Too much bicarbonate in water

[Bobcatbrewing42]

I moved to a new place and had no idea what was in the water. I knew it was from springs and a well and tasted good. I brewed a hoppy IPA and added a small amount of Gypsum as a guess. After brewing, I got some info from the State as to what is in the water. It's pretty soft.... CaSO4-12 Ca- 45, Mg- 26, Na-5, SO4 12, Chloride- 10 (all ppm). The kicker is 256 ppm of Bicarbonate. When I put that into BeerSmith 3 a note came up about "extremely bitter.". I kegged today and the beer looked great w good attenuation but the aftertaste is very unpleasantly bitter. Will this improve as it Carbonates and ages? Anything to fix it?
Another note: Beer Smith has very few water profiles, including nothing about Reverse Osmosis. Is RO water close to distilled for minerals? I could dilute my tap water with R.O. to reduce the Bicarb

 

[1HW]

RO is close to distilled in terms of purity. RODI (Reverse Osmosis / Deionized) is the same as distilled in terms of purity (both just get there via different mechanisms). I would treat RO water the same as distilled in terms of Beer Smith profiles. If you have an option to brew with all RO water, I would do that. The primary consequence of high bicarbonate is that your mash pH will be too high (i.e., closer to pH = 5.8 versus a more appropriate 5.4). Also note that alkalinity can be expressed in two different formats. One is as bicarbonate (HCO3); the other is as "Alkalinity as ppm CaCO3". Beer Smith uses HCO3. There is an approximate conversion to get from CaCO3 to HCO3 if need be.

 

[1HW]

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[Bobcatbrewing42]

RO is close to distilled in terms of purity. RODI (Reverse Osmosis / Deionized) is the same as distilled in terms of purity (both just get there via different mechanisms). I would treat RO water the same as distilled in terms of Beer Smith profiles. If you have an option to brew with all RO water, I would do that. The primary consequence of high bicarbonate is that your mash pH will be too high (i.e., closer to pH = 5.8 versus a more appropriate 5.4). Also note that alkalinity can be expressed in two different formats. One is as bicarbonate (HCO3); the other is as "Alkalinity as ppm CaCO3". Beer Smith uses HCO3. There is an approximate conversion to get from CaCO3 to HCO3 if need be.

Thanks. I did put a capful of lactic acid in both the mash and sparge water, something that I have been doing and getting better hop expression. If I use half spring water and half R.O. water, the bicarb gets closer to Beer Smith's recommended level.