I was reading some articles where it mentioned to use Bottled spring water (like Ice Mountain) to brew a pilsner. Is this a good idea? I plan on brewing a German Pilsner this weekend and was thinking about using bottled spring water to do this. Pros / Cons - is it even possible ? - suppose to give you a crisper / cleaner beer with less chances of off flavors?
thanks everyone
it really depends on the source of the spring water. water chemistry is a deep and (for me) murky subject but you will get some good advice from other shortly.
If you are doing all grain it matters a lot. if you are using extract it matters less but still makes a difference.
This is a great place to look up the bottled water you want to use and get an idea of its mineral content.
that’s a pretty cool site Denny.
thank you both - Denny - great website. i was able to look up Ice Mountain and it gave me the breakdown analysis of whats in it…
That is a darn nice resource. I do see that many profiles do not provide a ‘complete’ profile that is usable for brewing water chemistry. The Water Report Input sheet in Bru’n Water can help you to decipher missing ions in some cases. The objective is to produce a ‘balanced’ condition for the cations and anions.
Glad you guys find it useful.
I used to drink this one often, as the vending machines at work had it.
http://www.mineralwaters.org/index.php?func=disp&parval=2329
This one we had in the flat often. A nice mineral bite to this one.
http://www.mineralwaters.org/index.php?func=disp&parval=1183
I would not recommend brewing a Pilsner with those, even if they are from Germany.
Some German beers are brewed from the Rhine and they are ok…somewhat.