BeerBorg

Our spring water does taste good. I'm thinking distilling would remove any impurities, but I'll have to do some more research. It would only make sense to use water from the property if I'm trying to create an "all homemade" recipe.

I've got to get a LOT of batches under my belt before I attempt this, but it's something I sure want to brew too. Thanks for all the help.

Welcome!

You should send a sample of your water out for testing to see what its chemical makeup is. If you post that here, we can tell you what types of beer it would be good for making "as is".

You don't have to worry about "organic" impurities since you will be boiling the stuff and fermentation is generally bad for any type of human pathogen anyways. People have made good beer from duck pond (poop) filled water.

It's more about the % of various minerals.

If you distill or reverse osmosis the water then you have to add various minerals back into it to make good brewing water. If you brew straight up with something like RO water it will not make good beer.

As others have said, malting can get tricky. It is doable. But it has to be done right or you will "rot" not malt.

If you really want to find your own home grown yeast there are kits that will let you capture and isolate your own strains. But what kind of beer they will make could be pretty much anything. As in you won't have any idea what it will taste like until you try. It might turn out many shades of funky. If so, I would probably like it (my home grows its own yeast, so I'm used to it LOL), but lots of other people maybe not so much.

Everyone says growing hops is easy but I epically failed at that.

Welcome to the Borg...

Check into Ward Labs for the water sample testing, they do the water profile testing for brewing right around $40, it will be a great starting point. I started out with store bought spring water and those beers did come out pretty good.

Hayzer wrote:What if this water was from a spring on my property? Would you boil and go, or go further and distill this spring water? I drink it and have not had the scoots yet.

Potable spring water will work just fine.

No matter what the source ... boiling water is a big part of brewing beer.
The reason you want to avoid chlorinated water is b/c it will lead to off-flavors in the finished product.

Down the line ... if you move from extracts to all-grain ... you may want to investigate adding brewing salts and minerals to your spring water which quite often will take your homebrew to the next level in quality.

Welcome Hayzer! This is a great obsession and the Friendliest Forum on the Web.

Hello and welcome to the site/hobby/obsession from another Missourian, I live in SE Missouri.


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Welcome!

You joined the Borg on my birthday, so I already feel a special kinship.