Late in adding my salts

[stosh]

I ended up adding my salts to the mash at the 45 min mark. I do a full volume mash and always add them to the strike water before dough in. What effect could this have to the mash process and the final product?

 

[Silver_Is_Money]

I can't say for sure, having never made your mistake, but I speculate little to most likely no noticeable effect. You can mash successfully in distilled water. And at least one Trappist Monastery famous for world class ale mashes at an admitted 5.8 to 5.9 pH due to highly alkaline water. They do knock it down to 5.2 pH before or during the boil step however. That is all that is really necessary in most cases.

 

[VikeMan]

What effect could this have to the mash process and the final product?

What was your mash pH before adding the salts?

 

[stosh]

What was your mash pH before adding the salts?

Embarrassingly enough I don't know. I'm just now starting to wade into the water chemistry world and need to save up for and decide on a pH meter (any recommendations appreciated). Anyone want to buy some used corny kegs?

I understand it's difficult if not impossible to really say what could happen given that I don't have a benchmark. I use RO water, the EZ water spreadsheet, and have made one of my best ipas yet just assuming a blank slate and building from there. The EZ water spreadsheet gave a pH of 5.33.

Thanks guys for chiming in so far.

 

[VikeMan]

The EZ water spreadsheet gave a pH of 5.33.

I assume that's the predicted mash pH if you include the salts. What does it predict if you don't include them?

 

[Vale71]

Without salts your mash had a higher than predicted PH. How high depends on the malts used and on mash thickness.
Depending on where PH actually landed this could have caused either an increase or a decrease in fermentability. Too high a PH might even cause incomplete conversion but since you basically mashed with RO water that should not have happened even if your grist was made up of 100% light malts as RO water has no alkalinity.

 

[stosh]

I assume that's the predicted mash pH if you include the salts. What does it predict if you don't include them?

Without salts and acid malt pH was a predicted 5.66

How high depends on the malts used and on mash thickness.

9 lbs 2 Row
0.75 lbs. C20
0.25 lbs. Carapils
0.25 lbs. Acid Malt

Full volume mash at 150F for 60 minutes

 

[VikeMan]

Without salts and acid malt pH was a predicted 5.66

That's a little high, but shouldn't have much impact on fermentability.

Did you also skip the acid malt at the beginning of the mash? With it, BrewCipher (MpH) would predict 5.45, which most people would consider right in the sweet zone. Without it, it predicts 5.71. Still not much impact on fermentability.

 

[Silver_Is_Money]

With the acid malt added and for distilled water I have it mashing at 5.35 to 5.58 pH, with dependence upon which 2-Row is being discussed here (since if it is a barley base malt and it isn't 6-Row, it's 2-Row). And I also see it mashing anywhere from 5.52 to 5.76 if the acid malt was additionally left out, with the difference again being dependent upon the nature of the 2-Row involved.

The batch will be fine! Yeast dependent, it may not get to 4.3 or lower as its final beer pH (uncarbonated or decarbonated) in the end, and if it finishes above 4.3 pH it may not be fully long term storage stable, but that only becomes a 'potential' concern ~3 - 4 or more months down the road.

 

[stosh]

Did you also skip the acid malt at the beginning of the mash?

I mashed with the acid malt.

With the acid malt added and for distilled water I have it mashing at 5.35 to 5.58 pH, with dependence upon which 2-Row is being discussed here (since if it is a barley base malt and it isn't 6-Row, it's 2-Row).

I used standard issue Briess 2 Row. You mention distilled water. What is the difference between that and RO as far as water profile?

if it finishes above 4.3 pH it may not be fully long term storage stable, but that only becomes a 'potential' concern 4 or more months down the road.

If it is half as good as the last one it won't last more than a week or so

 

[Silver_Is_Money]

I mashed with the acid malt.
I used standard issue Briess 2 Row. You mention distilled water. What is the difference between that and RO as far as water profile?

That particular malt 'may' (with 'may' here meaning individual malt lots will vary as to analyticals) place it at the lower end of the 5.35 to 5.58 pH spectrum for the case of added acid malt.

RO water has some small measure of potentially pH raising alkalinity. Generally low enough to be of little to no pH consequence of concern, unless the source water for the RO is extremely high in alkalinity to begin with, and also depending upon the quality of the RO unit, and the age/use_demand_history of its elements.

 

[VikeMan]

I mashed with the acid malt.

So, from a mash pH perspective, you were probably right in the zone. And you added your salts (whatever they were) later, which got them into the wort/beer for flavor/mouthfeel purposes. If I were you, I would not worry about the mixup at all.