sorry if this is a stupid question because we don't have chlorinated water in Germany, but do people brew green tea or good coffee with tap water? Doesn't it taste god awful? One of the things which I remember from my holidays in Spain as a kid, which is one of the few countries which adds it here, is that the water tasted like pool water.
Compared to that, in New York, I can definitely taste it and it took some getting used to. (Ironically, at this point my senses seem to have been rewired to associate the taste of chlorine with fresh, i.e. non-stale tap water.)
Depends on where in .de it is sourced. "Uferfiltrat" meaning from deep wells next to, or near a river, deep wells reaching into other groundwater sources, and dammed reservoirs.
Uferfiltrat=shitty, deep well=depends, dammed reservoirs=mostly good/usually soft water.
Can even vary within larger cities, where different parts get water from different sources.
Yes, water quality matters a lot in coffee enthusiast land. They actually make little mineral packets that you add to a gallon of distilled water to get a "perfect" brewing water - I know since I actually use them for my espresso machine to fight scale buildup from my +10 grain tap water.
Note this excessiveness is really needed for espresso though; a regular Brita jug handles more tolerant methods of brewing perfectly well (and to be honest most people murder coffee enough that the water is the least of their concerns)
Just a suggestion as well, theres countless 'water recipes' that let you easily do the same thing for a fraction the price. They arent doing anything complicated. Some mixes are simple two ingredients, some go up to several, but all are pretty dead simple.
Lets you fiddle and fine tune things more for your own preferences too.
Its extremely unlikely that German water isn't chlorinated. Perhaps you are thinking about fluorinated?
Chlorine in water is actually fine and tasteless at the concentrations it reaches at the taps - it's basically extremely diluted stomach acid.
The problem is chloramines caused by chlorinated organics. These give water the swimming pool smell and are bad for you.
The solution is easy - reduce the organics in the water before chlorination, and oxygenate (aerate) the water before delivery. But systems can get overwhelmed by too much rain and runoff.
Chlorination of drinking water is indeed uncommon in Germany.
If it’s done, the level is often imperceptible, contrary to the US (I actually had to look this up – I’ve never tasted it in German drinking water in various cities myself).
> Chlorine in water is actually fine and tasteless at the concentrations it reaches at the taps - it's basically extremely diluted stomach acid.
No. The chlorine in tap water is HOCl + OCl- (it’s a weak acid/base equilibrium). Stomach acid is HCl. And chlorine has both a noticeable smell and odor even at low concentrations (e.g. 1ppm in water). The smell is much worse if any of the chlorine has reacted with organic crud to turn into NCl3.
More enlightened cities in the US use monochloramine (NH2Cl), which is a rather weak disinfectant but is barely noticeable at normal concentrations.
Chlorine solubility in water decreases rather quickly with raising temperature. This fact causes me to believe that if one doesn't like his hot-brewed tea made with tap water it's not because of chlorine exactly. I'd suspect calcium or iron instead.
My general experience in Australia when i talk about drinking RO water is that im looked at like a crazed madman who drinks "holy water"... So atleast hear i daresay its safe to say the average persons taste and smell must be piss poor
You can get inured to just about anything with enough exposure, barring exceptional circumstances where you have difficulty learning to ignore things.
Visiting friends recently, they have well water which smells like sulfur from their tap. Visiting them for a few days, I do not get inured to it, but my friend cannot tell it's there.
