Cedar Rapids Brewing Society

Hey all,

I've been noticing in my last few beers a bit of astringent off-flavor creeping up. I'm thinking this is due to my mill. I currently use a janked up pasta roller to mill my grains, usually takes a few passes through. Could I be shredding the husks to the point I'm releasing a ton of tannins?

Or could it be the overnight mashes I've been doing?

-Josh Peanasky

In my experience, a poor crush absolutely can lead to astringency. Conventional wisdom tells us that we shouldn't have to worry about astringency as long as the mash pH is below 6.3 (or something like that). After fighting with astringency for a year and eliminating every source I could find in homebrew troubleshooting guides, I finally decided to try and open up my grain mill to 0.045". Haven't had an issue since.

Acidify sparge water to below 5.2. Don't get greedy, and stop collecting wort when you get to 1.010. Probably not your mill.

Listen to the Dr. I just make stuff up as I go.

Hmmm, I don't make any adjustments to water, just Cedar Rapids tap. Don't have a pH meter (yet). I BIAB so batch sparging is generally calculated to give me correct boil size. Might have to try acidifying the sparge water at some point though.

-Josh Peanasky

Do you treat with Camden tablets or something to remove Chloramine. It won't boil out.

Nope. Was under the impression Cedar Rapids city water was low enough to not need it. I can't taste it personally.

-Josh Peanasky

Even if you can't taste it, it will ruin a beer. Beer can be OK, but simply throwing in a tablet will help a LOT!

Gotcha, I'll try that today and see what happens. Thanks for the help folks! Hopefully I can figure this out.

-Josh Peanasky

So here's a run-down of things I'm going to try. Brewing a Vienna/Sorachi Ace SMaSH today. Used campden tablet for water, doing a full volume mash. Otherwise grain milling and mashing is the same. We'll see if I can eliminate it thus way.

-Josh Peanasky

I'll be brewing the Durham Brown (Northern English Brown) again this weekend. It's the recipe I've brewed more times than any other. I'll be adding the Campden for the first time too. Hopefully Josh and I will both have positive things to report.

BTW, the CR tap water apparently has a lot more chloramine today than when I first started brewing this recipe.

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Couple years ago one of the CR water plants chemists came to my house for a brew session. He liked that I started with RO. He said CR water very high in chloramines. It would have to be delt with.

Hmmm, never heard that before. I know I can taste chlorine in Marion water, but never heard that CR has high chloramines. Might have to send out a sample to get tested.

-Josh Peanasky

You don't taste chloramines as much. The thing they do the most is spoil your beer over time. The ammonia used in the treatment process is very high. CR uses very small relative amount of chlorine. You can still make a decent beer with straight tap water but by adding a campden tablet it makes it much better. One tablet at the homebrew shop should treat 20 gallons of water. I used half a tablet for 10 gallons.

When I started to brew back in 2002 I used RO water only with minimal water additions. Usually just a little gypsum for hoppy beers. I was winning homebrew contests starting in 2003 and got a 1st place in at least one category in every comp I entered. Then I used CR tap water with campden tablets for several years. Stopped winning competitions. Went back to RO and my beer is much better. I have been doing much better in competitions. Hy-Vee is not the cheapest source but closest to my house. I get 10 gallons at a time for $3.90. For less than the price of a pint, my entire batch of beer is much better. Personally, I am considering installing an RO system in my brewery simply for convenience.

Good info Matt. I bought water at Hy-Vee and Walmart (they both have the same RO setups) for several years. I installed a RO system at the same time we installed a softener in our house. It's nice not having to make a trip to town to get brewing water. I put in a big enough tank so I can pull all my water at once. Others just let it fill up over a day or two. How involved one wants to get with water recipes is up to you. Keep simple or make a different profile for each style. I rather like playing with recipes and experimenting.

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