My first brew with brand new equipment.

[HebridesRob]

I would change your hopping. 45g bittering hops and 5g aroma hops. I'm guessing high IBUs and very little hop flavour or aroma. For easy drinking ain for 25-35 IBUs. You definitely want more aroma hops. US05 yeast always serves me well.

Thanks. Pretty much bang on what I was thinking with regard to hops. I hadn't got as far as thinking about IBUs but 25-35 sounds pretty convincing to me. Aroma is definitely absent. In fairness to myself here, I just wanted to get something made and I wanted to keep it simple. I sort of knew the aroma would be deficient but I'm a little surprised at how bitter it turned out. It isn't hugely bitter, just more than I expected.


Thanks for the yeast suggestion, think I have some but will get some if I don't.

 

[Twostage]

I'm definitely right. It isn't about how acidic the water is, it's to do with how salts in the water buffer or complement the compounds in the mash.
https://byo.com/hops/item/1493-the-power-of-ph
"...dark malts are naturally acidic and will lower the mash pH. Even crystal malts will have some acidic effects, and the simplest solution to poor brewing water is to use a proportion of dark malts. Many great brewing centers of the world, particularly London, Dublin, and Munich, have water low in calcium and high in carbonates. The alkalinity of the water makes brewing pale ales or lagers difficult without acidification of the mash. But because they traditionally brew darker beers, such as porters, the acidity of the malt is able to overcome the buffering of the carbonate water."

By the way, Rodabod is right. High carbonates = hard water = dark beer. It actually says that in your quote. To pick out a few words 'dark malts', 'dublin', 'high in carbonates', 'brew darker beer'.

A summary of the quote is you need the darker (hence acidic) malts to lower the pH of hard water into the right range for mashing. The water in Pilsen is soft (no need to lower the pH, no dark malt) so they brew pilsner, the water in Dublin is hard so they brew Guinness.

Must admit that paragraph is confusing :shock:

 

[HebridesRob]

Most of it, do you have the rest ? for the full profile you need calcium, magnesium, sodium, chloride, sulphate, bicarbonate and ph.

(or did I miss the rest ?)

Thanks for the yeast suggestion by the way. I'll give that one a try, sounds the ticket for something I'm planning.

The water I have is mains water but it's collected a fairly short distance from where I live. It's rain run-off from peat moorland, it flows over Lewisian Gneiss rocks. I just treat it as though there's none of the above and put just about everything in. I just aim for the minimum ppm for the style on the assumption I won't go far wrong.

 

[Twostage]

Thanks for the yeast suggestion by the way. I'll give that one a try, sounds the ticket for something I'm planning.

The water I have is mains water but it's collected a fairly short distance from where I live. It's rain run-off from peat moorland, it flows over Lewisian Gneiss rocks. I just treat it as though there's none of the above and put just about everything in. I just aim for the minimum ppm for the style on the assumption I won't go far wrong.

Reasonable assumption, the calcium and magnesium levels are quite low. Gypsum and Epsom salts are both sulphates which should emphasise the hop character but then you also add table salt which could be balancing it back to malty. Flying a bit blind without knowing the actual chloride but you could try missing the salt out and seeing if the next one is more hoppy.

 

[HebridesRob]

Reasonable assumption, the calcium and magnesium levels are quite low. Gypsum and Epsom salts are both sulphates which should emphasise the hop character but then you also add table salt which could be balancing it back to malty. Flying a bit blind without knowing the actual chloride but you could try missing the salt out and seeing if the next one is more hoppy.

I wanted to increase the sodium content and it was the only way I could do it.

 

[Twostage]

I wanted to increase the sodium content and it was the only way I could do it.

Next cupboard along from the salt in your kitchen - baking soda - sodium bicarbonate

 

[MyQul]

With regard to it you brew being overly bitter, what attenuation did you get? You've mentioned it was quite high, which I think, is normal for WH yeast. I got 82% for my ordinary bitter I used WH in.

So that being said the high attenuation will strip out a lot of the residual sugars which would normally balance out the bittering from the hops.

 

[HebridesRob]

With regard to it you brew being overly bitter, what attenuation did you get? You've mentioned it was quite high, which I think, is normal for WH yeast. I got 82% for my ordinary bitter I used WH in.

So that being said the high attenuation will strip out a lot of the residual sugars which would normally balance out the bittering from the hops.

I think this is partially what happened. I also thing there's too many IBUs for the drink I was trying to make.

It isn't too bitter for the style, by the way, just not as easily drinkable as I'd have liked. Still quite a reasonable beer.

Edit: didn't answer the question, 80%.

 

[HebridesRob]

Next cupboard along from the salt in your kitchen - baking soda - sodium bicarbonate

Then I'd have increased the amount of carbonate and would have had to go around increasing all the other salts to compensate for the alkalinity.

I made stout last week, I put a little bicarb in that. More soluble than chalk, which I also used a little of.

 

[Twostage]

Then I'd have increased the amount of carbonate and would have had to go around increasing all the other salts to compensate for the alkalinity.

I made stout last week, I put a little bicarb in that. More soluble than chalk, which I also used a little of.

Yep, it's like plate spinning.

I use the spreadsheet from howtobrew and it's .1 g of this, .2g of that, oops too high etc. etc.