This month, the Troubleshooter takes on a wide range of issues from ingredients and equipment considerations to style requirements and brewing techniques.

WATER CONDITIONING FOR PILSENERS

In a recent "Ask the Troubleshooter" column (2), you responded, "It is perfectly possible to brew Pilseners with the infusion method, but you must have a calcium content of 50-100 ppm combined with very low total alkalinity (<75 ppm)." Let me further add excerpts from a recent City of Chicago water analysis: alkalinity total calcium carbonate 103 mg/L; pH 8.29; chloride 12.2 mg/L; sulfate 18.8 mg/L; hardness (calcium carbonate) 140 mg/L; calcium 34.8 mg/L; sodium 6.8 mg/L; magnesium 10.8 mg/L.

First, I'm a bit thrown by the fact that both alkalinity and hardness are measured in terms of calcium carbonate mg/L. How can I have both 140 and 103 mg/L of calcium carbonate? Second, if hardness is "total dissolved solids" (which I've heard from various sources), why am I adding calcium in this recipe if "soft water is a must"? What I sort out from all this is that I'm in pretty good shape if I get my calcium over 50 ppm (using gypsum) and total alkalinity below 75. Is this correct? How do I soften my water and get the total alkalinity below 75 ppm? Finally, if I break all the water rules concerning softness/calcium, what is the effect on this recipe as to taste and so forth?

DM: Hardness is not the same as total dissolved solids. Properly speaking, hardness is the content of calcium and magnesium ions in your water. When they measure the hardness of water, however, many labs lump all the hardness together to give a single figure, "hardness as calcium carbonate." This does not mean that all the hardness is in fact due to calcium carbonate, or even to calcium in any form, but it does mean that the sum total of all the hardness in your water has the same chemical effect as the stated quantity of calcium carbonate (140 mg/L or ppm). Similarly, the total alkalinity figure does not mean that all the alkalinity in your water is in the form of calcium carbonate - only that the alkalinity is equivalent to the stated concentration of calcium carbonate (103 mg/L or ppm). These water analysis figures are an excellent example of how scientists deliberately present their findings in such a way as to cause maximum confusion for the rest of us.

Now, let's talk about brewing Pilsener. Pilsen water is very soft, and many brewing experts believe that it is important to duplicate Pilsen water as closely as possible to approach the flavor of that beer. It is even more important, however, to get the mash pH right, and the only way to do that, with an infusion mash, is to get the calcium content of the mash water up to 50-100 ppm and the alkalinity down to no more than 75 ppm.

The best way to accomplish these things with your water supply would be first to add a teaspoon of calcium chloride to 5 gal of well-aerated tap water, then boil the water for 1/2 h. Cover and let it cool overnight. Decant it to leave the precipitated chalk (calcium carbonate) behind. This water should be excellent for making a Pilsener mash. For the sparge water, adjust the pH to 5.7 with phosphoric acid. Use a meter or good test strips for your measurements.

As for the effect on flavor, I believe that the softness of chloride is more appropriate to a Czech-style Pilsener than the dry edge imparted by sulfate, hence my recommendation of calcium chloride rather than gypsum. The mineral content of your water is not really that high; however, you may have to shoot for a bitterness level lower than Pilsner Urquell (43 IBUs) to get a smooth finish.

LAGER AND ALE MALTS

DM: I assume by lager and ale grain you mean lager and ale malt; that is, the types of pale malt used as the base ingredient for most beers. The answer, in the case of American microbrewed ales and lagers, is that there is no difference. The vast majority of American microbreweries use domestic two-row brewer's malt for their ales and for any lagers they might make.

In Great Britain, the situation is different. Malts destined for pale ale are dried at a higher temperature and come out of the kiln somewhat darker than lager malts. This difference in kilning imparts a fuller flavor to the British ales and contributes color. American ale breweries attempt to compensate by using larger quantities of dark specialty malts, but the result is not quite the same.

It is often said that lager malts are less modified than British ale malts. These days most pale lager malts are described as well-modified, and the fact that they can be used successfully in a single-infusion mash supports the description. Nonetheless, a simple chewing test will show you that many British ale malts are still more modified than current domestic or imported lager malts.

Besides color, another difference caused by the higher kilning of British ale malt is the destruction of dimethyl sulfide (DMS) precursors. One of the differences between British amber ales and their American counterparts is the lack of sulfury DMS character in the British beer. Beers made from British ale malts generally have much lower levels of DMS, which can best be described as having a "creamed corn" aroma. If you want a full picture of the chemistry of DMS, George Fix has an excellent discussion on pages 142-147 of Principles of Brewing Science (3).

Another important difference is the enzyme content of the malts. British barley varieties tend to have lower enzyme potential than American malting varieties, and the higher kilning temperatures used for British ale malt make it worse. Nonetheless, as long as your mash pH and temperature are correct, British ale malt will give complete starch conversion in an all-malt mash. High quantities of adjuncts may cause trouble.

My advice about interchangeability is to use British ale malt (and British hops and British ale yeasts) if you are trying to make an authentic British ale style. For American, German, or even Belgian ales, domestic two-row brewer's malt will give good results. For a perfectionist, imported pale malt (sometimes labeled Pilsener malt) may be worth the extra cost when making continental-style beers.

EXTRACTION EFFICIENCY

DM: I assume you are making 5-gal batches so that your volume of wort at the end of the boil is about 5.25-5.5 gal. That being the case, I would expect at least 1.044 original gravity from this recipe. The number one cause of low extracts is sparging too fast. The sparge (rinsing the grain bed with hot water), not including recirculation and runoff, should take 45 min at least. (For more information about sparging, see Jim Busch's "Stepping Up" column on page 22 of this issue.)

Other things to look at include the crush of the malt (make sure that a large proportion of the malt grains have not been left intact) and the pH, temperature, and duration of the mash. Be sure you are measuring mash pH and temperature accurately and that the duration is at least 1 hour in the starch conversion range (149-158 °F). I have never used the EasyMasher, but from the drawing in the ads I can't see why it should give a lower extract than a false bottom or a manifold.

CHALLENGING LAUTERING SITUATION

When it comes to lautering, however, they seem less than perfect. If a standard, flat false bottom is fitted in the kettle where the curved edge of the bottom meets the straight side, it would take about 10 gal of water to underlet the mash because about one-fourth to one-third of the kettle's total volume is contained in the dome. I assume that a mash/lauter tun that contained that much liquid under the false bottom would have the same enzymatic problems as a very thin mash.

A circular or spiral copper manifold would solve that problem, but presents its own problems - stirring the mash might ruin the manifold because a round container doesn't have corners to secure it, and the kettle's dome shape suggests the possibility of inefficient, uneven sparges. Would the dome shape cause part of the mash to become oversparged and part undersparged, or would the wort flow evenly through the mash? I have been told that wort runs quicker down the side of the lauter tun than through the mash. Would this problem be heightened because my tun is one continuous side that terminates at a 2-in. hole?

One more question: Where can I find a small, sanitary, food-grade pump? Can a regular high-temperature pump do the job, or does it have to be stainless steel?

DM: I agree, the space created by the curvature of the bottom is too big to allow you to use a flat false bottom. You probably would not have trouble with conversion - at least not with American pale malt - but your sparging would be limited. I'm inclined to think a coiled piece of copper tube in the bottom would work. I've seen a number of these tuns where the manifold or coil simply sat there, held in place only by gravity. Most lauter tuns built this way, however, have a flat bottom, so the only way to find out for sure is to try it and see. If it doesn't work, you could probably salvage the coil for use in another vessel.

Pumps are one of the biggest problems for advanced home brewers. There's not a whole lot out there that matches up very well with your requirements. Stainless steel is certainly the ideal material for a sanitary pump body, but it is expensive. W.W. Grainger offers a few pumps that might work. Specifically, they have some plastic-bodied, magnetic-drive centrifugal pumps that are rated to 200 °F and a pH range of 3.0-11.0. They might be OK for most uses in a home brewery. One model - catalog no. 2P039 - has an open motor and costs $125. The other model - catalog no. 2P040 - is the same but has a totally enclosed fan-cooled motor, which is a much better idea for wet areas but the price goes up to $176. Ouch. Maybe some of the gadget people out there have some lower cost alternatives.

BREWING AUTHENTIC BELGIAN ALES

DM: I don't have the addresses of any Trappist monasteries - sorry.

Regarding materials, it is true that the closer you can come to the original, the better. It is my impression, however - based on considerable tasting of these beers - that the most important ingredient by far is the yeast. Fermentation characteristics dominate all of the big Belgian ales I have sampled. I believe that yeast is the key to the true flavor you are looking for.

I strongly recommend Martin Lodahl's article on abbey beers in BrewingTechniques (4), if you haven't read it. He discusses candy sugar at some length but does not directly address the question of where to find a dark Belgian candy sugar or a reasonable substitute. He does state that white sugar is a reasonable substitute for the lighter colored candy sugars used in the pale-colored Belgian ales. Fools rush in where angels fear to tread, so I'll go out on a limb and say that when I home brewed amber to brown Belgian styles I just used dark brown sugar. Seemed to give a good flavor. I also request that Belgian ale devotees please suggest any alternatives that they have found superior to brown sugar for the darker types of Belgian ale. How about it, folks?

I am puzzled by your comment that you age your own hops. In lambic brewing, hops are aged for several years to get rid of their bitterness. But for the strong ales discussed here, hops are used for bitterness and flavor, so fresh, well-kept hops are required.

RECIPE SCALE-UP

Also, what books would you arm yourself with if you were me? The references I currently use are Jean de Clerck's A Textbook of Brewing (5) and books from the Institute for Brewing Studies (IBS).

DM: You are right, recipes don't scale up well. This is especially true with regard to hops. Generally, you get more hop utilization from a big kettle, but many variables are involved, and utilization is hard to predict.

For your late and finish hops, an awful lot depends on how long you whirlpool after throwing in the hops. I assume you will be using pelletized hops exclusively - most micros do because they are much easier to remove after the boil. If you have been using whole hops in your home brewing, you should switch to pellets to get some idea how they behave physically. I can't tell you what you will get with your system, but at the 15-bbl brewery I worked with in St. Louis I got about 33% utilization from hops that were added 45 min before the end of the boil. Hops added at the beginning of whirlpool (1/2 h before starting knock out) yielded about 18% utilization.

Your numbers for water use seem low - your grain-to-water ratio will produce a very stiff mash. You will find it much easier to stir an 8-bbl mash if you use more water. I suggest measuring the foundation water needed for your mash/lauter tun (for more information about foundation water, see Jim Busch's "Stepping Up" column on page 22 of this issue). For a trial brew, use 1 bbl (31 gal) of water for every 100 lb of grist, plus the foundation water. This assumes, of course, that you will be using a conventional mash/lauter tun and doing single-infusion mashes. That being the case, you should expect to get ~30 points specific gravity/lb/gal for an average recipe (original gravity = 1.048, 20% specialty malts).

Efficiency is reduced for higher gravity worts - assuming you continue sparging until you have collected the desired final quantity of wort. If you cut off sparging at a fixed point, such as a runoff gravity of 1.012, you may get lower extract from your low- and normal-gravity beers as well.

Total water usage - mash plus sparge - is usually about 1.4 times greater than the volume of wort collected in the kettle (not the volume after the boil). In addition to this water, I always cool my 15-bbl batches by spraying 200-300 gal cold water on the mash and letting it drain before shoveling the spent grains out of the kettle. This practice may be considered a waste of water, but it makes handling the spent grain safer and more pleasant and will help the grain keep better if it cannot be disposed of immediately.

The really tricky part of scaling up recipes is not calculating water-to-grain ratios, though, it's trying to predict color and flavor contributions from your specialty malts. All I can say about this is "Be prepared for surprises." Depending on the malts, the mash system, and the equipment you have been working with, you may find that you have to make some major adjustments to your proportions to replicate the color and flavor of your home-brewed batches. Some people have been able to scale up pretty easily, but others have not.

By way of example, I use about 13% British crystal malt in my American Red ale recipe. This is a fairly dark caramel malt, rated at about 55-65 °L. The beer is definitely on the light side of the spectrum for the style. When I was home brewing, I never would have used anywhere near that proportion of crystal malt, even in much darker amber ales, yet that is what it takes with my current system.

Regarding books, you have got the best already with de Clerck. I don't know which IBS books you have; their North American Brewers Resource Directory (6) is good but does not talk about the brewing process. I suggest George Fix's Principles of Brewing Science (3) and the beer styles series books for the styles you are interested in. I don't know of a good, practical, basic guide aimed specifically at microbrewers. You can gather a lot of information from back issues of The New Brewer, conference transcripts, and of course BrewingTechniques. Advanced home brewing books can also be helpful, but I assume you have gone through those already.

REFERENCES

(2) Dave Miller, "Ask the Troubleshooter," BrewingTechniques 2 (3), 16-19 (1994).

(3) George Fix, Principles of Brewing Science (Brewers Publications, Boulder, Colorado, 1989).

(4) Martin Lodahl, "Brewing in Styles," BrewingTechniques 2 (6), 28-35 (1994).

(5) J. de Clerck, A Textbook of Brewing, Vol. 1 (Chapman & Hall, New York, 1957).

(6) North American Brewers Resource Directory (Institute for Brewing Studies, Boulder, Colorado, 1994).