"NY" wrote in message
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"Jethro_uk" wrote in message
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On Thu, 07 May 2020 14:21:40 +0100, NY wrote:

I'm about to try brewing beer from a kit. Our tapwater is fairly hard,
but the house has a water softener (*) for one of the kitchen taps.

Is it better to use hard water, as it is supplied, or to use water from
the softener? I can't detect any difference in taste of water from the
normal or softened tap.


(*) One of those inline cylindrical ones that is fitted with compression
fittings into a branch of copper piping off the rising main.

As with most things to do with food and drink, there's a lot of personal
preference involved. Hardness in and of itself won't affect the process
much so it's really a question of what taste *you* (and any significant
others ) prefer.

The beauty of homebrewing (as with all home cooking) is you get to
experiment and can arrive at what you like. Which may or may not be
commercially available.

Just make sure you sanitise everything,

I dont bother and have never had a
bad brew and have done over 300 now.

and above all have patience.

Are you bottling for a secondary ferment, or just serving from the keg ?

I've got a keg. Depending on results I may try bottling at a later date.

It's the first time I've tried brewing. I'll be intrigued to taste the
results.

I'll never go back to commercial beer unless
I end up too decrepit to move the crates of
bottled beer around and even then I will
likely just get one of the neighbours kids
to do that bit for me.

Yes, I'll try to keep everything scrupulously clean

It isnt really necessary. I obviously do wash the
brewing barrels out after the mega brewing
run I do every year or so but that all I do.

and make sure I wash away the steriliser solution afterwards.

As a matter of interest, is the steriliser solution disodium metasilicate,
sodium carbonate, troclosene sodium (what's that?) likely to be OK in a
septic tank?

Likely not, but its easy enough to tip that into
a bucket and just tip it onto a bare patch of dirt.

Might be ok in the septic tank tho
given that is pretty dilute by then.

We're not on mains drainage so we always need to check with things that go
down the drain (eg washing up liquid / dishwasher tablets, toilet
cleaner - no bleach!).

The tap water is from underground aquifers as opposed to reservoirs (I'm
in East Yorkshire, near Bridlington). I've not smelled any strong chlorine
smell when I've run water into the sink or the bath (presumably it would
already have boiled off hot water but would still be present in cold
water), but I'll
remember the trick of leaving it to stand for a while, if I can
find a clean vessel to put it into, in addition to the brewing vessel. I
suppose I could put it into the keg to stand before pouring it into the
brewing cylinder.

I'm sure when my dad tried home brewing he kept it in the airing cupboard,
but that would kill the yeast because the temperature could go above 25
deg C.

That doesnt kill the yeast. We do get up to 30C at times
and the beer keeps brewing fine. It not ideal taste of the
beer wise, but the yeast keeps going fine.

I remember he put one batch on top of the deep freeze and wondered why he
couldn't get it to clear. Then it dawned on us: the vibration of the
freezer compressor motor was enough to keep the yeast in suspension
instead of allowing it to precipitate out. ;-)