Does pH adjustment make a better tasting beer?

well, breweries don't stay within 5.3-5.6 for nuthin'
camp out with some gypsum and baking soda or higher ph water on board to adjust mash up or down if nec.. imo ph is just like a number of other steps that can be shortcutted or not, but those steps add up either way and thats how you should look at it... 1 shortcut + no biggie... 2 shortcuts bigger.. etc etc

 

@Shawn3997 I used to live in LR, were you at Vinos or one of the new places (can't remember their names but went to several before leaving state.). Or are you in NWA?

I would go out on a limb to say that likely yhe bitter you are picking up is more from the brewing process than the pH. If they were sloppy in the sparge process and allowed husks into the boil= bitter tannin bite. Types of grain used can also offer higher tannins that you might be picking up.

Are you using tap or filtered/RO water in brewing?

While I noticed the water wasn't great in AR, it doesn't taste bad. That said water sources in AR are covered by oak trees (I used to be a water production tech), which oak is high in tannins obviously, and those tannins aren't necessarily stripped out in the water production process.

Another factor I noticed with most AR beers and brewing- temperature control. It's fuggin HOT in AR, hot temps create all sorts of off flavors. Make sure you ferment in winter (nov/dec/jan) unless you have a fermentation chamber/fridge. Most of the local brews I noticed down there tasted to me like they were all fermented too hot (like my beer that I ferment my garage in the hot PNW summers at 80+*.).

Just some ideas, this is the fun part of homebrewing- troubleshooting!

 

My 2 cents. If your past batches of homebrews taste excellent to you then don't bother with water pH tinker. If over and over again you are following recipes of various styles and something tastes not quite right with your beers, then pursuing water pH adjustments might be worth pursuing.

 

Most water sources work well for certain styles of beers but not others (if not treated). I wonder if that is why certain beers have developed and become popular in certain areas and not others...

 

That was true for the olden days. Now Brewers can adjust the water in many ways and brew what they want.

Mash pH is very important. Finished beer pH is very important. I have adjusted finished beer pH to enhance the flavor perception.

 

That is why I put if not treated in parentheses. I 100% agree with what you said

 

Well, dark beers were what they made a drank in Munich. The ground water, surface and shallow wells, has a fair amount of alkalinity.

Now they drink Helles. Many breweries have deep wells that bring up soft water from an aquifer that originates in the Alps (Ayinger's is roughly 1900-2000 ft deep). They also used sauergut or acid malt to adjust the mash pH down. They also have a shallow well and blend some of that water in for Dunkels.

Yeah, we agree.

 

I wonder how long brewers have been manipulating the chemistry of water. Many of the things they have historically done in the brewing process were done before they probably understoodd the chemistry/science behind it (yeast being a prime example). Thanks for the post. Do you know how long they have been doing that for?

Gotta love the most underated part of brewing (water), which usually makes up over 90% of the beer. I did not pay any attention to it up until a couple years ago (been brewing for 7 or so years). Now I distill my own water and add salts to try and create the water profile of my choice. I think it makes a difference in the beer.

On a side note, the three most important things in brewing in my opinion are yeast (type, fermentation temperature, health, oxygen, etc.) water, and sanitation. As a new brewer 95% of my thought used to go towards malt and hops with no or little concern with water or many yeast factors. I think most new home brewers are the same way.

I am amazed how well our early beers came out. They were not as good as the beers we make now for the most part. I think it is a credit to our sanitation and also to the incredible power of yeast. We used to just shake the wort to aerate and pitch 2 packages of liquid yeasts (sometimes they were old). Fermented between 60-75 degrees. No treatment of water and it still came out okay.

Just found this, thought I would share with others. Just started reading it:

http://allaboutbeer.com/it’s-the-water/

 

Ayinger's brewer. Is from the lite 1990s, and the wells are there. The old brewhouse is in the town, and I don't know what they had for wells there.

Water chemistry was figured out for the most part in the late 1800s. There was probably some lag for it to become accepted and implemented. With that I will say that there are some new breweries that don't adjust, and the beers suffer for that.