Water, Water Everywhere but is it good to Brew?

Water accounts for the largest percentage of beer. Up to 97% in some cases. Water must then have an impact on the final flavor and quality of the beer produced. It is often overlooked, but I think should be considered when deciding what style of beer to produce.

Some of the reasons to consider the quality, mineral, and salt content (profile) of the brew water is different combinations bring out a more malty versus bitter character, as well as, providing a  healthy environment for yeast and enzymatic activity. First and foremost it should be potable and taste good from the tap. If there is a strong chlorine, sulfur or other off flavor, I would get some bottled water.

There are a few specifics to be aware of then when brewing with your tap or municipal sourced water. A great page on brewing water knowledge exists from Bru'n Water. Ill list a few of the basics:

1. pH - Water pH of the mash influences a number of factors in brewing including; fermentability, color, clarity, and taste of the wort and beer. The acceptable mash pH for brewing is in the range of 5.2-5.8. So the higher the starting pH (more alkaline) your water source, more of a chance will be an alkaline leaning mash pH. Acid or acidulated malt is sometimes added to bring mash pH down.
2. Hardness - is primarily due to the calcium and magnesium content of drinking water. Since there is a minimum calcium content desired in brewing water, moderately hard to hard water is typically desirable for brewing. 
3. Alkalinity - is related to pH, but is not a direct measure of it.  Alkalinity is a measure of the "buffering" capacity of a solution and its ability to neutralize strong acid and resist pH change. According to Bru'n Water "Alkalinity has a significant effect on beer flavor.  Beer flavor differs significantly from wine in large part due to the difference in alkalinity between beer wort and grape must.  The flavor of wine can be characterized as sweet and sour while most beers can be characterized as bitter and sweet.  The acidity of wine provides most of the balance to the wine sweetness while the bittering from hops provides most of the balance to the beer sweetness.  The alkalinity of grape must is typically negative due to its pH being under 4.3.  After fermentation, wine pH typically falls into the 3 to 3.5 range. The alkalinity of beer wort helps keep the pH of beer in the 4 to 4.5 range and helps avoid the wine-like reliance on acidity for flavor balance."
4.  Residual Alkalinity (RA) - RA is an indicator that is specific to brewing and is an important factor in defining the suitability of brewing water.  RA is calculated with the following equation when calcium, magnesium, and alkalinity are input as (meq/L) or (ppm as CaCO3). 
5. Minerals and Beer Styles - The historic beer styles that have developed around the world were sometimes the result of the water conditions present in that area. Typically, dark-colored beer styles developed in areas with high RA water and light-colored beer styles developed in areas with low RA water. 

Ithaca's Water Profile
Ithaca is supplied with water from two sources, Cayuga Lake and Six Mile Creek. The latter supplies the City of Ithaca. I am outside of the city limits and am supplied by Bolton Point Water from Cayuga Lake. The water is sourced directly from this glacial lake 400 feet out and 65 feet below surface. I called the water company directly to receive the following information from an engineer at the plant:

He also mentioned the water has a pH 8.3-8.2 and a level of hardness at 150 mg/L. Using the equation above for RA, I calculate an RA of 65.9.

Here is another style guide from Bru'n Water which also gives general style numbers to follow:

My brew water is moderately hard and alkaline. If I wanted to make the most often drunk American Lager beer, I might need to adjust my water a bit to come closer to the original Pilsen profile or the one above.

The EZ Water Calculator provides a handy way to punch in your profile and see if it falls within acceptable ranges given the recipe you plan to follow. It then suggests additions of various minerals and salts to adjust your water.

It looks as though my water is suited to styles darker and more bitter focused on hop charachter as I play around with typical recipes. I wont go into any more details on the adjustment of brew water as it is beyond my present scope. But this exercise gives a good start of which styles of beer my water will produce well.

Setting Up the Homebrewery Part 2

Homebrewery Location
If you're like most homebrewers you probably have to consider where you are going to do your mashing/boiling/fermenting, where to store all this equipment, and lastly take into consideration any others living with you (yes your wife...me thinks most husbands would be elated if their wives were making beer, however my small sample of one finds the converse not always true). The mashing and boiling can be done on the kitchen stove, but if you can get it out of the house i.e. the garage, patio, maybe a really well ventilated basement, do it. Making beer can be messy. Crushed grain is dusty, mashing and sparging can be messy, and boiling is steamy with the looming threat of boil overs on your kitchen stove. Since we are also making a living drink highly susceptible to bacterial and wild yeast infection, the brewing location should ideally be as clean as possible. Garages and basements are not always the most sanitary of environments, but keeping the clutter down and maybe a good sweep/mop/hosedown once in awhile should be helpful. Should also be mentioned that most of us getting into homebrewing for the first time are rightfully knocked over the head to be clean when brewing. Brewing beer requires sanitized equipment and care in handling the cooled wort all the way to the bottling step so the yeast we introduce to the wort can do their job effectively without the threat of an infection. I mop down my basement floor after every brew, clean and even spray Star-San on my cleaned equipment...I'm a bit OCD when it comes to clean, but I digress.

I chose my basement for everything but the boiling of wort. I boil out in the garage with the garage door open (even in the dead of winter). Those burners are pretty intense and I can imagine throw off a large amount of dangerous CO (maybe that's while I'm lightheaded during the boil or maybe its the beer I'm drinking. I kid, I kid...kind of). My basement is relatively dry, clean, has the added benefit of a slop sink (huge for cleaning equipment), and most importantly remains at a stable temperature during the winter of 49-59F and 60-70F in the summer. Ithaca is cold except for two months out of the year (if you like sun, do not move here:). The temperature of the environment you intend to ferment in plays a big role in what you can brew effectively. Since fermentation buckets up in the main part of the house are not feasible, I mostly ferment in the basement. I bring them up once in awhile to warm depending on what I'm brewing but mostly stick to the basement.

There are temperature controlling methods for fermentation- heat blankets to warm, ice baths or controlled refrigerator to cool- but I want to keep it simple and brew to the environment instead of transform it (yet). This is a bit limiting then for what type of beers I can brew. Ale or top fermenting yeasts need warmer temps than lager or bottom fermenting strains.  I need yeast strains which work well in ~50-60F in the majority of the year and ones in the 60-70F for the summer months.Yeast are truly an amazing microbe worthy of more than my simplification here, but for this blogs purposes I'm going with the KISS motto.

These handy charts from Lug Wrench Brewing for the two major suppliers of liquid yeast to home brewers, Wyeast and White Labs, really narrows down my choices. It looks like I can be comfortable brewing almost all the ales in the summer months with maybe the exception of some of the Belgian strains (red shading) and most of the lager strains, German Ale, Scotch Ale, Kolsch, and the California Common types for the rest of the year (green shading).

The one last bit regarding location is the one ingredient not thought of much but makes up >90% of the final beer, or what I like to call water...

Setting Up the Homebrewery Part 1

Like most home brewers you start out with an extract brew (barley sugars converted to a syrup comprising the majority of the fermentables) but eventually want to go to an all grain brew. Milled malted barley soaked and strained through various temperatures of water releases fremementable sugar into solution, or what is called wort. Boil the wort, add some hops, cool and add yeast to the wort in a controlled temperature environment, wait some time and you have beer. Pretty simple huh?
After my first extract brew I decided to try an all grain brew. I read if you can make oatmeal you can make beer from grain-I make damn good oatmeal!

Equipment
There is some additional equipment needed to get started with all grain homebrewing. First thing needed to outfit your brewery is a large enough brew kettle for the batches planned. The typical 2-3 gal stockpot found in many kitchens isnt going to cut it for a full boil of wort. It can get downright dangerous not to mention messy boiling large amounts of sugar water on the kitchen stove. However, many go this route, but id rather take the operation out of the kitchen...
A large enough brew kettle is a wise first investment. I also think a stainless vs aluminum pot is the way to go. Aluminum oxidizes in strange ways, possibly imparts off flavor, and that Alzheimer's link...I just shelled out the extra money.  I chose the plain option, no fancy thermometers or spigots.
Next to consider is size. Since my kit came with a 6 gal carboy and two 6 gal buckets, I plan on typical 5 gal finished batches to bottle. A 7 plus gal pot would do the trick. Of course you can always boil smaller batches with the larger pot but not vice versa. I chose the 10 gal Megapot purchased from Northern Brewer:


http://www.northernbrewer.com/shop/brewing/brewing-equipment/brew-kettles/megapot-stockpot.html

Last to consider before purchasing a kettle is how you will mash and lauter the grain. Alot of homebrewing is mashed and lautered in a converted beverage cooler. Mash grains in the cooler, lauter (rinse and drain) with some sort of manifold or false bottom (shown here).



I chose a different method popularized in Australia called Brew In A Bag or BIAB for short. Taking a simple nylon bag, again available at most online or local home brew suppliers, you may mash the grain in one single pot such as your 10 gal brew kettle, drain the grain like a large teabag leaving behind the sweet wort.



If you plan on leaving the kitchen stove behind then you will also need a source of heat to boil wort in your new kettle. I chose the typical outdoor propane type burner from Bayou Classic:




Also needed is an accurate way to measure temperature of the mash. A simple but long enough thermometer to poke into the pot is the way to go. I bought a digital candy/oil thermometer from Home Depot- make sure whatever you purchase reads in the typical brewing temperatures of ~70F to 200+F:



Lastly, I would recommend investing in a wort chiller. Although not necessary to brew an all grain batch like the above equipment, it minimizes the chance of an infection finding its way into your wort before the yeast is pitched. Cooling wort quickly also helps minimize oxidation and other off flavors in the finished beer. If you are handy you might be able to make one of these below, however I purchased one and was done with it:



There are countless other gadgets and supplies you can purchase to get started, but I found the above with the typical contents of a homewbrew kit (bucket fermenter and or glass carboy, hydrometer, tubing to transfer liquid, sanitizing solution like Star-San,) is enough to get started.

Here is a pic of some of my equipment in the "brewery" aka the basement:

10 Gal Megapot, Ale Pail, 6 Gal Glass Carboy, scale, hydrometer, thermometer, misc...missing from here is the burner, another unspigotted Ale Pail (wort chiller in the 5 gal pot in the background). Dont forget the Utica Club boxes to store bottles:)

That leaves a question then regarding location of the homebrewery. As they say in real estate, Location, Location, Location. For next time...

The Beer Bug

SO.....I received a Brewers Best Kit for 2012 xmas, yes a bit old to still be excited about receiving gifts, but I get to make my own alcohol- enough to make me giddy.
First extract kit was a Belgian Tripel. As usual for a first time brew I screwed it all up- boilover, didnt steep grains at the right temp, fermentation stalled, racking issues, clueless on bottling and on and on. But the beer actually came out great, even with a FG of 1.030!


http://www.brewersbestkits.com/pdf/1044%20Belgian%20Tripel%20Recipe.pdf

First Brew- February 2013 Belgian Tripel

needless to say, I'm hooked:)