Burton Pale Ale using Brewlabs Burton Yeast

[Fallen]

I'm planning to brew a Burton-style Pale Ale at the weekend using Brewlabs Burton Ale Yeast. Although it sounds wrong, I want to achieve that strangely appealing sulphurous aroma.

I used Graham's water treatment calculator and set the criteria as 'Burton Pale Ale'. However, the values from Graham's calculator conflict with what I was sent by the very helpful folks at Brewlab.

I sent Brewlabs the Charlbury and West Oxfordshire water report which lists the key figures as:
Hardness (CaCO3) 280 mg/l
Chloride as Cl 35 mg/l
Sodium as Na 20.3 mg/l

I've also measured alkalinity as 180mg/l using the salifert kit

Brewlabs instructions:
Hello Paul,
To Burtonise your water, use the CRS advisory sheet as issued by your supplier to reduce the alkalinity to around 30 – 50mg/l.
For liquor salts, these need to be added to the grist prior to mashing.
Each litre of Burton Ale wort produced requires:
Calcium Sulphate: 0.91grams
Calcium Chloride: 0.26 grams
This will give 303mg/l of calcium, 400mg/l sulphate and 200mg/l of chloride. You can add a little magnesium sulphate, replace around 0.2grams/litre of the calcium sulphate with 0.2grams/litre magnesium sulphate for authenticity although not necessary.

This is where my confusion starts i.e. what minerals (and when to add them) to try to replicate the mineral content of Burton water.

I'll be adding CRS to bring alkalinity down to 30-50 as recommended and I'll treat mash and sparge water in the same way.
BUT: What volume do I set as the required volume to be treated for the other minerals (which I'll be adding to the grist prior to mashing)? Do I set the volume to be treated as strike water volume, brew length volume (40L) or pre-boil wort volume?

If I use the brew length volume of 40L as the volume to be treated, the recommended mineral additions are:

Graham's calculator: 11.66g Calcium Sulphate, 8g Calcium Chloride, 8.11g Magnesium Sulphate.

Brewlabs instructions: 28.4g Calcium Sulphate, 10.4g Calcium Chloride, 8g Magnesium Sulphate.

So, the only significant difference in recommended additions from the two sources is the amount of Gypsum? Am I working this out properly and are my assumptions right in using the brew length as the 'volume to be treated' criteria?

[Aleman]

You treat all the water for CRS and only the final brew length for mineral salt additions. . . . assuming you add all the minerals to the HLT at the beginning.

You calculations look correct to me . . .of course the assumption is that the water than the 'brewery' in Burton has water that is naturally high in sulphate . . . which may or may not be true

[Fallen]

Cheers Aleman

What's the general concensus on when to add the minerals? I thought CRS in the HLT, everything else in the mash?

Also, should I go with Graham's calculator or Brewlabs recommendations on the amounts?

[steve_flack]

I think you missed Aleman's suggestion that you might not actually want to replicate Burton water.

In any event I add half the salts in the mash and half in the boil. But maybe that's just me.

[Fallen]

I think you missed Aleman's suggestion that you might not actually want to replicate Burton water.

I read the comment but the significance is lost on me. Is it a reference to the decline of Burton as a brewing town and the outsourcing of production elsewhere (with different water profiles)? Happy to be enlightened.

[Aleman]

The published water profiles may not actually be the water the breweries actually brewed with . . . as many brewery wells came from different water bearing strata . . . hence my suggestion.

I see no point in trying to replicate a published' brewing profile exactly, as it is difficult to know just what tricks the brewers are playing when they brew. I simply aim to add an additional 150ppm calcium to my calcium poor liquor, and decide if I want to use calcium sulphate or calcium chloride depending on do I want hops or malt accentuated. . . . in your case you are going for a gypseous liquor. . . I have hit massive amounts of gypsum in a beer with no significant problems and the brewlab recommendations are inside that so you should be fine with the Brewlab recommendations, which are not way out there.

It is normal practice to treat all of the liquor with CRS . . . and then to add all of the brewing salts to the HLT . . although adding them to the mash would work just as well. personally I treat my mash Liquor, and then add the satlts for the sparge liquor directly to the boil . . . but that is just me.

[Fallen]

Thanks again Aleman. Makes perfect sense now.