Wild Brews: The craft of home brewing, from sour and fruit beers to farmhouse ales Hardcover – 19 May 2022 free download PDF file google drive 0857837818

 

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'Jaega Wise is the new brewing superstar' CAMRA BEER magazine

Produced using a mixture of naturally occurring yeasts and bacteria, wild fermented beers offer the 'fine dining' of the beer world. These beers are how beer tasted 200 years ago, before brewing was industrialised, and are enjoying a worldwide revival.

Jaega Wise, head brewer at East London's Wild Card Brewery and presenter of Amazon Prime's Beermasters, is one of the UK's experts in wild fermentation. Here, she explains the science behind the brewing process and shares her recipes so that you can experiment at home. Learn how to brew, bottle, and age your beer in wooden barrels, and produce a range of different sour beer styles, farmhouse ales and fruit beers.

Recipes and styles featured in the book include:
- German Berliner Weisse (tart and refreshing) and Gose (salty and dry)
- Belgian Lambics, gueze, Flanders red ale and fruit beers
- French Farmhouse ales such as saison and biere de garde
- Norwegian Farmhouse Ales including the Kveik IPA
- English Old Ale

Also included is a trouble-shooter section to guide you through what happens when wild yeast and bacteria get out of control and how to remedy it. Whether you are a beer geek or a home brewing novice, Wild Brews contains everything you need to replicate today's sour and wild beer styles at home.

CONTENTS 

Introduction 

. THE INGREDIENTS 

2. THE MICROORGANISMS OF THE WILD BREWER 

Lactobacillus 

Pediococcus Acetobacter Brettanomyces 

. BARREL AGEING 

4. GET FRUITY 

5. WILD BREW STYLES 

Tools of the Trade 

Types of Beer 

. THE RECIPES 

THE BASIC METHOD Kveik New England IPA Raspberry Saison 

THE KETTLE SOUR METHOD 

Sour Raspberry Saison 

Gose 

Passion Fruit Gose 

THE PITCH AND WAIT SOUR METHOD 

Berliner Weisse 

Flanders Red Oud Bruin Lambic 

Geuze Old Ale 

. PACKAGING YOUR BEER 8. WHEN THINGS GO WRONG 

Directory 

Where to drink 

HOW TO USE THIS EBOOK 

Select one of the chapters from the main contents listand you will be taken straight to that chapter. 

Look out for linked text (which is in blue) throughout the ebook that you can select to help you navigate between related sections. 

You can double tap images to increase their size. To return to the original view, just tap the cross in the top left-hand corner of the screen. 

INTRODUCTION 

My first experience of cask beer was at the Loughborough Polish Club, where CAMRA held one of their many annual beer festivals. I was given a glass, some tokens and a piece of paper that listed all the available beers. Tentatively, I went through the list and eventually settled on a Harvest Pale by local brewers Castle Rock Brewery. It was light, citrusy and gently carbonated, with a fresh, bitter edge. It was also warm. Not actually heated-warm, but still miles away from the cold, fizzy lagers I was used to. I liked it. I stayed at that beer festival till late that night. It was the beginning of my love affair with beer. 

You’re supposed to have grandiose memories of your first beer, and in a way, I do. Growing up in the UK’s Midlands, beer to me was something you drank in tinnies with your mates in the park. It was summer 2003. I was fifteen years old and eager for life experience. I wore thick glasses and a large, full backpack, and I had never been kissed. My best friend Becca was my sidekick, or rather I was hers. She was a tad shorter than me, with mousy brown hair, and she was very pretty. My first beer was that summer: a can of Foster’s lager in the park behind the big Asda with friends from school. The boys in the group were the most confident. They would take it in turns to swan into the supermarket, dressed carefully to look older so they would get served. Foster’s wasn’t particularly my first choice - beer wasn’t really my first choice, to be honest. But, as we were at the mercy of others, Becca and I accepted our tinnies readily. Foster’s soon became Carling, which then became Strongbow cider, and, in turn, Carlsberg. When we were feeling fancy, it was Grolsch. I recall, quite vividly, the following summer, we rated them. My first tasting in a way, albeit not so formal. They 

all decided that Grolsch was the best of the lot and Carling the worst. I remember strongly disagreeing, and it descended into a good-natured teenage argument. 

A few years later, I could be found, half pint of lager in hand (I was once told that buying halves made you look more feminine), dancing to Usher’s ‘Yeah’ with my friends in the corner of the local snooker club. I didn’t know it then, but those experiences were going to shape my view of beer forever. The Midlands is a place full of beer - whether the good, the bad or the ugly, it’s always beer. 

I was born in Woolwich, southeast London. My family moved to Nottingham when I was a baby. At the time, I had two older brothers and an older sister. My parents were in the throes of a divorce, and some of my earliest memories are of the two of them arguing. When I was three or four years old, my mum took us to live in Trinidad and Tobago in the Caribbean, to start again, I assume. My early memories are full of life in Trinidad: from full, sweet, ripe mangoes to the harsh cane licks disguised as discipline. I missed my granny a lot, and remember the packages she used to send us filled with British biscuits. 

I’m not sure why we came back - I’ve never asked. My mum had married again and had just given birth to my little sister. I remember well the shock of our return to England. It was cold - really cold. We moved back to Nottingham and in with Granny. At school, I was a weirdo, with Trinidadian habits that were not quite the same as those of the children of Nottingham. I was also clearly academically ahead. We moved around a lot after that, all over Nottingham. In total, I went to six different primary schools. They were mostly Catholic, but one was secular, Radford Primary. There I learned to play steel drums and had a best friend, a Hindu girl called Hemangi. I remember this school vividly. It was very different from the rest. There, I was introduced to other religions and different cultures. There were many children with disabilities, and I was 

quickly given the task of helping them with their reading. It was a poor area. For those of you that don’t know Nottingham, Radford is one of the most deprived areas in the city. 

By the time I got to secondary school, I was bright and minimally damaged. My mum’s second marriage was long over, and I was now one of eight children. I thrived in maths and the sciences, and was fiercely competitive in sports. I was one of the ‘free school meal’ kids, but I never let it bother me. In fact, the government support allowed me to do many things. I spent my EMA (Educational Maintenance Allowance) on driving lessons and got a grant to go to university. Throughout the years, my dad used to visit. He lived in Hull, and we sometimes used to go there, but mostly he came to Nottingham. We used to go out at the weekends to watch movies, go to Burger King, bowling and the like. My dad was a very intelligent man. He had a PhD in Physics and was often the smartest person in the room. I admired him greatly, and was devastated at his premature death at the age of forty-two. I was just sixteen years old. 

I remember choosing what course I should study at university. It was between English and a subject I didn’t really know anything about, Chemical Engineering. I really did consider studying English: I love to read. But I think my dad’s legacy shaped the way I wanted to be viewed in the end. I liked being a scientist. I liked the feeling it gave me. Chemical Engineering it was. 

Studying engineering really helped me. It taught me how to be methodical and logical, and how to problem-solve and think creatively. It also taught me how to use pumps and heat exchangers. It set me up perfectly for the technical side of 

brewing. I didn’t know it at the time, but I was building my foundations for a career in the beer industry. 

I moved to London in 2010. At the time, there were fourteen breweries in the capital. The Kernel Brewery was only just beginning and Camden Town Brewery was in its infancy. Wild Card Brewery started a couple of years later in 2012. First, we were based in our living room, then in the dingy cellar of a pub in Walthamstow, east London, where we swapped casks in exchange for rent. We quickly outgrew that space and moved to the Ravenswood Industrial Estate, in the posh part of E17 known as ‘Walthamstow Village’. 

All the while, the UK craft beer scene was bubbling underfoot. We were neighbours to Hackney Brewery, Brodies, Redemption, Beavertown, East London Brewery and a whole host of others. It was a very exciting time, with new breweries popping up across the country on what felt like a weekly basis. And we worked hard. Probably the hardest I’ve ever worked. Brew shifts. Bar shifts. Delivery shifts. Then all over again. Speak to any brewer, in any brewery across the world, and they’ll tell you it’s anything but easy work. 

As of 2020, there are 129 breweries in London. That gives you an idea of the growth: 115 new breweries have been started in the capital in as little as a decade. London was by no means in isolation: this pattern was repeated throughout the country. It was a real British brewing boom. 

In that time, I’ve brewed cask beers, lagers, pale ales, IPAs, stouts, barrel-aged beers, sours, low-ABV (alcohol by volume) beers and high-strength beers. I’ve bottled, kegged and canned, and brewed Belgian styles, German styles, American styles and historical styles. I’ve homebrewed, cuckoo-brewed, brewed on 

-litre kits and 10,000-litre kits, and many in between. I’ve done multiple collaborations and judged numerous competitions all over the world. I was lucky enough to be named the UK’s Brewer of the Year in 2018. There is no higher honour as a brewer - it’s like the brewing Oscars, if you will. 

Today, I am the Head Brewer at Wild Card Brewery, and in this book, I’m going to show you my tricks, tips and homebrew recipes. Although pale ales, stouts and everything in between are joys to brew, traditional ‘ales’ are not to be the focus of this book. We are going to be delving into the world of funk, into pellicles, bacteria and Brettanomyces - things that make beer sour. We are going to explore the joy that is barrel ageing and look at uncontrolled and wild fermentations. These beers are often seen as the pinnacle of brewing knowledge and prowess. They are viewed as mysterious by many, and finding books that contain all this information is difficult. I live a train journey away from Belgium, and am very lucky that I have ready access to some of the best wild brews in the world. I hope to share my love, enthusiasm and experiences with these beers. 

I recently had the opportunity to recreate a historical beer, a Tudor ale, for a BBC TV show. I love a challenge, so I set about researching ale recipes from the Tudor period in earnest. Tudor ales were brewed using malt that was typically dried with wood fires, which meant the malt would take on a smoky flavour. So that’s where we started. Using a hastily constructed smoker, I fired my base malt over wood chips. The ale turned out brown and smoky, and it soured quickly. We know that the technology needed to produce pale malt didn’t come until much later, hence the colour of the ale. The sourness, however, was interesting. My Tudor ale didn’t contain any hops, which are antibacterial in nature. Instead, it was made with a mixture of 

herbs and spices known as a ‘gruit’. In addition, it was common to store beer in wooden barrels, which almost certainly would have been riddled with microbes. In all likelihood, Tudor ale would have soured quickly. When I tasted the beer, it tasted so familiar, yet so foreign to my twenty-first-century palate. Our modern tastes are comparatively banal, I’m sure. Now, we are so used to clean brewing, with our stainless-steel vessels and our sterilising sprays. Long ago, long before brewing hygiene was fully understood, most ales would have had some semblance of funk. It’s this funk we are looking to understand - and to exploit. 

One of my first wild brews was De Ranke’s Kriek. An intense, deep red, cherry-blended lambic. It was superb. The beer was very fruity, but not overly sweet. In fact, it was the opposite, quite dry, with only a hint of cherry sweetness. It was sharp, sour and refreshing, with both an earthy underbelly and a vibrant cherry zing. It came wrapped in off-white thin paper, with the words ‘KRIEK DE RANKE’ printed on the front in large, bold red letters. Not an easy beer to walk past. I was hooked. 

I would have to say one of my favourite wild beers was actually a recent one. I try to make it a point to sample something new when I’m out and about, and this time I’m especially glad I did. I’d travelled to Amsterdam, where I was invited to talk at a conference. After a long day, I popped into Proeflokaal Arendsnest, an excellent bar in the centre of the city. I would highly recommend this bar; they had fifty-two beers on tap, and two of those were cask ales. One of the cask beers jumped out to me immediately: Lambiek, by Dutch brewers Vandenbroek. The beer blew me away. It was superbly balanced: tart, but in a gentle way, and just the right combination of fruity and funky, with a strong oak backbone. The lower carbonation and higher serving temperature from the cask seemed to suit the beer beautifully, bringing out some interesting flavours I didn’t even realize I’d missed in other chilled bottled lambics. I was truly in heaven that day. 

When brewing wild beers, do not be afraid to ask questions. I have learned so much from others, and you can, too. Most brewers are friendly folks, and will be more than happy to offer you tips. I recently met the Mikkeller Baghaven team and asked them dozens of questions while suppin’ on their Amphora fermented Danish wild ale. In essence, it’s good to compare notes. 

BARLEY, WATER, HOPS & YEAST 

The four ingredients needed to make beer are barley, water, hops and yeast. For the purposes of this book, I am going to briefly cover each ingredient, but I would advise anyone who is interested in brewing to read up further on all of them. To put it bluntly, you could write an entire book on each of these simple yet complex ingredients. 

There are some basic rules of thumb you should follow when brewing, and it’s perfectly possible to make spectacular beer without zooming in on the science. 

Fermentation is by no means a new process. For as long as there have been humans, we’ve been finding a way to make things alcoholic - whether intentionally or not. The word ‘ferment’ comes from the Latin ‘fervere’, literally meaning ‘to boil’. It’s easy to see why one would make that connection. The process of boiling does mimic some of the physicality of an active beer fermentation, albeit without the scalding heat that usually comes with a boil. It wasn’t until Louis Pasteur’s work in 1876 that the role yeast played in alcohol fermentation was fully understood. 

When I first started brewing, I was obsessed with wanting to control every tiny thing in the brewing process. And, to a certain extent, you probably can. Over time though, I learned that making great beer may be a science, but it is also an art. Beers today are ‘cleaner’ than they have ever been, but a beer can be technically flawless without necessarily being a great beer. The average adult has 2,000-4,000 taste buds on their tongue. No machine can truly replicate this. People all around 

the world are employed as tasters, because they can do what machines cannot. Your tongue is one of your most powerful weapons. The other is your nose. Both can be trained and moulded to learn to recognise positive and negative flavours and smells, which will help to improve your brews. I’ve included a chapter on negative beer flavours to guide you on this journey. 

I’ve found this book difficult to write. I’m very aware of my background. In my very core, I am a scientist. Trying to balance that with the flowery language necessary for an entertaining recipe book has been a challenge. So, in all candour, I made a decision to be true to myself: to write the book I would have wanted to read when I was starting out on my journey into wild beers. 

Yes, that does mean there is some science. I’ve tried to keep it to areas where it’s totally relevant. Understand, though, that for me, science is not a dirty word, but a friendly one. It’s an area in which I feel safe and comfortable. I’m also well aware that this may not be the case for many of you, and I would absolutely hate people to put this book down out of fear that it is too technical. So I hope that I’ve come to a healthy balance: that was certainly my aim. Feel free to delve straight into the recipes, or to read up more about the technical side in the subsequent chapters. That’s one of the fantastic things about beer: it welcomes all. 

BARLEY 

Barley is a type of cereal grain. It has been grown by humans around the world for thousands and thousands of years. The primary use of barley in the brewing process is as a source of sugar. It is the brewer’s job to extract the sugar from this cereal grain. 

MALTING 

In order for barley to be useful to the brewer, it has to go through the malting process. If you were to pick barley from the fields, then add hot water to it, very little would happen. The amount of sugar you would get out of the barley would be minimal. This is because barley in its raw form is very hard hurt-your-teeth hard. The malting process softens the barley and makes it a sugar source accessible to the brewer. 

It was down to the brewer to malt barley as well. These days, there is a whole other industry of people known as maltsters, whose job it is to do just that. They feed malted barley into the brewing industry and the whisky industry, as well as to the of all your favourite malty drinks and snacks (think Ovaltine and malted milk biscuits - nom nom). 

Having a working knowledge of the malting process is useful. Prior to arriving on your doorstep, the malted barley has gone through farmers, chemical engineers, chemists and biologists, all ensuring that it has been malted in just the right way to give you the sugar you need. Barley that has been poorly malted should now be the exception rather than the rule, and 

simply working with a reputable maltster can help you to avoid a lot of problems. 

The malting process loosely looks like this: 

1. Raw barley is usually stored in dry form, so the first step is to 

steep the raw barley in water. The water is then drained and the barley is allowed to rest in the air. The barley is then soaked in water again. This happens several times until the desired moisture content of the barley is reached. 

2. Barley begins to germinate, or to grow a little bit. A number 

of different enzymes are developed and the starch reserves, which the plant would ordinarily need for growth, become accessible. This is known as ‘modification’. 

3. Germination is purposefully stopped by applying heat and 

kilning the barley. 

4. The barley is then dried, so its moisture content is greatly 

reduced. 

5. The tiny rootlets growing out of the barley kernel are 

removed (they come off quite easily with a little agitation). 

6. The barley is then sent to the brewer, either whole or pre

crushed. 

THE CRUSH 

Either the maltster or the brewer will crush the grain in preparation for brewing. The aim is to break the barley kernel to give better access to the goodies contained within. It’s unlikely that you’ll have a grain mill at home, so it’s important you buy crushed malted barley when you make your purchase. 

The level to which the grain is crushed is also of importance. Is the crush fine, or is it coarse? This becomes important in both the mash and sparge stages of the brew, which I will explain below. During the mash, you mix crushed malted barley with hot water in a vessel called a mash tun. This process is commonly known as ‘mashing in’. Your primary aim is the conversion of the starches and carbohydrates in your malted barley into simple sugars using the enzymes already present in the barley. 

After leaving the barley and water for some time to get acquainted, you must then begin the process of separating the barley from your now sugar-laden water, which is known as the ‘wort’. 

More water is sprinkled over the barley to rinse off and capture any remaining sugars you’ve produced during the mash stage. This is known as ‘sparging’. Your wort has to be able to pass through the barley, so it’s important that your grain bed has good filterability. The crush of your malted barley will affect this filterability. It will also affect the amount of sugar you get per kilogram of malted barley - in other words, your mash efficiency. 

A finer crush means the enzymes in your malted barley will have an easier time and more sugars will be produced, but this comes at the expense of filterability. You’ll probably end up with a porridge-like mess, and it then becomes difficult to 

separate the grain from wort. Too coarse a crush, meanwhile, allows for greater fluid flow in between your grain, meaning you’ll be able to separate the grain from the wort easily, but this is at the expense of efficiency. A compromise between the two is what you’re looking for: good efficiency and good filterability. 

It is common for larger microbreweries to have a mill, which means they will buy whole malted barley and dictate the crush themselves. While advantageous in terms of both cost and brewing efficiency, dictating the crush of your barley is just not an option for most homebrewers. I would probably go as far as saying crushing your barley at home is an unnecessary barrier to a new homebrewer. Although, having said that, I have met several keen homebrewers who do crush their own grain. If you’ve got the desire and the equipment, why not? 

Do keep an eye on the quality of your crush when you receive your barley. If you’re doing everything else right, but are still ending up with a grain bed that won’t filter your wort, better known as the dreaded ‘stuck mash’, a poorly crushed barley could be the potential cause. 

A grain mill crushes the malted barley kernels directly into the mash as it is mixed with hot water. 

TYPES OF MALT 

There are many different types of malt used in brewing, from the lightest of pale malts to the dark, rich and intense black malt. 

The foundation of any beer recipe is its base malt. The base malt makes up the majority of your brewing grain and will be responsible for a large proportion of enzymatic activity and sugar produced in your mash. Different variations in kilning in the final stages of the malting process determines the wide variety of malt colours and flavours available. The amount you kiln a malt also determines its enzyme content and therefore the amount of sugar you will get from it. 

As a general rule, the lighter the malt in colour, the more sugar you will be able to extract from it. With darker malts, more enzymes are destroyed by the heating process, so these malts are used for their other attributes, mainly flavour and colour. 

LAGER MALT 

A malt with very low colour and high enzymatic activity, which means good sugar extraction. 

PALE MALT 

A low-colour malt that tends to give a light-straw to golden colour. Commonly used as a base malt, it has high enzymatic activity. 

VIENNA MALT 

Golden to amber in colour, this malt gives beer good body and mouthfeel. It has enough enzymatic activity to be used as a base malt, or it can be blended with other malts. 

AMBER MALT 

A lightly toasted malt that provides biscuity flavours, with a delicate toasted note and a crisp dryness. Dark golden to light brown in colour, this malt should be used in combination with other malts. 

MUNICH MALT 

This malt can add a dark golden to brown colour to your brew. It’s known as being full-flavoured and rich, and brings heavy bready and malty flavours to your beer. This malt also has a high level of enzymatic activity, so is great for starch conversion into sugars. 

CRYSTAL MALT 

This caramelised malt adds sweet, nutty, chewy, toffee and caramel flavours to your beer. It comes in a variety of colours, from the golden caramalts to the deep red of the dark crystal malts. With the right combinations, it’s fantastic for adding a true red colour to your brew. 

BROWN MALT 

This malt adds a smooth mouthfeel and brings nutty, chocolate and coffee flavours to dark beers. As you would expect, it adds a brown colour. When used lightly, it adds a dark amber hue. 

CHOCOLATE MALT 

This adds a dark chocolate flavour to your beers with low bitterness levels, and gives a rich deep-brown colour. It can make up up to 10 per cent of your malts. 

BLACK MALT 

The darkest of the coloured malts, this adds bitterness and intense notes of smoky coffee and cacao. It can be used lightly for its intense dark colour without the roasty flavours. 

SUPPLEMENTARY INGREDIENTS 

(ADJUNCTS) 

Although malted barley is the primary grain used in the production of beer, unmalted barley and other cereal grains, such as oats, rice, corn, rye, wheat, sorghum and millet (among others) can also be used to make beer. When they are used as a supplement ingredient to the main mash, these are known as ‘adjuncts’. 

UNMALTED BARLEY 

ROASTED BARLEY 

This unmalted barley is exactly what it sounds like: barley that has been roasted. It gives flavours of coffee and chocolate, with prominent burnt notes and a very present bitterness. It works well in combination with chocolate malt and can add an interesting complexity to your beer. 

I always use a healthy amount of roasted barley when brewing a stout. Be cautious when using it in quantities above 10 per cent of your grain bill as it can very easily overwhelm and dominate a recipe. 

FLAKED BARLEY 

An unmalted, cooked barley that is then dried and flattened, this is great for a nice, thick, creamy head, and can add excellent body and mouthfeel to your beer. Flaked barley adds an interesting grainy flavour, but it needs to be mixed with malted grains, as it doesn’t contain significant enzymes for starch conversion into sugar. 

TWO-ROW OR SIX-ROW BARLEY 

You may have heard of ‘two-row’ and ‘six-row’ barley. I want to touch on this briefly so you’re fully prepared when making your malt purchase. Six-row barley is typically grown in the US. It contains high levels of enzymes, which means that you can mix it with flaked rice and flaked corn in the mash and still get a good efficiency. Two-row malt is what is typically grown in the UK and Europe. It has a higher carbohydrate content than six-row, and a lower enzyme content. There is also a flavour difference between the two that must be noted. US six-row tends to add a grainier flavour, whereas the European two-row adds a maltier characteristic. 

Which one is better? Many times I have sat in malt conferences and heard someone proclaim that ‘the UK grows the best barley in the world’. But don’t just take a European’s word for it. Just like the skewed version of British history I learned as part of my Catholic upbringing (Guy Fawkes was a freedom fighter, apparently), as a UK brewer, I am obviously biased. If you are interested in experimenting with different grains to supplement your main mash, like rice or corn, then by all means give six-row malt a go. 

WHEAT 

WHEAT MALT 

Widely used in the production of wheat beers, this can be used as a base malt, forming up to 70 per cent of the main grist (the grist is the total crushed cereals used to make up your mash). Unlike barley, wheat does not contain a husk, so it suffers from poor filterability. I usually like to use wheat malt for between 40 and 45 per cent of the main grist when making a wheat-based beer to avoid issues when sparging. Wheat malt adds a haze to your beer, along with gentle bready and citrussy flavour notes. If used in small quantities, wheat malt can add body and a long-lasting head. 

TORREFIED WHEAT 

To ‘torrefy’ something means to heat it. Torrefied wheat has been heated until it ‘pops’, popcorn-like. This process exposes its internal starch, ready for starch conversion into sugars. Please note that torrefied wheat does require the presence of malt enzymes for starch conversion to occur. Torrefied wheat can form up to 10 per cent of your grist, but I like to use about 3 per cent for a nice, thick, creamy head. It adds a slight grainy flavour to your beer. 

FLAKED WHEAT 

An unmalted wheat. Added to the grist in quantities typically between 5-10 per cent, it is known for adding a crisp flavour to your beer. Good for foam stability and adds a thickness and a haze to your brew. 

OATS 

MALTED OATS 

Malted oats are exactly that: oats that have gone through the malting process. Malted oats are very versatile and can be used in a wide variety of beers. They add a velvety mouthfeel and a silky smooth body. They can typically form up to 20 per cent of your grist. Expect lower sugar extraction in malted oats compared to malted barley. 

FLAKED OATS 

Flaked oats are unmalted oats that have been heat- and pressure-treated. This gelatinises the starch, making it readily available for us brewers. Commonly found as regular porridge oats in supermarkets, oats can add what can only be described as a gummy propensity to your mash. If oats make up more than about 10 per cent of your grist, you need to take steps to counteract this, otherwise you may have issues with a stuck sparge later on. Holding your mash at a temperature of 4050°C (104-122°F) for 30 minutes, known as a ‘beta-glucan rest’, can help. You can also try adding rice hulls to increase your mash bed’s filterability. 

RYE 

Rye is often used for the rich mouthfeel and full palate it gives to beer. It also imparts a distinctive spicy flavour. Rye that has been malted is common, although be aware that rye is huskless, which means it makes poor filter material. If rye makes up more than about 20 per cent of your grist, you may want to add a mash filtration aid, such as rice hulls. Works wonderfully in malt forward beers, especially when used in conjunction with crystal rye malt. 

WATER 

Water is the lifeblood of beer. It makes up around 94 per cent of the content of a 5 per cent alcohol pint, yet in my experience, it is often the most overlooked brewing ingredient. 

Water, in almost all naturally occurring circumstances, will contain various substances, including dissolved gases, dissolved ions, microorganisms, pollutants and physical solids to name but a few. Prior to coming out of your tap, your water will have gone through several stages of water purification. Things like physical solids, harmful bacteria and heavy metals, such as lead, should all have been removed at your local water treatment plant. Here in the UK, what comes out of our taps is safe to drink. However, drinking water still contains plenty of things, from dissolved impurities to added disinfectants. The exact composition of your water will vary from place to place. 

Different beer styles have developed in different parts of the world often because of the chemical composition of the local water. It’s one of the reasons why London is known for its porter and the Czech Republic is known for its Pilsner. As brewers, we try to mimic the water composition that we know will produce a particular style of beer well. 

If you are at the beginning of your beer-making journey, I would suggest that brewing with pre-boiled tap water is a good place to start. Your brewing water should be clear, odourless and safe to drink. If you’d like to leave water treatment at that, then to you I say, Happy Brewing! If, however, you want to get more into the nitty gritty of water treatment, read on... 

GET YOUR WATER TESTED 

Water composition directly affects the flavour of beer. You could make exactly the same beer, side by side, but use different sources of water for each, and those two beers will probably taste different. Depending on the type of water in your immediate area, and the kind of beer you want to make, you will probably have to treat your water. 

Knowing the chemical make-up of your water is a great place to start. Most breweries will have had their water tested at some point, and will probably be happy to share the results, so ask your local brewery for that information. If that isn’t an option, talk to your water provider and they should be able to send you a report showing what’s in your water. It is also relatively cheap to send a sample of your water to a laboratory for testing. 

SENDING A SAMPLE OF WATER FOR TESTING 

Top tip: a shop-bought bottle of water makes the perfect sample container 

because... 

1. Empty the contents from your shop-bought bottle of water. 2. Rinse the bottle three times with your brewing water, then fill. 3. Send your labelled sample to your local brewer’s laboratory for testing. 

It is invaluable to obtain a laboratory analysis of your water in order to get a detailed breakdown of its chemical composition. 

INTERPRETING YOUR TEST RESULTS AND MAKING WATER ADJUSTMENTS 

Reading a water report can be a dazzling affair. However, if you’re starting with drinkable tap water, there’s really no need to be dazzled, as there are only six parameters we are interested in. They are: 

CHLORIDE 

CL -1 

SULPHATE 

SO -2 

ALKALINITY 

CACO 

HARDNESS 

CACO 

CALCIUM 

CA + 

MAGNESIUM 

M +2 

I always find it useful to bear in mind how certain dissolved compounds present in your water will directly affect the flavour of your beer. You can use this as a rough guide: 

•  Chloride - affects the fullness, mouthfeel and body of your 

beer. 

• Sulphate - affects the dryness and crispness of your beer, 

and accentuates hops and bitterness. 

• Alkalinity - affects the pH: high levels can lead to flabby, 

dull-finished beer. 

• Hardness - can cause scale on heating surfaces, which can 

lead to burnt notes on beer if left unchecked. 

• Calcium - affects your beer’s stability, clarity and flavour. 

•  Magnesium - affects the performance of your yeast, as it’s 

an important yeast nutrient. 

ADJUSTING CHLORIDE & SULPHATE 

One of the easiest ways to demonstrate the effect that water treatment has on the body, balance and flavour of your beer is to change the amount of chloride and sulphate present in your brewing water. 

High chloride levels add a fullness and sweetness to your beer, while high sulphate levels will add the perception of puckering dryness and a bitter accent. So, the two have opposite effects on the flavour of your beer. More important than the total sulphate and chloride content of your brewing water is the ratio between the two. A 3:1 sulphate-to-chloride ratio will generally give you a drier beer, perfectly suited to British bitters, whereas a 1:2 sulphate-to-chloride ratio will give you a much softer beer, much more appropriate for milds and the more modern, low-bitterness, heavily hopped IPAs. 

I do have fun playing around with the sulphate-to-chloride ratios in my brewing water. In my opinion, adjusting this ratio can create some of the most noticeable changes in your beers. I have had particular success with a sulphate-to-chloride ratio of 1:1; I find it offers a nice compromise between the benefits of chloride and sulphate ions in your beer. In essence, feel free to play around here - there are big flavour gains to be had. 

Acceptable chloride levels in your brewing water are between 0-250mg/l. Sulphate levels should be in the region of 50-350mg/l, with less bitter beers on the lower end of that scale, and the higher end reserved for beers with more prominent bitterness. You can use calcium chloride flakes to increase chloride and calcium - this will also slightly lower the pH of your mash. Calcium sulphate (gypsum) will increase your calcium and sulphate levels and add a dry crispness to your beer. Magnesium sulphate (Epsom salts) will increase the 

magnesium and sulphate levels of your beer, and will also help with your beer’s crispness. 

Sodium chloride (yes, table salt) can be a useful addition to adjust your chloride levels and increases palate fullness. Be careful to keep any sodium chloride additions to below 280mg/l to avoid your beer taking on a more ‘salty’ flavour. 

Your local homebrewing shop will have these salts. Ask for a specification sheet, which will tell you how much you should add for an increase in the desired ion. Add your salts directly to your grain when mashing in, not to your water. 

mg/l=1ppm (parts per million). 

ADJUSTING ALKALINITY 

Alkalinity is a property of water and describes the water’s ability to resist changes in pH. Low levels of alkalinity are preferred for most beer styles. Generally, you want your water to contain less than 50mg/l alkalinity (CaCO). High levels of alkalinity in your brewing water can cause a high pH throughout your brew and can lead to flavour issues, especially when making pale beers. A finished beer whose pH is too high tastes ‘flabby’ and unfocused - dull. And that’s never a flavour we are going for. 

One of the easiest ways to reduce your alkalinity is to add an acid to your brewing water. The most common options are sulphuric acid or lactic acid. Your local homebrewing shop should sell these acids, which should come with instructions for dosing rates. Lactic acid has many uses in beer making and is generally referred to as simply lactic acid. In beer circles, however, I’ve found that sulphuric acid is often disguised under a commercial name, so watch out for that. 

It’s important to remember that when acidifying your water, there is not a specific pH you need your brewing water to reach. The relationship between the pH of your brewing water and the pH of the mash is by no means a direct one. The chemistry is complex. The most important factor is the overall pH of your mash. This is one of those basic rules of thumb: if you manage to get your mash pH to between 5.2 and 5.5, you’ve done good. 

Another technique for reducing alkalinity is to add a kilned or roasted malt to your mash. A good example of an area with high alkalinity in the water is London, where I happen to do the majority of my brewing. In order to make a porter, you require barley that has been roasted. The roasting process acidifies the malt slightly, and that acidic malt combined with high-alkaline 

London water creates excellent conditions to make a porter. In essence, as a homebrewer in London, you can make a cracking porter or a luscious stout without adjusting your water in any way before brewing. If you were to try to make a lager or a pale ale under the same conditions, though, it probably won’t be great. 

If you want to make a light beer, you can also use acidulated malt. Acidulated malt is made using lactic acidproducing bacteria. In general, 1 per cent acidulated malt in your grist will lower the pH of your mash by 0.1. In areas where there is high alkalinity, it’s not uncommon for acidulated malt to form up to 10 per cent of your grain bill. 

If you are brewing in an area with low alkalinity and you want to make dark beers with lots of roasted malts, you may need to increase your brewing water’s alkalinity in order to get the pH of your mash into the 5.2-5.5 golden zone. You can add calcium carbonate or sodium bicarbonate (bicarbonate of soda) directly to your mash in order to raise its pH. 

Buy yourself a pH meter. Hitting certain pH targets throughout your brew will let you know that you are on the right track, and this will ultimately lead to better beer. If you don’t want to spend the money (and let’s face it, you may not want to stretch to the expense of a pH meter if you’re a casual homebrewer), then buy pH strips. They won’t be as accurate, but they are cheap. You can buy narrow-band pH strips, i.e. 4.6-6.2 pH, which will keep you on track throughout your brew. 

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