Hey All,
My christmas beer is an oatmeal raisin stout with spices this year. It's all done and in the keg and it's pretty nice except for two things;
There is a bit too much astringency, I suspect because I soaked cinnamon sticks in vodka for a month and added the vodka to the keg. I suspect this because the astringency is kind of woody, like that you might find in a wood aged beer. Although I also think the skins of the raisins might have added some tannins, they were in the beer for a couple, three weeks.
There is a touch too much tartness, I suspect from the raisins as it's kind of raisiny/grapy/fruity tartness, I don't THINK it's infected but it could be that as well I supose.
So last night I decided to do an experiment, I took a couple tiny grains of calcium chloride and dropped them right in my glass with a couple oz of beer and swirled it around and I think it helped. I think by accentuating the malt a bit more it draws attention away from the flaws a bit while still allowing those flavours that I want to be showcased. I LIKE the tart raisin and the slightly woody cinnamon, just not quite so much.
Finally to the actual question. As a ball park how much Calcium Chloride should I be thinking about adding? I can't imagine I would want more than say 5-10 grams. Is there a convienient way to use bru'n water to figure out some PPM values for the chloride based on post ferment additions? I suspect I could simply by plugging in the volume of beer in the keg and adding the salt until the ppm is where i want it.
I see recommendations for a roughly 2:1 sulfate:chloride ratio for hoppy beer, would I want to reverse this for malty beers? 1:2 sufate:chloride?
