osirisisisis@yahoo said:
I read that some believe that when making tea or hydrosol out of MH that the lower the PH the more spice the water will hold. It seems that a ph of 4 is commonly referenced. Will a PH of 3 hold more spice then 4 or how about a PH of 2. If so how much more in percentage? Is Muriatic pool acid safe enuff to create a PH of 1 to extract and then basifid back to 7 with food grade NaOH before severing as a tea. If Muriatic is not clean enuff then what about citric acid?
Is there a place or a link that anyone has for food grade Muriatic Acid or food grade Hydrochloric Acic?
I don't believe that it is true that lower pH = higher solubility. I am fairly certain that as long as the pH is acidic (below 7 or so), the spice will not freebase and will remain water soluble. I do not recommend drinking a brew made with HCl, or NaOH for that matter. I'm not confident that "food-safe HCl" exists.
If you
were to brew with HCl at pH 1, then basify with NaOH using precise titration methods to ensure that the brew would not be caustic/toxic, your brew would probably still contain a whole bunch of salt (HCl + NaOH = NaCl). Aya and it's analogues taste terrible enough, I personally would not want a bunch of salt in it to make it even worse.
To be quite honest, I don't know that there really is any benefit to making the brew acidic at all... Perhaps people prefer this in case the naturally-occurring salts of DMT are heat sensitive, in a similar sense that DMT acetate can supposedly be freebased with heat. A very small amount of food-safe acid (ascorbic, citric, etc.) would be more than enough to ensure that all the alkaloids stay in salt form.
Again, I don't know for a fact that this is the reasoning behind adding acid to brews, this is only supposition. It could have something to do with breaking down the plant matter. But I know many people make successful and potent brews by simply adding a couple kiwis into the mix. This serves as a natural source of a food-safe acid (ascorbic) and seems to be more than enough.
