Brewing with strange fruit

[WalesAles]

Is chalk a good investment for the brew box?

Hello Brewtalk,
Happy New Year!
Chalk is good for writing your stuff on the beer shed wall! Then wipe it off!
Only joking! Couldn`t resist!
WA

[jmc]

.........
I wish you luck in achieving malo-lactic fermentation Jim, cheers for the link on acid acidity and malo-lactic bacterial culture (didn't know it existed cheers) your a legend very helpful. I decided to test Potassium carbonate i set off two batches one with Potassium carbonate with grapefruit juice(concentrate and tanning turbo grapefruit lol) and the other with apples and grapefruit zest no Potassium carbonate just tanning.

Thanks for all the comments on options of correcting acidity very helpful, i would never thought bi carbonate of soda would be viable in brewing? this hobby is limitless i am wondering about other cooking ingredients you could use for interesting results, have a happy homebrew new year!

The 75/25 mixes came out beautiful, bottle matured and yum thanks for the tip, i had an idea for strawberry and kiwi cider? that is for next year tho, i also got some more hops in i got one called "progress" never heard of it so i got 100grams for the future testing, also got cascade and citra so I'm good and stocked up for now.

I saw chalk in my local brew shop i was tempted to try? i decided against it and bought things i needed. Is chalk a good investment for the brew box?

edit - my spelling why are you so bad? i need to read more books next year.

Glad the 75/25 AJ/Grapefruit juice mix came out well. I've not tried that so its on the to-do list.

I've no direct experience but just going by what I've read potassium carbonate affects flavour the least when used to reduce acidity (compared to chalk = calcium carbonate). If you can't get hold of potassium carbonate, chalk will certainly reduce acidity (as will sodium b-carbonate), but with any of then I'd to a trial sample before using on your whole brew.

Good luck with your future experiments.
ATB John

[brewtalk]

Hello Brewtalk,
Happy New Year!
Chalk is good for writing your stuff on the beer shed wall! Then wipe it off!
Only joking! Couldn`t resist!
WA[/quote]

Thats funny, more of a fan of marker pens as i can't wipe it off keep up the good humor man my grammama is getting better my verbs are making sense now.

Jim they're only 4.5 liter test batchs to try and sample, i only used half a tea spoon the test of potassium carbonate as test run, the batch with potassium carbonate took quite quickly less then 14 hours no yeast starter?

[CJR]

Is chalk a good investment for the brew box?

I have to say I'm not sure, considering you have potassium carbonate.

Potassium carbonate - K2CO3.
Calcicum carbonate - CaCO3.

They're pretty much the same thing, with the carbonate being the main component that (I believe) will affect the brew.

[brewtalk]

Is chalk a good investment for the brew box?

I have to say I'm not sure, considering you have potassium carbonate.

Potassium carbonate - K2CO3.
Calcicum carbonate - CaCO3.

They're pretty much the same thing, with the carbonate being the main component that (I believe) will affect the brew.

Chemistry isn't my strongest skill its good to get confirmation that i don't need chalk when i have potassium carbonate, The test batch is still blupping away so i will have results soon cause I'm curious?

I saw the CaCO3 it reminds me of the water treatment spreadsheets when you test your local water supply and see if additions are needed for stouts,porters,ipa's etc would this stuff be useful for water correction? say reduces alkalinity?

edit- my typing skills are getting worse at the moment

[jmc]

Both Potassium & Calcium Carbonate will do the same job in reducing acidity.

Some say Potassium Carbonate has less of a 'chalky' taste.