Using bottled water

Hey all,
I was just curious if anybody uses storebought water for making their beer? If so which type work best (drinking,distilled,spring)? And also in the case of using bottled water for topping off an extract batch, do you treat the water as being contaminate free and just add it or do you boil it first? Thanks for the help.

If I were to use bottled water, it would definitely be spring. But aside of living in the Southwest or near a sulphur spring most tap water is really pretty good. Personally, I used to like EVIAN until I found out the French were spelling it backward NAIVE.

Use Drinking or spring water! The water is already sterlized. Or you can use your tap water if it does not reek of chlorine.

Bottled water ain't pure. It's mostly filtered city water, unless it says different, and they add flavorings to it too. I'm using Southern California tap water, but I've only brewed brown beers- and I drink them warm, this time of year. Perhaps I will educate my palate to the deficiencies....or not?

does your wter taste good from the tap? if it does its probably ok. look for a analysis of the content of your water (in terms of hardness, minerals, etc.) then compare that to a analysis of famous brewing regions waters. if your water is too soft or hard or has too much of anything in it you may want to consider using bottled water. i live in the southwest and the water here is terrible. i still used it for brewing though on my first 8 batches. each batch had a similar off taste that bugged the crap out of me. after researching i decided that the off taste was due to the water and not rinsing of my bleach sanitizing solution. so i began using distilled water, which i recomend because you know the content of it (nothing but H20), and use gypsum and others to get the water where i want it to be in terms of its content. guess what, since then there are no mentionale off flavors in my beers (at least not that are due to the water). so i recomend researching your water and then making a decision about whether to use tap or bottled.

I used to buy spring water for my brews. One advantage is that it can be seen as sanitary for brewing purposes and many spring waters have additional oxygen added to them (at least it says that on the label). So if you don't boil it before using it to top-off your chilled wort, it will help with the aeration of the wort.

Kai

casebrew said:

Bottled water ain't pure.

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Water that's labeled as "Spring Water" certainly isn't filtered city water, unless the spring happens to be in the city. As a matter of fact, by law in the US, water labeled "spring water" must be both filtered and sterilized, and must list the source of the water. Similiarly, water labeled as "Drinking Water", while it may be from the same supply as your city water supply, must also be filtered and sterilized before being sold.

Oh yeah, atticmonkey, to answer your question, I use bottled spring water. I'm sure my city water supply is probably fine, but it just seems to me by using bottled water to top off that I'm completely eliminating one possible source of infection or chemical contamination (cloramine).

When I went to the store to purchase water they were labeled "spring water" or "filtered tap water". I bought the spring water but I think I will boild out my tap water for the next batch. I thought I read somewhere that distilled water would not be the best choice.

Hmm.... I used bottled water when I lived on an on-campus apartment. The water tasted terrible. After that I have always used tap water with no ill effects to date. I dont know about bottled water... you know some of it taste funny to me. Certainly try the water first to make sure you like the taste.

I used to use bottled water as an extract brewer...now with AG...thats just too much water.

If you are using bottled water, definitely go with spring water and avoid distilled water. The problem with distilled is that nearly all minerals are filtered out as well. These minerals are important when brewing. You could add minerals to the distilled water to achieve a certain profile, but that could require a lot of minerals.

Having said that, the type of water is not as important when topping off an extact batch as the minerals really aide/shape your brew during the mash and boil. Still, your best bet is to stick with Spring water...if you must use bottled water.

I get distilled. I used to use my own tap water but due to the minerals in it, my beer has a funny aftertaste. I was told this by my local HBS and was recommended to get distilled.

I thought distilled was a bad choice because you want the water to have some hardness from minerals in it. Wouldnt distilled lose the hardness?

xpoc454 said:

I thought distilled was a bad choice because you want the water to have some hardness from minerals in it. Wouldnt distilled lose the hardness?

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And you are correct. Distilled is lacking in minerals better suited for your beer. Quite frankly, all of you that are purchasing water for your beer... Just go get yourself a Pur Filter from Home Depot or similar. Save yourself some time and money. On my brewday (AG - 10+ gallons needed) I get all my water from the tap through my carbon filter on my kitchen sink. Your purchased bottled drinking water isn't that much different than what you'd get from a simple carbon filter.

desertBrew said:

Quite frankly, all of you that are purchasing water for your beer... Just go get yourself a Pur Filter from Home Depot or similar. Save yourself some time and money.

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But the water from a carbon filter isn't sterilized, or even sanitized, is it?

El Pistolero said:

But the water from a carbon filter isn't sterilized, or even sanitized, is it?

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We're not looking for sterilized when it comes to brewing. All we want is sanitized.

Having said that, I dont know how much more "sanitary" bottled water is versus tap water through a filter. My opinion is that there are much more important "unsanitary" items to worry about than the water (which is really only an issue for topping off extract batches).

Just my 2 cents.

El Pistolero said:

But the water from a carbon filter isn't sterilized, or even sanitized, is it?

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It will be once you boil it, won't it?! As long as it hasn't killed you when you drink it, I wouldn't worry.

I have used spring water in the past, but since I got a PUR filter attached to my faucet, I stopped. I really like that thing.

I would only use spring water on a recipe where the original water source used very soft water and I wanted to replicate that style to the letter. My water is very hard. That's great for replicating Burton water, but not so good for some other styles.

vtfan99 said:

We're not looking for sterilized when it comes to brewing. All we want is sanitized.

Having said that, I dont know how much more "sanitary" bottled water is versus tap water through a filter. My opinion is that there are much more important "unsanitary" items to worry about than the water (which is really only an issue for topping off extract batches).

Just my 2 cents.

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I think the difference here is extract vs. all grain. When I'm talking about needing sterilized water, I'm talking about the water I'm using to top-off in the carboy. That water I personally want to be sterile, and if I wasn't using bottled water, I'd be boiling tap water. Once I move to all grain, well then that's a whole nother story.

El Pistolero said:

I think the difference here is extract vs. all grain. When I'm talking about needing sterilized water, I'm talking about the water I'm using to top-off in the carboy. That water I personally want to be sterile, and if I wasn't using bottled water, I'd be boiling tap water. Once I move to all grain, well then that's a whole nother story.

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Yea, I forgot about the topping off water with extract. When I was doing extract I ended up topping off with my filtered water; but was that the best idea; dunno but suspect it was ok. You would might be safer with store bought but haven't we seen articles on chemical analysis of "Arrowhead drinking" water (or choose your vendor) where the water wasn't much better than "fill in your local water provider".

Thanks for all the information. The main thing I was worried about was the sanitary aspect of my tap water. I really dont know if having to boil a couple gallons of water would be any cheaper than buying spring water in the long run. I would have to do the boil either with my propane or natural gas and with the prices where they are it might add up. My tap water taste alright, has a slight clorine taste, but for the most part is not that bad. Those of you that use tap water in your brews, do you always boil the top off water? I have no idea how most city water plants do things, maybe all water is run through a sterilze stage but if so would it be good enough for the beer?

when i used my tap water i didn't boil it, but suspect it would have eliminated some of the off flavor. because you say there is a slight chlorine taste i would recomend boiling it for 15 minutes or so to get that chlorine taste out.

about distilled vs. spring: i like distilled because i can add the minerals to the quantity i want without worry. sure you have to buy the minerals, but theyre not expensive, and one jar of the few you need will last a long time. i think it might actually be cheaper to buy bottled than boil tap water. as long as you have one of those refill stations to go to where the water cost 25 cents a gallon, then its not expensive. even for doing all grain. the ten gallons or so cost 2.50. not too bad in my opinion. ecspecially considering the difference in quality of the finished product that i have experienced.

So, how about using a mix? Rather than spending money on distilled water, then spending more for minerals, just mix the two? 3 gals of tap, plus 3 gals of distilled, will cut the tap minerals in half, and save $3 in distilled water...

Drengel, are you buying water distilled for 25 cents/gal, or filtered ?

there is a filling station at the natural foods store that fills either distilled or drinking water for 25 cents a gallon.