water to use with wine kits

[pkirtani]

I am making Cabernet Savingnon from a WineExpert kit.
I need advice on what water to use:
1) I have used my well water/tap water before - but then thought the wine kind of had a weird odor
2) One time I used distilled water - I have read that is the worst idea since distilled water has no minerals in it
3) will bottled water (spring water) work well?
Please advice..
thanks,
-Prasanna

 

[cmason1957]

This is one of those ask 10 winemakers get 11,maybe 20 opinions. I often use spring water, but I live in a city with chlorine in the water. I have made wine with the city water, it was OK. I think we'll water is probably good, if it tastes ok to drink.

 

[tradowsk]

I personally use bottled spring water. I am of the opinion that your choice of water is a "do no harm" type decision. You want to avoid adding chlorine to the wine, as it can "cork", the wine later. Spring water is less than $1/gallon usually, so I would use that.

 

[Scooter68]

Everyone works out their own 'best methods' other than knowingly using tainted or water you suspect to be less than clean a free of bacteria, it's pretty hard to tell anyone what the 'right' water to use. So we work it out for ourselves. For me this is my routine (Copied from another post I made)

Distilled water, for rinsing/ prepping my pH meter, and making my Starsan solution. (Local tap water makes my Starsan solution cloudy immediately)
Filtered water - For volume additions when prepping a must AND, oh the horror, topping off my wine. (I use additional fruit volume & shoot high on the ABV so dilution of my wine is not an issue.)
Tap water - For washing, rinsing equipment/bottles after washing AND, when out of Filtered water, for prepping a wine batch.

I don't rinse off my sanitizer (Starsan) normally, but if taking SG measurements or pH tests, I do occasionally use filtered water or distilled water for that.