Water: A Comprehensive Guide for Brewers (Brewing Elements)

This book is very technical and includes many long and drawn out math formulas that take a page or more to process. The author does an excellent job of covering water chemistry at an exhaustive level. The author takes the time to give a math formula for each water chemistry ingredient of importance and then works through that formula with a popular beer brand as an example. This book brings up more questions as it gives answers but it also provides the tools to get the job done. The author does an excellent job of providing trouble shooting guides for how to balance water chemistry adjustments. He explains at length how one adjustment may affect another adjustment and ultimately change the beers flavor for better or for worse. The basic instruction outline is as follows: 1. Get a water analysis report for your brewing water source. 2. Pick a popular style or brand of beer which you want to target for flavor profile and look at that cities water analysis report. 3. Adjust your water PH/Chemistry to match the water PH/Chemistry of that city. 4. Make the first test batch of beer, to determine the initial flavor outcome. 5. Make additional batches of beer and use the math formulas to tweak chemical additions until the beer tastes perfect. The authors advice is to start with water that has been treated through reverse osmosis since it is a “blank slate” to work with. If reverse osmosis purified water is not available, then distilled water is the next best option. If you start with a blank slate water source, then it is fairly easy to add chemicals until the water resembles the chemistry of the famous brewing cities where your desired style or brand of beer is made. Once your water chemistry matches the chemistry of your favorite brewery city, then you can keep working the math formulas and experimenting with the chemical additions amounts until you are satisfied with the beers final flavor. If you start with a non "blank slate" (like your local tap water) source then you are much more limited in the amount of chemical adjustments that you can make to the water before you reach maximum amounts. This book can only guide you in the right direction for altering your water chemistry. It doesn't give any specific instructions about how to adjust water chemistry to suite a specific beer type. It can't tell you how to perfectly match a beer or beer style since each brewery may change their water chemistry before brewing. They may start with tap water from the city water source but they may adjust the water chemistry in the brew house before brewing. There is no way to know for sure which chemicals they change. The good news is that starting with matching the city water analysis report will get you close enough to begin and then you can use the many many formulas to tweak your water chemistry until you’re happy with the final beer taste.

I'm only into Chapter 4 and I have already got my money's worth from the book in regards to information. While it is a very dry read (pun sort of intended), the information in it is fairly easy to understand. There are obvious topics in here that are geared more towards the professional brewer, with topics about brewery wastewater treatment and high end filtration; but the first seven chapters out of 10 will benefit the homebrewer. Many homebrewers are looking for the "how do I" when it comes to water adjustments, but I come from the camp that wants to know why. Without an understanding of why you are doing something, you don't really understand the changes you are making. I have found a lot of resources online tell you how to adjust your water to met specific numbers, but don't really explain the correlation between the changes you are making. Be warned though, if you are not really looking for a deeper understanding of water and it's influence on brewing. You may be disappointed in the book. The actual "how to" is chapter 7, which in my opinion, from flipping through the chapter, would be worth the money for the book alone. But again, I think you are missing out on the point of the book because there is plenty of "how to" information on the web. One person on here so far has said this book is not geared towards the homebrewer, and I think that statement is incorrect. This book is just way more than they were probably looking for in regards to information. Only the last 3 chapters are not geared towards the homebrewer. Well, some of chapter 8 may apply but mostly just the first 7 chapters benefit the homebrewer. With that said, the whole "Brewing Elements Series" from brewer's publications has been very technical so I don't expect anything less. EDIT: Now that I have finished the book my opinion has not changed. I found the most helpful chapters to be chapters 6 (controlling alkalinity) and 7 (how to adjust water) by far. The only gripe I have is from other reviews around the web about the book being too technical and so on, or wondering why it covers things that homebrewers don't need. The answer is because the book is not geared strictly to the homebrewer. I know we are used to most of the books about brewing that we have access to, to be just for the home brewer. But all of the brewing elements series of books are geared towards both the homebrewer and the pro. So if you are not into the overly technical discussions or the equations, skim them, and focus on the rest. You will still get a lot from this book if you do that.

"Water" is the third book in the Brewing Elements series, after "Yeast" (Zainasheff/White) and "Hops" (Heironymous). This is easily the most technical book of the three. Like the other books, this is targeted at both home brewers and professional brewers, so there are a couple chapters in there that most homebrewers will gloss over (e.g. waste water treatment). However, there is a wealth of information that can help the homebrewer improve the quality of his/her beer. While the book does not shy away from the technical details, it remains fairly readable, even to someone like me who has not thought about chemistry since high school. While many chemical equations are included, they are largely unnecessary (albeit helpful) to understanding the bulk of the material. Where one absolutely must think about techincal details, the authors do a good job of simplifying the computations as they apply to actually making beer. One highlight of the book is that it heavily incorporates the (recent) research of noted homebrewers such as Brungard, deLange, and Troester. I personally have been going mostly off of the writings of these three (on various websites and forums) for my knowledge of brewing water up until now; I am excited to have this information synthesized in one place. The book also includes several examples of how to take a target water profile and modify it to brew a particular style of beer. Along with the general guidelines presented, the reader should be able to then apply these principles to their own water and beer styles they are brewing. Like the "Yeast" book, I see this becoming one of the brewing books I pull off the shelf most frequently.

Excelente livro para quem já tem um conhecimento de química antes da leitura. O autor mostra ótimos exemplos para calcular os parâmetros necessários

It is a pleasure to read such a comprehensive book on water treatment in the brewery. This is compulsory reading for anyone who is looking to become an advanced or professional brewer.

Il libro completa la serie "Hop" e "yeast". Da avere contando l'importanza dell'acqua nella produzione della birra. Tanti spunti per affinare il prodotto e capire cosa può influenzare il risultato finale. Lo stile della birra alla fine dipende anche dall'acqua. Molti dettagli tecnici-chimici (non può essere altrimenti in fondo). Ottima la spedizione da parte del cliente del market place. Contento che ora sia presente anche su amazon IT e non solo sullo store UK

Ich habe mit einem Einsteigerbuch angefangen Bier zu brauen, und es klappt nicht so richtig. Und siehe da, man sollte doch mehr Dinge beachten, als einem die Einsteigerliteratur suggeriert: Wasser ist eine durchaus wichtige Zutat, der man mehr Beachtung schenken sollte! Deshalb habe ich mir dieses Buch besorgt. Zunächst war ich enttäuscht, dass es keine deutsche Literatur zu dem Thema gibt, doch das Buch ist gut verständlich geschrieben. Es wird zwar auch recht viel auf Chemie eingegangen, aber das hält sich durchaus im Rahmen und man muss den Teil auch nicht unbedingt durchlesen, es hilft aber beim Verständnis. Gut ist auch, dass hier wirklich explizit auf die Bedürfnisse aus Sicht des Braumeisters eingegangen wird und nicht allgemein die Chemie des Wassers behandelt wird. Es lässt sich viel praktisches Wissen entnehmen und ich bin mir sicher, dass es mir bei der Problemlösung bei meinen Fehlversuchen helfen wird.

Lo recibí en tiempo y forma!