Is any calcium or magnesium left after mashing?

[Bullhog]

Hey everyone! So I have been reading a lot of water chemistry lately. I've mostly finished the BA Water book, and I started wondering if any Calcium (and magnesium for same reason) is left over after mashing. So hear me out here:

Calcium and magnesium react with phosphates in the malt to lower alkalinity/ph. The malt has way more than enough phosphates to react with the calcium and magnesium at any level (mostly). So I was wondering if there was any leftover or unused calcium/magnesium to help with other beer aspects. I know that you need both, so I assume that not all is used up, I just was hoping someone would verify.

Edit: I wanted to add that this interests me because if there is in fact no, or very little, left over, I was wondering about the benefits of adding the minerals back with topoff water.

 

[Silver_Is_Money]

It appears that only about a ballpark of 36% of the calcium in mash water complexes with phosphates. And malt contains an over-abundance of magnesium.

http://thirdleapbrew.com/technical/ward-labs-mineral-analysis-of-tree-house-julius/

 

[couchsending]

Post 33 in this thread is all you need to know in regards to what happens to calcium during the process.

https://discussions.probrewer.com/f...sponsorship/7800-calcium-beyond-mash-ph/page3

malt adds lots of minerals on its own but that doesn’t mean your water doesn’t need more.

There have also been quite a few studies that measure the malt contributed ions and how they change after mashing, boiling, and fermentation. However I’ve never seen a study on the ions contributed by hops. We know they generally add alkalinity as they increase pH but that’s about it.

edit: what isn’t discussed in post 33 is Ca loss in the mash if using acid to adjust as well as Ca.

 

[VikeMan]

It appears that only about a ballpark of 36% of the calcium in mash water complexes with phosphates. And malt contains an over-abundance of magnesium.

http://thirdleapbrew.com/technical/ward-labs-mineral-analysis-of-tree-house-julius/

Couple of things about that analysis.
- The difference between the beer calcium and wort calcium was actually -26% (the blogger did the math backwards)
- It ignores the calcium contribution of the malt itself (or rather, it's unspecified and hidden in the numbers)

ETA: In the first point above, I'm referring to the "Julius" numbers and not the Tonsmeire numbers.

 

[Bullhog]

what isn’t discussed in post 33 is Ca loss in the mash if using acid to adjust as well as Ca.

I do that, everything appears to be working fine for me, but I guess you really don't know that unless you are conducting a lot of experiments, which I am not. Could you share some thoughts on adding both?

 

[Bullhog]

It appears that only about a ballpark of 36% of the calcium in mash water complexes with phosphates. And malt contains an over-abundance of magnesium.

http://thirdleapbrew.com/technical/ward-labs-mineral-analysis-of-tree-house-julius/

Thanks for sharing this! I wish there was a lot more analysis like this out there.

 

[Bullhog]

Thank you everyone for your input. My question is answered. Yes, there is still calcium left over, but this brings up a good follow up, is the minimum recommended 50ppm calcium too low? what about in pilsners?

 

[Silver_Is_Money]

Thank you everyone for your input. My question is answered. Yes, there is still calcium left over, but this brings up a good follow up, is the minimum recommended 50ppm calcium too low? what about in pilsners?

I used to think this way also, but in reality there is no magic minimum of 50 ppm for calcium. For a Bohemian Pilsner you may want 20-40 maximum ppm calcium. People have made beer with distilled water and no added minerals. Malt has some level of inherent calcium.

Also, if your strategy is to sparge and I follow a no-sparge strategy, then my 50 ppm calcium contains twice as much calcium in the mash as does yours, provided that your mash and sparge water volumes are each half of my single mash water volume. PPM is very deceptive. mEq is a far better measure.

 

[FswBG]

Thank you everyone for your input. My question is answered. Yes, there is still calcium left over, but this brings up a good follow up, is the minimum recommended 50ppm calcium too low? what about in pilsners?

Do you use yeast nutrient to account for loss during the mash? Most DP nutrients includes biotin, pantothenic acid, calcium, magnesium, potassium, and zinc which should give you peace of mind. I don't know the exact quantity needed based on the variance from water additions (strike/sparge) to the time the YN addition at the end of the boil however.