Lee_M Senior Member Joined: 2 Dec 2012 Posts: 42 Location: Los Angeles Expertise: I live coffee
Grinder: Baratza Encore Drip: V60 Roaster: Popper
Posted Fri Mar 1, 2013, 1:23pm Subject: Re: Who understands water?
My suggestion was mostly out of curiosity, not actual knowledge. I certainly wouldn't suggest adding hardness to your water if you're making espresso, but if you're just brewing coffee and not getting any scaling, I think it'd be interesting to see if you could make better coffee with water adjustments. We know that chloride and sulfate have a major impact on beer flavor. Why not give it a shot? Compare unadulterated water with (1) a calcium chloride addition and (2) a calcium sulfate addition.
tdifraia Senior Member Joined: 13 Dec 2012 Posts: 77 Location: Boston Expertise: Just starting
Espresso: QM67 Grinder: Baratza Vario Drip: Bunn
Posted Fri Mar 1, 2013, 1:28pm Subject: Re: Who understands water?
Excellent point. I would think it would change the taste for the better.
Lee_M Said:
My suggestion was mostly out of curiosity, not actual knowledge. I certainly wouldn't suggest adding hardness to your water if you're making espresso, but if you're just brewing coffee and not getting any scaling, I think it'd be interesting to see if you could make better coffee with water adjustments. We know that chloride and sulfate have a major impact on beer flavor. Why not give it a shot? Compare unadulterated water with (1) a calcium chloride addition and (2) a calcium sulfate addition.
Posted Fri Mar 1, 2013, 2:38pm Subject: Re: Who understands water?
Lee_M Said:
My suggestion was mostly out of curiosity, not actual knowledge. I certainly wouldn't suggest adding hardness to your water if you're making espresso, but if you're just brewing coffee and not getting any scaling, I think it'd be interesting to see if you could make better coffee with water adjustments. We know that chloride and sulfate have a major impact on beer flavor. Why not give it a shot? Compare unadulterated water with (1) a calcium chloride addition and (2) a calcium sulfate addition.
I'd add crushed eggshells. Add calcium carbonate alone, and let the acidity of the coffee dissolve the calcium during brewing. This is something proven to change the taste of coffee with blind tasting.
Since you have brewed beer, you know how salty calcium chloride is... my stomach turns thinking of it in coffee. ROFLOL.
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D4F Senior Member Joined: 15 Mar 2012 Posts: 1,194 Location: USA Expertise: I like coffee
Espresso: Gaggia Classic PID Grinder: Preciso
Posted Fri Mar 1, 2013, 2:50pm Subject: Re: Who understands water?
Netphilosopher Said:
I'd add crushed eggshells. Add calcium carbonate alone, and let the acidity of the coffee dissolve the calcium during brewing. This is something proven to change the taste of coffee with blind tasting.
Well, let's say you want to get to 150ppm TDS. You're at 132ppm, so you want to add 18ppm of salts. 1ppm = 1mg/l. If you were using pure calcium chloride or calcium sulfate, you'd want to add 18mg per liter of water. However, the salts you can buy are usually the dihydrate form of calcium chloride and calcium sulfate, meaning they contain two molecules of water per molecule of salt. This works out to about 20% of the molecular mass of calcium sulfate, and 25% of calcium chloride. Therefore, to add 18ppm TDS, you'll need to add ~23mg per liter of calcium sulfate, or ~24mg per liter of calcium chloride. That'll still leave you with very soft water, and may not have a detectable flavor impact. You'll need a scale accurate to at least 10mg (unless you want to treat very large volumes of water), but you can get one for ten bucks these days.
You can also try to match some of the target water profiles on the brewing calculator, listed under Water Target Report. Most of these have considerably higher levels of calcium, chloride, and sulfate. To use the calculator, just choose your total water volume, input your water report under Source Water, then play around with different salt additions until you match the target. Adding gypsum (calcium sulfate dihydrate) will increase calcium and sulfate levels, while adding calcium chloride will increase calcium and chloride levels. In beer, sulfate is said to enhance bitterness, while chloride is said to enhance sweetness, but I don't know if it has the same effect in coffee.
Calcium carbonate, AKA chalk, will increase calcium levels as well as alkalinity. I expect that adding eggshells to brewed coffee would change the flavor mainly by raising its pH.
Well, let's say you want to get to 150ppm TDS. You're at 132ppm, so you want to add 18ppm of salts....Therefore, to add 18ppm TDS, you'll need to add ~23mg per liter of calcium sulfate, or ~24mg per liter of calcium chloride. That'll still leave you with very soft water, and may not have a detectable flavor impact.
I don't know exactly what it is about this subject but I feel like a useless moron whenever I try to understand it. When I was a homebrewer our tap water was nasty so I started with R/O and made additions based on what I had read elsewhere. I didn't really understand what I was doing. I still don't.
If this was your water, would you do anything? If so, what?
Lee_M Senior Member Joined: 2 Dec 2012 Posts: 42 Location: Los Angeles Expertise: I live coffee
Grinder: Baratza Encore Drip: V60 Roaster: Popper
Posted Tue Mar 5, 2013, 10:13pm Subject: Re: Who understands water?
Well, here's the thing. I've never adjusted my water for coffee (beyond filtering), and hence don't really know if you SHOULD do anything. But it's something I've been meaning to try for awhile, so I encourage you to do so as an experiment. I'd do it myself, but I'm waiting on a water report for my new place. Check back with me in a month.
There are two ways that you could approach this. A cautious approach would be to try the additions I recommended for 150ppm TDS. This will certainly make good coffee, but you might not be able to taste the difference.
More radical adjustments to your water are more likely to make your coffee better, but also more likely to make it worse. I just don't know. I haven't done the experiments yet, and I don't have access to any good information on this matter. If you want to try something that will probably make a tastable difference, I would try matching the Balanced Profile. 0.13g/l of calcium chloride and 0.12g/l of calcium sulfate will you get you there. Bear in mind that this will put you at about 350ppm TDS, and you may start to see scaling.
jpender Senior Member Joined: 11 Jul 2011 Posts: 402 Location: California Expertise: I like coffee
Grinder: Kyocera CM-50 Vac Pot: S/S Moka Pot Drip: Aeropress
Posted Wed Mar 6, 2013, 8:26pm Subject: Re: Who understands water?
Lee_M Said:
Well, here's the thing. I've never adjusted my water for coffee (beyond filtering), and hence don't really know if you SHOULD do anything. But it's something I've been meaning to try for awhile, so I encourage you to do so as an experiment. I'd do it myself, but I'm waiting on a water report for my new place. Check back with me in a month.
There are two ways that you could approach this. A cautious approach would be to try the additions I recommended for 150ppm TDS. This will certainly make good coffee, but you might not be able to taste the difference.
More radical adjustments to your water are more likely to make your coffee better, but also more likely to make it worse. I just don't know. I haven't done the experiments yet, and I don't have access to any good information on this matter. If you want to try something that will probably make a tastable difference, I would try matching the Balanced Profile. 0.13g/l of calcium chloride and 0.12g/l of calcium sulfate will you get you there. Bear in mind that this will put you at about 350ppm TDS, and you may start to see scaling.
I appreciate the time you've spent thinking and posting about this.
What I get is that: (a) you say you're not a water expert; (b) minor adjustments to attempt to match coffee brewing ideals will probably result in indetectable changes, taste-wise; (c) doing crazy-shit to the water might help, will probably hurt, but could be fun. Might as well throw some tofu in there and see if it improves the flavor.
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