High Sulfate Levels in Beer - How Much is Too Much? (feat. Adam Makes Beer)

In a previous blog post, we shared our anecdotal experience with excessive sulfate levels in beer, particularly in hop forward styles like IPA's. You view the article here, but in summary, we found that a number of our beers, all of which featured loads of hops added late in the boil and at dry hop, were completely lacking in hop aroma and flavour. On top of this, they had a harsh, astringent bitterness that overpowered everything else, and a strong malty sweetness. In short, these beers just weren't any good, and we ended up dumping a couple of them.

Although many of these symptoms can be attributed to oxidation, we're confident in our cold side processes, so we're ruling this out as a cause. After some further reflection on what may be the cause here, we became suspicions of the Brewfather "Hoppy" water profile, that calls for a relatively high level of sulfate - at 275ppm.

We're quite perplexed at why this Brewfather hoppy water profile even exists - as the name is totally misleading. You'd expect a "hoppy" profile to accentuate hop character, not mute it. We wanted to get a second opinion on this from someone who knows far more about brewing beer than we do, so we reached out to Adam Mills from Adam Makes Beer on YouTube who featured our question on his latest Q&A livestream.

Our full email to Adam was a bit longer than this, so we'll just include the question at hand here, though he does read our full email out in his YouTube video which is included further below.

Excessive sulfate levels and their impact on hop aroma/flavour and bitterness

I use Brewfather for recipe design/creation as well as water adjustments. I've attempted a number of hop forward batches like West Coast IPA and simple pale ales that have used Brewfather's "hoppy" water profile which contains 110ppm calcium, 50ppm chloride, 275ppm sulfate. These beers have all had a significantly reduced hop flavour and aroma, and in the case of the West Coast IPA's, I'd say all hop aroma (and flavour) was stripped out, leaving an aggressively bitter beer with a cloying (malt) sweetness that I ended up dumping. I'm confident in my cold-side processes (using CO2 pressure transfers) and am certain it's not oxidation, and further testing has lead me to believe the somewhat high sulfate level (and sulfate to chloride ratio) may be to blame here. Do you have any thoughts/experience on this? There are a number of recipes out there that suggest elevated levels of sulfate - 275ppm or even over 300 in some cases - am I missing something here? What levels of sulfate (and chloride) do you typically use in hop-forward styles like IPA?

After changing things up and using a water profile with 75ppm calcium, 50ppm chloride and 150ppm I've had a wildly different outcome, with awesome hop flavour, even when using far less hops than I have in my previous IPA's with the "hoppy" water profile.

Straight off the bat, Adam suggests the Brewfather hoppy water profile is "crazy", and those sorts of levels just aren't needed. He goes on to recommend sulfate levels of around 125-150ppm are adequate, along with anywhere between 50-100ppm of calcium.

Adam also explains how he has done aggressively bitter IPA's, leaning exclusively on chloride, and getting all the calcium inclusions from calcium chloride only. We know that chloride heavy water profiles, and more specifically a chloride to sulfate ratio that is high in favour of chloride is popular for hazy beer styles like NEIPA or Hazy IPA, but it's not something we've really heard done for bitter styles like "regular" IPA's. Perhaps something for us to consider testing out in the future.

Ultimately, Adam suggests the sulfate levels in this profile are "too much" and of course, making sure that we understand our source/base water prior to adjusting it - something we failed to mention we are already doing in our message to him, but it makes sense that you need to know what the mineral content of your brewing source water is before making any adjustments in order to be able to do so with any level of accuracy.

Adam also quotes John H Palmer, the unofficial Godfather of homebrewing and author of  "How to Brew", that water chemistry is like the seasoning, or salt and pepper in cooking. "You can make a dish amazing with it, or you can ruin it". We've certainly experienced both sides of the coin here, but it's certainly a reminder to err on the side of caution and use less minerals in the water - as ultimately they should help accentuate an already good beer to make it great.

Wrapping up, Adam does agree that sulfate levels this high could potentially be stripping out hop character from the beer, and to dial it back, emphasizing that the sulfate level in the Brewfather hoppy water profile is "really really high".

It was certainly great to have our full email to Adam read out and answered on his live Q&A, so a big thankyou to Adam for taking the time to give such a thorough and detailed answer to our question. We'll certainly be reaching out to him again next time we have a brewing related question that we struggle to find an answer to ourselves.

You can check out the full Q&A video here or watch it using the embedded video below. Adam begins reading our email at 1:20:29.

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Pacific Pale Ale - Tasting Results/Review

This would have to be one of the best pale ales we’ve ever made. There’s a few things we’d adjust slightly if we were to make it again, but overall we’re very pleased with how it turned out. A slight tweak in our water profile, namely moving away from the Brewfather hoppy profile and trying a reduced level of sulfate appears to have netted us some real improvements in hop aroma and flavour.

It presents with a light straw colour - initially there was a bit of haze present but this cleared up surprisingly fast, especially considering the presence of wheat malt in the grist and has now dropped very clear.

There’s loads of hop aroma from the mosaic and Simcoe hops. Predominantly citrus with a hint of lemon and the slightest of cattiness from the Simcoe hops.

The flavour profile is much the same with loads of orange, lemon and lime citrus notes. A slight bit of cattiness on the palate as well which isn’t unpleasant at all and helps add a bit of complexity. Bitterness is restrained and works well in balancing the overall flavour profile. Pilsner malt and a bit of wheat don’t really add much in terms of flavour, which is what we expected. It turned out a little boozier than expected - it’s full strength but the alcohol is well masked by the hops.

We’re also very impressed with the mangrove jacks yeast, a brand we hadn’t used before and would certainly not hesitate to use some of their other varieties (or even this one again) in the future.

Mouthfeel is fairly light with a good amount of carbonation to add a little bit of bite to the flavour profile. 

Very approachable, easy drinking and would be a real crowd pleaser. Quite similar to some “summer ales” we’ve had in the past.

Adding a third hop would really elevate this one a bit more by adding even more hop complexity and flavours into the mix, perhaps some Amarillo but as it is we’re very pleased.

Moving forward we'll definitely be using this water profile as our standard/base profile for hop forward styles.

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