Water question

Hi all,

Lots of chat about sanitizing and preventing bad things from getting into the brew, so I had a question about the water. I'm new so only doing extract brewing at this time. I boiled 2.5 gallons of water + extract + hopes. After chilling I added it to the primary and then topped it with water off to make 5 gallons total. I made it through primary, and it is now in secondary with no issues (not saying I did not make mistakes, but no infection at least).

Anyway I was thinking about that topping off with water. What should I have used? In my case I used filtered tap water. Should I have used unfiltered, bottled spring, distilled, or even boiled water. Then again does it matter, am I reading too much into it.

Thanks all

 

I used to top off with gallons of bottled spring water. Never had an issue with contamination.

And yes I think your reading to much into it. Normal new brewer jitters. Happens to us all.

 

For extract, as long as the water tastes and smells good, it's fine to use. Someone may bring up the chance of infection, but in all the extract batches I did topping off with tap water, I never had an infection.

I think you're fine.

 

I use a brita filter. I know here you can get filtered water from a machine for like $1.75 for 5 gallons. Couple bucks to make sure you have good water is worth it.

 

Thanks everyone

 

it makes little difference but ideally tap water should be boiled then cooled to room temp to drive off any remaining chlorine