my water profile and what do you think

[the lizard king]

ph 8.2
sodium 12
potassium 2
calcium 16
magnesium 3
total hardness 53
nitrate 0.4
sulfate 10
chloride 11
carbonate 3
bicarbonate 31
toatal alkalinity 30
so my question is, with this profile I would take salts and minerals bought from the lbs and add to clone a certian water profile like belguim. basically using a brew water calc until the levels meat the same of the default water profiles like on beer smith. after doing this should I still go ahead and add my ph stabilizer to the mash or would that throw off the minerals that I added already? this stuff gets so confusing, anyone know any good reading about this that is not totally scientifically confusing?

[ajdelange]

This water is pretty soft. I'd add a tsp of CaCl2.2H2O per 5 gallons and leave it at that. I really have come to believe that trying to tailor water to a particular location should be left to advanced brewers.

There is an attmept to simplify the whole thing at http://www.homebrewtalk.com/f128/brewin ... er-198460/ so you may want to look at that.

[jwatkins56550]

Looks pretty similar to my water in NC.

If you are just starting to mess with water, just adjust your calcium levels....its very important, and the levels for brewing are wide, so adding a little too much won't hurt...

If you are making a malt forward beer, add calcium with Calcium Chloride
For a hoppy beer, add calcium with Gypsum

Try and shoot for at least 40ppm calcium with your additions.

If you are adding salts to your mash, then don't add a pH stabilizer.

If you want more info give a listen to the brewstrong water-ganza shows!

[dmtaylor]

Your water is super-soft -- it's close to Pilsen water, or distilled! You can build whatever kind of water you like from it. During the beginning of the mash, check your pH and add stabilizer only if needed. You may find you need salts plus pH stabilizer for lighter beers, but probably don't need any salts or stabilizer for darker beers, unless you want salts for flavor purposes or authenticity.