I know of zincs importance in yeast growth, metabolism etc, does the malt itself lend enough zinc if used with 100% distilled water? Im wondering if there are any appreciable drawbacks of not adding it, say with like not adding yeast nutrient. Im always concerned with adding something if I don’t know everything that it does or contains like; changes in flavor or water/beer profile getting out of wack based on minerals it can add etc. Will a beer still come out fine or is it more based off lag time and performance?
IIRC malt contains enough zinc. I think zinc deficiency is only an issue with other kinds of fermented beverages.
AFAIK, yes the malt will provide adequate zinc. My understanding is that zinc is good if you plan to save and reuse yeast, and I understand some people add extra zinc because of that.
Wort is usually deficient in zinc, saw a few presentations by PhDs at NHC that said that.
Can’t recall who or when, but I saw one at an NHC that said the zinc was there, but it didn’t hurt to be sure.
One I remember.
http://www.ahaconference.org/w…-NHC2009-Yeast%20nutrition.pdf
The short answer is no, there is not enough zinc naturally occurring in malt for a healthy fermentation.
Using tap or spring water should augment the zinc to the point where there is enough; only a trace amount is needed. But using distilled or RO water should, in principle, lead to fermentation problems unless you supplement the wort with zinc or yeast nutrient (which has some zinc). “In principle” being an important qualifier, because in my view, reality astonishes theory more often than not.
Thanks fellas, you’ve all been a lot of help, to add to the discussion is it true that you need trace minerals of copper as well for yeast ( I don’t have anything copper in my brew house) or is that a bunch of malarkey?
In another post a Brewer asked about nutrients. ^^^this is one reason I add nutrients.
I use 100% RO, I never add zinc or yeast nutrient and I haven’t had any issues with fermentations using liquid, dry or re-pitched yeast. So from my experiences, my opinion is you don’t need to add.
Next batch will use Wyeast Yeast Nutrient for first time
Simple and cheap enough to try.
My experience and research indicates that there can be problems when brewing with pure waters like RO and distilled. Including trace elements like zinc and copper do improve fermentation and finishing. When added in the proper trace amounts, they are imperceptible to drinkers.
I have used it for years. Works well.
+1. It is good insurance since I too use RO water to brew with and build my water profiles for the specific beer I am brewing. I even put a pinch of yeast nutrient in my starters.
Also oddly enough, the highly dreaded manganese has a sort of symbiotic relationship with zinc in the presence of yeast, and the two must go together, with manganese at only a small fraction of zinc (which in and of itself is not needed in more than very small amounts). It has been found that when there is no manganese the zinc should be held to less than 0.6 ppm, else fermentation will actually begin to suffer, but in the presence of just the right minute quantity of manganese the yeast can both tolerate and benefit from much higher ppm’s of zinc.
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1002/j.2050-0416.1975.tb03784.x
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1002/j.2050-0416.1998.tb00996.x
Thanks, good to know.
While we’re headed down this rabbit hole… I wonder how much Zn and Mn are left after dosing with BTB, and if it’s low enough to affect yeast performance
Joe Formanek told me in an email “Remember, though, that not all ions are removed, which is OK because some are important for proper yeast functionality.” He didn’t go into specifics (how much was left).