUST be between 5.2 and 5.6 for optimal results, and tighter for specific styles, and that malt contributes acid into the mash that must balance with alkalinity in my brewing liquor. I do not blindly believe that beard is required to brew great beer, yet I have one. I do repeatedly brew my house APA recipe with differing target profiles to dial in the right flavors (Batch #7 is pretty close).
My personal brewing changed dramatically when I embraced that my water was a significant (but not the only) issue with my brewing. This is also directly related to the improved quality of my observations and notes, and expansion and education of my taste and smell senses. I had noticed early on that my tap water, in a partial mash, created a medicinal and astringent quality in beer, and that I couldn't expect to brew light colored beers reliably. Spring water had an advantage over my tap water. When I moved to All Grain and eventually to 10 gallon batches, buying spring water was inconvenient, and I simply filtered my tap water with active charcoal, and used Campden tablets. Immediately the astringency returned, as well as terrible efficiency. I focused heavily on brewing procedures and processes, and repeated brews with the same terrible results. So I poked more into water chemistry.
I have to admit I didn't brew using the KISS Primer recommendations. I dove in, as I am apt to overcomplicate things, and looked at multiple spreadsheets and discussed with many of the local breweries. I got my water tested (it is totally unsuited for drinking BTW) and I settled on Bru'n Water (after testing in the mash) to help make the appropriate adjustments and changes to my process (adding extra salts to sparge not boil), and brewed two identical APA batches with store bought RO water using different profile recommendations. The differences were dramatic in the kettles, and I was sold before I tasted the final products. Both were good - but as I got more comfortable adding minerals - my beers improved, as well as my confidence. In the end - I spent considerable money on a high flow rated RO system and haven't looked back. My competition scores and feedback from respected colleagues has gone up... I am now comfortable enough (and take good enough notes) to experiment with additions based on the grist and hops bill... and get some pretty good results.
Here's the rub. I would not EVER have started brewing if you told me I would need to buy or manage water. I would have believed it too complicated and difficult to achieve something as simple as beer. I am very budget-minded yet I decided to spend the money on a good brewing system, and then on temperature controlled fermentation, then kegs and a kegerator, and then on a consistent water system. Would I recommend people to home brew? Absolutely. Would I tell them they need to spend the money I spent to brew good beer? Absolutely not. However, I believe they need to consider their water source as a key constituent, and the Primer is the perfect starting point.
This really sums things up. This board (and AJ, Martin, Yooper, TH, Kaiser and many others) have made something as seemingly arcane as mash chemistry approachable and simple. While Palmer's Water book is fairly technical, it is still accessible and approachable by most of us. We can either use the knowledge or ignore it.
Most of us started on old advice, old books. Papazian didn't spent a great deal of time on the importance of water in homebrewing - and I think helped to propagate the myth of good drinking water making good beer. To be fair - Palmer spends more time on water, but in the bulk of content in How to Brew - until the Water book - his focus on the Residual Alkalinity nomograph was really the only innovation (now dated) in home brewing water treatments for many years (along with budget priced pH strips and meters, and home RO filters). Also - their goal was primarily to o increase awareness of homebrewing, so water was the afterthought. While I had a basic understanding of water, it took some brutally honest judging sheets - and good advice from a friendly professional brewer - for me to focus on my brewing water. So if the focus is to make homebrewing accessible and simple (which is a great goal!) - then perhaps better advice can be given than use your tap water because it tastes good. I think the Primer is that starting point, and an intro to brewing would be well served to make those recommendations and incorporate the exceptions into example recipes. The danger, again, is that some people prefer chlorides and sulftates low - while others high - it's extremely subjective and personal - and add confusion to the recipes. People seldom follow instructions anyway. Someone mentioned earlier that water adjustments aren't important as they aren't part of recipes. I wholeheartedly disagree, however, also understand that everyone's water profile is a moving target, as is their crush, their system, utilization, fermentation capability, etc. Of course, then, any recipe will provide different results brewed by different people on different systems in different environments.
Water is absolutely a key component, as someone said earlier; water, yeast, malt and hops. AJ and I may subjectively disagree on this point - but I have had success building my RO water up to match (decarbonated) local profiles in achieving something close to my memories and notes from sampling beers overseas (particularly UK, Belgium, France and Germany) and domestically. I still absolutely respect his input, but I like a bit of sulfate it turns out in my hoppy beers. I don't blindly accept that every beer needs 50 ppm Calcium and at least 300 ppm Sulfate. I do accept that my mash pH MUST be between 5.2 and 5.6 for optimal results, and tighter for specific styles, and that malt contributes acid into the mash that must balance with alkalinity in my brewing liquor. I do not blindly believe that beard is required to brew great beer, yet I have one. I do repeatedly brew my house APA recipe with differing target profiles to dial in the right flavors (Batch #7 is pretty close).
My personal brewing changed dramatically when I embraced that my water was a significant (but not the only) issue with my brewing. This is also directly related to the improved quality of my observations and notes, and expansion and education of my taste and smell senses. I had noticed early on that my tap water, in a partial mash, created a medicinal and astringent quality in beer, and that I couldn't expect to brew light colored beers reliably. Spring water had an advantage over my tap water. When I moved to All Grain and eventually to 10 gallon batches, buying spring water was inconvenient, and I simply filtered my tap water with active charcoal, and used Campden tablets. Immediately the astringency returned, as well as terrible efficiency. I focused heavily on brewing procedures and processes, and repeated brews with the same terrible results. So I poked more into water chemistry.
I have to admit I didn't brew using the KISS Primer recommendations. I dove in, as I am apt to overcomplicate things, and looked at multiple spreadsheets and discussed with many of the local breweries. I got my water tested (it is totally unsuited for drinking BTW) and I settled on Bru'n Water (after testing in the mash) to help make the appropriate adjustments and changes to my process (adding extra salts to sparge not boil), and brewed two identical APA batches with store bought RO water using different profile recommendations. The differences were dramatic in the kettles, and I was sold before I tasted the final products. Both were good - but as I got more comfortable adding minerals - my beers improved, as well as my confidence. In the end - I spent considerable money on a high flow rated RO system and haven't looked back. My competition scores and feedback from respected colleagues has gone up... I am now comfortable enough (and take good enough notes) to experiment with additions based on the grist and hops bill... and get some pretty good results.
Here's the rub. I would not EVER have started brewing if you told me I would need to buy or manage water. I would have believed it too complicated and difficult to achieve something as simple as beer. I am very budget-minded yet I decided to spend the money on a good brewing system, and then on temperature controlled fermentation, then kegs and a kegerator, and then on a consistent water system. Would I recommend people to home brew? Absolutely. Would I tell them they need to spend the money I spent to brew good beer? Absolutely not. However, I believe they need to consider their water source as a key constituent, and the Primer is the perfect starting point.
This really sums things up. This board (and AJ, Martin, Yooper, TH, Kaiser and many others) have made something as seemingly arcane as mash chemistry approachable and simple. While Palmer's Water book is fairly technical, it is still accessible and approachable by most of us. We can either use the knowledge or ignore it.
