Nice vs harsh bitterness

[Nick JD]

I like harsh bitterness in some beers. It's grassiness I can not stand.

 

[Dave70]

I like harsh bitterness in some beers. It's grassiness I can not stand.

I've got a little from both column A & B when dry hopping with Amarillo in an APA. The grassiness faded over time, but it remained harsh till the last drop.

But in the last wheat / pale with one 60 min and one flame out addition there was none, it's fruitilicious, and with no dark malts or crystal to hide behind.


The wheat incidentally was no chill.
Just sayin.

 

[Parks]

I've got a little from both column A & B when dry hopping with Amarillo in an APA. The grassiness faded over time, but it remained harsh till the last drop.

But in the last wheat / pale with one 60 min and one flame out addition there was none, it's fruitilicious, and with no dark malts or crystal to hide behind.


The wheat incidentally was no chill.
Just sayin.

Quick Q - how long did you dry hop for? My findings and heaps of reading lately suggest 2 days max for most so I would be interested to know what time you did which gave you perceived grassiness.

 

[Maxt]

Manticle, I had never heard about the late hop/ harshness due to lack of boil time...I just know that I have always struggled to tame galaxy. Food for thought

 

[manticle]

Like I say, it was just something I read. I have also read however that an extended hopped boil (from memory longer than 3 hours) and wort will actually reduce in bitterness.
First was from Fix (Principles of brewing science) second from allen & cantwell (barley wine).

I'd be interested in exploring further. When I do a 2 or 3 hour boil I don't add hops till 60 mins left.

 

[Mardoo]

I'm very interested in the relationship between late hopping and bitterness. There must be some pretty complex interactions between the various alpha acids during isomerization that wouldn't come into play as much with "hop bursting".

I've never seen anything mentioned about late hopping and bitterness as related to the greater levels of oils remaining. Many plant "essential" oils are exceedingly bitter if concentrated, if not most. Could those be contributing to harsh bitterness in late hopping? This is pure speculation on my part.

Manticle, thanks, as always, for your great posts.

 

[Fat Bastard]

Drop the MgSO4. Use acid and the two calcium salts, style dependent.

Is your water chloraminated?

Sydney water has no chloramine as far as I know. Why would you drop the MgSO4? The spreadsheet says it should be in a certain range, and small amounts get it within that range. Lots of stuff I do when brewing I am yet to understand fully!

 

[manticle]

All grain brewing provides enough magnesium. Unless you are brewing high adjunct beers, you will have enough. Magnesium does what calcium does but less effectively so you are better off using calcium salts than magnesium salts.

Too much magnesium makes beer taste odd, way too much makes you **** your pants.
In short - there's enough there already, extra is not super effective, too much is bad

 

[Dan2]

All grain brewing provides enough magnesium.

Any idea how much? This is something the water calculators don't do.
EZwater says ideal range of 10-30ppm, and punching MgSO4 into it changes the profile readout, but adding grains doesn't change anything but pH

 

[durgarth]

Fantastic discussion. From my own experimentation (from lots of reading)I have found a lot of the harsh acid bitterness can be "smoothed" out if a percentage of the hops are added in the mash. So for example the 20 minute additions are added to the mash (at least double the quantity) the result is a smooth balanced rounded product. If the same amount was added in the boil the result is harsher, more astringent and certainly more bitter.

I await more input from those more experienced.

 

[manticle]

First wort hopping has been found (in some tests, not necessarily conclusively) to result in smooth bittering and flavour.
Mash hopping is what you describe which is different but it's possible it may have a similar effect - slow, hot steep pulls out essential oils and maybe very slow isomerisation or solubilisation of alpha acids.
I am hypothesising only.

@dan2 - no idea why calculators don't take it into account but I've not read a good text on the subject of water/mash pH that suggests you need to add extra Mg if your Ca levels are appropriate and my own limited experience with epsom has not been favourable.

 

[Mardoo]

@dan2 - no idea why calculators don't take it into account but I've not read a good text on the subject of water/mash pH that suggests you need to add extra Mg if your Ca levels are appropriate and my own limited experience with epsom has not been favourable.

Can you give a title for one of these texts Manticle or anyone? And also for any good text on hop utilization? I got the Brewers Publications book For the Love of Hops and was pretty disappointed with the information on using hops.

 

[manticle]

Essays in brewing science by Lewis and Bamforth, Principles of brewing science by George Fix, New Brewing Lager beer by Noonan and Brewing science and practice by briggs, boulton, brookes and stevens all have good information about hops and water/mash pH.

All bar the last are readily and cheaply available from the book depository (order through this link and support my brewing club: http://www.bookdepository.co.uk/?a_aid=melbournebrewers&a_bid=7da4aeb1&chan=wadd )

The last is very expensive and very technical and I still have to re- read and wade through in its entirety. I may have another tech title somewhere that I've forgotten - will have a search.

 

[Adr_0]

Essays in brewing science by Lewis and Bamforth, Principles of brewing science by George Fix, New Brewing Lager beer by Noonan and Brewing science and practice by briggs, boulton, brookes and stevens all have good information about hops and water/mash pH.

All bar the last are readily and cheaply available from the book depository (order through this link and support my brewing club: http://www.bookdepository.co.uk/?a_aid=melbournebrewers&a_bid=7da4aeb1&chan=wadd )

The last is very expensive and very technical and I still have to re- read and wade through in its entirety. I may have another tech title somewhere that I've forgotten - will have a search.

Even Palmer's 'How to Brew' shows the relative impact of Mg salts vs Ca with his little Ca/Mg/Hardness/beer colour scale. Braukaiser has some pretty in-depth water analysis/pH control articles. You probably need to measure this first.

No idea about hop utilisation sorry.

 

[Dave70]

Quick Q - how long did you dry hop for? My findings and heaps of reading lately suggest 2 days max for most so I would be interested to know what time you did which gave you perceived grassiness.

Pretty sure It was four days at normal temps, then a further three crash chilling - about 20 grams.

I would have dismissed it a s a harsh hop on that beer alone, but like I said, in a different beer, it tasted like a different hop. Perhaps it's not the hop, its what you do with it that counts.

I'd say definitely say there's a tipping point where more isn't necessarily better, no matter how well you balance it.

 

[Nibbo]

I find i get some bitterness from Briess Extra Special Malt...From memory, the most i've used in a batch is about 10%. For me, I enjoy what flavour it gives.

 

[Mardoo]

Essays in brewing science by Lewis and Bamforth, Principles of brewing science by George Fix, New Brewing Lager beer by Noonan and Brewing science and practice by briggs, boulton, brookes and stevens all have good information about hops and water/mash pH.

All bar the last are readily and cheaply available from the book depository (order through this link and support my brewing club: http://www.bookdepository.co.uk/?a_aid=melbournebrewers&a_bid=7da4aeb1&chan=wadd )

The last is very expensive and very technical and I still have to re- read and wade through in its entirety. I may have another tech title somewhere that I've forgotten - will have a search.

:icon_offtopic: Yeah, the Briggs books are pretty full on, and as you say expensive. I read his "Malts and Malting" when I was toying with the idea of opening an Australian traditional floor maltings and the bio-chem was a real slog for me and FULLY worth it. Then I lost the book. Those suckers are pricey to replace! I may have to go all in on Brewing Science and Practice.

And Dr. Charlie Bamforth just rocks. I heard an interview where he mentions that Dr. Thomas Shellhammer was doing some good research on hop utilisation, but I haven't yet managed to track much down by him. There's this reeeeeally tempting link with abstracts from the World Brewing Congress but I haven't as yet tracked down any of the presentations. I may just have to contact the presenters directly. http://www.worldbrewingcongress.org/2012/abstracts/podiumabstracts.cfm

 

[BreathingHeat]

Tried the Bridge Road Single hop Galaxy or Stella?

They were a bit harsh...

Yep, definitely the Stella. Rather unpleasant in my opinion. Harsh bitterness would be a precise description. On the flip side, a beer like SN Torpedo is very bitter, but yet a smooth bitterness. Far less tough stinging.

I have struggled with superficial/harsh bitterness in many of my IPAs.

Great topic.

 

[mabrungard]

In your opinion, what is the best way to do this?
With my pale beers, I can't seem to get the pH into the right range according to the EZ water spreadsheet (tested with strips) but it's not a drama with the darker beers like the Red IIPA.

I've been looking to getting some 88% Lactic Acid or acidulated malt to compensate, but not sure which way to go here.

Paper pH strips are not reliable for brewing use. The plastic ColorpHast strips are generally reliable, but they have a systematic error of reading about 0.3 units too low. Since those strips are consistently low, you can adjust for that error. But paper strips are just not reliable at all.

It does sound like your water has some alkalinity in it since pale beers are troublesome and darker beers are less so. Including acidification in your brewing process would be wise for those paler beers. I suggest that you visit the Bru'n Water site and review the Water Knowledge page to get an understanding of more of these water adjustment goals and techniques.

Unfortunately, there is misinformation out there regarding magnesium in brewing water. As mentioned above, malt provides all the Mg needed for brewing. The ONLY reason to add Mg is when you want its sour astringency in your beer. For hoppy and bitter beers, that effect is desirable. Therefore, the true desirable range for Mg in brewing water is 0 to 40 ppm.

 

[mmmyummybeer]

:icon_offtopic:
Maybe getting slightly off topping to bitterness but just wanted to add to earlier water adjustment and reading resources posts earlier and mentioning that John Palmer's 'Water' book should be due out later on in the year which I imagine would be a good easy to read resource for water info.

 

[Fat Bastard]

Paper pH strips are not reliable for brewing use. The plastic ColorpHast strips are generally reliable, but they have a systematic error of reading about 0.3 units too low. Since those strips are consistently low, you can adjust for that error. But paper strips are just not reliable at all.

It does sound like your water has some alkalinity in it since pale beers are troublesome and darker beers are less so. Including acidification in your brewing process would be wise for those paler beers. I suggest that you visit the Bru'n Water site and review the Water Knowledge page to get an understanding of more of these water adjustment goals and techniques.

Unfortunately, there is misinformation out there regarding magnesium in brewing water. As mentioned above, malt provides all the Mg needed for brewing. The ONLY reason to add Mg is when you want its sour astringency in your beer. For hoppy and bitter beers, that effect is desirable. Therefore, the true desirable range for Mg in brewing water is 0 to 40 ppm.

Thanks for your helpful post!
I'm using those plastic pH strips you mentioned. The reason the guys at work recommend these over a meter is that in their opinion, meters can be accurate, but without calibration at every use, using expensive test soutions and careful handling they can be worse than the strips. Then again, the glorified sparkie calibration dude uses a pH meter to check the RO water system.

In honesty, I haven't measured the mash pH for ages, and given that I've had a measurable increase in efficiency over 20 odd brews since starting to play with water chemistry, and a subjective improvement in taste, I've been happy to leave it at that. I do recall the measured mash pH was lower than EZ water predicted, but maybe not by as much as 0.3.

Looks like the next steps for me will be to dump the Epsom Salts, use acidulated malt to bring the pH down to the higher end of the scale on EZ water, and go from there.

Cheers!
FB

 

[mabrungard]

:icon_offtopic:
Maybe getting slightly off topping to bitterness but just wanted to add to earlier water adjustment and reading resources posts earlier and mentioning that John Palmer's 'Water' book should be due out later on in the year which I imagine would be a good easy to read resource for water info.

Thanks for the mention. AJ Delange and I were the technical editors for that book. It should be out in October.

FB: calibration solutions are a necessary part of pH meter use. Yes, they have to be used prior to each day's use. They aren't expensive though.

The plastic strips seem to be relatively accurate enough when you include the systematic error. Do recognize that those strips have a short lifetime also. They go bad, so use them quickly. Share with some friends so that you don't have to waste them. Cutting the strips in half can be a good technique to extend their use. Be aware that the manufacturer recommends dunking them in the solution for 1 to 10 minutes to get a good reading. It seems that wort has a low ionic strength and that is why a long contact time is required.

 

[treefiddy]

Thanks for your helpful post!
I'm using those plastic pH strips you mentioned. The reason the guys at work recommend these over a meter is that in their opinion, meters can be accurate, but without calibration at every use, using expensive test soutions and careful handling they can be worse than the strips. Then again, the glorified sparkie calibration dude uses a pH meter to check the RO water system.

pH meters can also often measure conductivity. Since the RO system is probably removing mostly dissolved salts, the conductivity is much lower in the purified water. The purity of RO water is usually measured in resistivity, but it is closely related to conductivity so what he's doing is pretty normal.

You could take one of your strips into work and dunk it in the pH 4 buffer solution used to calibrate the pH meters, it may give you a better idea of the accuracy of your particular strips.

 

[piraterum]

Great discussion!

It's clearly a complex issue with many factors at play.

Interestingly, in the Mr Malty article which references several different sources, it suggests late hopping results in a much smoother hop bitterness than the traditional 60 min / 90min bittering additions. It specifically mentions how well this works in 10 min IPA's ie where except for 3 or 4 IBUs, all of the hops are added during the last 10 minutes of the boil.

"Hop Selection

Select your late hop varieties based on how pleasing the aroma. "I select hops for late hopping based on their aromatic quality," Brynildson says. "We utilize a number of low alpha aroma varieties as well as mid-alpha dual purpose hops for late hopping. Some examples are Styrian Golding, East Kent Golding, Cascade, Centennial, Crystal, Mount Hood, and US Fuggle."

Zien says, "We look for aromatic hop varieties with good flavor characteristics and low cohumulone values. In our experience, these are the hops that isomerize without imparting harsh or astringent-like hop profiles. This goes beyond late-hopping for flavor and aroma, and applies equally to smooth bittering early in the boil as well. The hops that have worked best for our late-hopping include Cascade, Amarillo, Tomahawk, Simcoe, Chinook, and a newer variety, Palisades. Tomahawk and Simcoe have relatively high alpha acid values and somewhat low cohumulone values and are best used in lesser percentages than the other hops mentioned. For our English-style Ales, we use East Kent Golding and Styrian Golding. One of AleSmith's Belgian-style Ales, Lil' Devil, benefits from a run through a hop-back containing Styrian Golding whole hops on its way to the heat exchanger."

Some studies suggest that late hopping with high cohumulone hops tends to result in a more harsh bitterness. However, Brynildson says, "I don't buy into the cohumulone equals 'harsh bitterness' theory. I also believe that the cohumulone argument is independent of how you are utilizing the hops-kettle hopping or late hopping. Some of the best smelling hops in the world are high in cohumulone and I plan to continue using them."

Given that a number of brewers report a less harsh bitter from late hopping, it might be a lesser issue than first thought. It might be more important to select late hops based on their flavors and aromas first, and their cohumulone fraction second."


http://www.mrmalty.com/late_hopping.php

Late hopping can, according to Fix,lead to undesirable compounds, even in nobles due to the limited contact with hot wort (supporting the earlier assertion that longer boils may reduce harshness). Could it be heavily late hopped with new world hop type beers you're getting it in - 10 minute IPAs and such?

 

[Adr_0]

My further 2c (probably up to 14c by now?) - warning, anecdotal evidence following:

I brewed an ESB with my Brisbane water, without adding gypsum and diluting to approx 9L/kg in the mash (my stuffup on brewday):
78% MO
8.5% demerara sugar
6.4% medium crystal (Thomas F)
1.6% roast barley
Hopped to 35IBU with Challenger at 60min, plus some Willamette at 15min
Wyeast 1275.
It was quite astringent, obscenely so in the pre-ferm sample. It improved somewhat mid fermentation, but was bag again towards the end (typical) at 1.013 or thereabouts. However, at 1.010 now it is quite smooth, but still has a definite hint of astringence, astringency, astringentness and maybe even astringentism. Probably astringency. Did pH play a part? I didn't measure so I can't totally say (hence the anecdotal).

A day later, brewing my extra-pale black IPA with 2g/kg gypsum, max dilution was 4.5L/kg in the mash:
88% Weyermann vienna
6.8% Weyermann CaraMunich I
4.5% wheat
1.057, 50IBU
9 IBU Simcoe at 60min
8.5IBU Simcoe at 50min
8IBU Simcoe at 40min
7IBU Amarillo at 30min
6.2IBU Amarillo at 25min
5.5IBU Amarillo at 20min
3IBU Cascade at 15min
1-2IBU Cascade at 5min

Smooth as the buttocks of a young child at a tasting at 1.023 - obviously will get drier but I can't see it being an issue at all in a week. Again, did not measure pH but even the fairly chunky volume of hops had the pre-fermentation sample tasting wonderful.

Obviously different hops and different profile, but the 50IBU came across significantly smoother than the 35IBU. I have used Challenger and Northdown in a previous ESB that was beautiful (I always do 30-35IBU for some reason for these beers), but had what I would describe as a 'bite' on the tongue rather than an astringent note, and was dosed at 1.5-2g/kg with gypsum. Same water, guarantee the water/grain wasn't as diluted as it was a fly sparge and a moderate boil only. The yeast in that case was Whitelabs Burton Ale, but it was a glowing bright beer.

But, I can probably throw all this out the door as I didn't measure pH in either case. There are a few definite pre-cursors of higher than ideal pH - poor mash conversion (some starch in the mash), astringency, dark cloudy wort.

Very anecdotal, but if somebody out there has kept better records and noticed astringent bitterness correlated with high pH, it might be something to steer away from in future batches. I will be brewing the ESB again soon - was happy with the recipe and love the yeast - so I will be curious how I go with gypsum dosing and a less dilute mash. I will just have to brew it within the next couple of months - and it will still be anecdotal until I measure two examples.

EDIT: corrected gypsum to 2g/kg from 2g/L

 

[roverfj1200]

With Mash PH is this any good

http://www.craftbrewer.com.au/shop/details.asp?PID=919

Was planning on giving it a go

Cheers.

 

[mabrungard]

With Mash PH is this any good

http://www.craftbrewer.com.au/shop/details.asp?PID=919

Was planning on giving it a go

Cheers.

It's far from ideal. Other researchers have found that it buffers to a pH of more like 5.7 which is several tenths higher than desirable. Learning to use an acid to neutralize excess alkalinity is a better approach.

 

[bum]

It's far from ideal. Other researchers have found that it buffers to a pH of more like 5.7 which is several tenths higher than desirable. Learning to use an acid to neutralize excess alkalinity is a better approach.

Did the research give any indication if it may actually be of benefit over not treating water at all (that even though the resulting ph may not be perfect)?

 

[spog]

fellas,for good info on hops&bitterness listen to the BeerSmith podcast #58 with Charlie Bamforth.
it an interesting topic and Charlie explains it well. ...cheers...spog...

 

[Nick JD]

fellas,for good info on hops&bitterness listen to the BeerSmith podcast #58 with Charlie Bamforth.
it an interesting topic and Charlie explains it well. ...cheers...spog...

Thos podcasts always leave me with a lot of interesting theoretical knowledge and zero practical application of it. I know know all about the alpha acids, their stereoisomers (and how cis and trans taste different) but have SFA Idea how this applies to hop selection and boiling approaches. In short - those podcasts are great for speaking crap, but useless for making better beer.