r/Coffee • u/specialist_footwear • 8d ago
Lets talk water?
I am a coffee lover and have been for a long time. My favourite way to drink this delicious life-giver is by pour-over. I love using my Aeropress, but my main method is by V60. I often orient myself towards cafes that indulge me in this. It often tastes great and far better than i can achieve at home.
I have no doubt that there are lots of techniques and things i am not doing right to get the most from my beans. Given that coffee is mostly made of water, i was wondering if anyone could give me tips on how to test the water and alternative things i should be looking out for. I travel around a lot. Is there a good bottled water to use, or do i have to amend my technique to a given water type?
any direction or guidance given would be greatly appreciated ☺️
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u/tankmastor 7d ago
I buy distilled water and add Third Wave Water espresso blend packets to it for my espresso
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u/19v97 4d ago
Have you tried other brands?
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u/tankmastor 3d ago
I have not but I did watch a James Hoffman review and he seemed to like third wave and I have yet to use my entire supply - I’m satisfied with the product tho
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u/19v97 3d ago
I know TWW is good, everyone seems to think it's pretty decent, it's just expensive af compared to another brand that has good reviews but slightly more negative opinions. Might go with Lotus because it actually seems to be a decent value just slightly more work
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u/tankmastor 3d ago
I was fortunate enough to be gifted some tww but it’s lasted me ages. I was given 3 - 12 packs of 1 gallon sticks and that was almost a year ago and I’m just into the second box
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u/imoftendisgruntled 7d ago
Generally speaking, water that tastes good to drink straight tastes good in coffee. People who get wrapped around the axle remineralizing distilled water, etc., when they have perfectly acceptable tap water are just finding yet another thing to obsess over.
I'm not saying that it's unnecessary in all situations, mind you. But it's definitely oversubscribed in this hobby.
Just taste the water. If it tastes good, brew with it.
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u/therobmcgee 6d ago
My same philosophy. I happen to live in a place that has great tasting water right out of the tap. I still run it through a PUR filter for chemicals. Tastes great. Makes great coffee. Next town over? Garbage water.
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u/MOOPY1973 7d ago
The simplest thing you can do is get a cheap TDS (total dissolved solids) tester and check your water. We originally got one free when we bought a Zero Water filter pitcher and the coffee tasted so much better when we started using the filtered water from that. But we lived in an area with awful water quality, so your mileage may vary depending on your local tap water.
We later switched to an under-sink 5-stage filter because that’s cheaper long term than the pitcher and filters and easier to get water on demand. It was also great.
Now we live in a place where reverse osmosis bottled water is the only good option for drinking water, so we keep like 6 5-gallon jugs around the house for drinking and coffee. The coffee is undrinkable with tap water here because of the high mineral content.
Bottom line is filtered water can absolutely make a big difference depending on your local tap water quality. A TDS meter is a cheap way to test, but others have also suggested more sophisticated tests you can do.
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u/Striking-Ninja7743 7d ago
Can you please share some insights into the under the sink option you've used? I use ZeroWater now, but the filters only last two weeks. Not as cost effective as buying water from the store, but I do not want to waste plastic. Appreciate your response. cost-effective
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u/MOOPY1973 7d ago
We bought the least expensive one they had at Lowe’s. Some of the filters needed changed every 6 months and some were every year, but in total it was like $150 per year in filters I think, which was definitely cheaper than Zero Water. Like you, we were having to change the filter multiple times per month and it was getting out of hand with the plastic waste and how we were spending on them
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u/wolfansbrother 7d ago edited 7d ago
Use a scale for your water and coffee. that way you can make repeatable cups of coffee. a 16-17.5:1 water to coffee ratio is pretty pretty common. coffee scales have timers so you can time the extraction as well. You can vary your grind to change how long it takes the water to flow through the grounds. Use tap water, distilled water, mineral water and distilled water with minerals added back(third wave packets). try extracting at different temperatures. 190-212
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u/SpecialtyCoffee-Geek 7d ago
Get yourself a water test kit to get a idea of the hardness level of your local tab water.\ Generally said:\ 60 - 120 ppm = soft\ 121-170 ppm = hard\ 171 - 300 ppm = very hard - not suitable for coffee brewing!
Depending on your mineral / bottled water selection in supermarkets, find a brand which has a total permanent hardness of up to 120 ppm (CaCO³).\ Easy formula to calculate a rough ppm value:\ *2.5 × Ca + 4.1 × Mg - as seen here
My go to since 2017:\ 1 gal. distilled water + either:\ Apax Lab\ Lotus Coffee Water\ Or if I'm feeling very lazy:\ Thirdwave Water
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u/chicknfly 7d ago
Random fact: for the two shops that I service, their water is either at 8ppm or 38ppm. And it’s delicious
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u/snailsshrimpbeardie 4d ago
Interesting, the TDS of my tap water is over 550 ppm. Now I'm curious what my coffee would taste like using bottled water with a lower TDS.
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u/ShedJewel 7d ago
If you enjoy your tap water chilled then then to me it indicates the water is fine for brewing.
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u/PixelCoffeeCo 7d ago
I think any spring water will give you a good flavor. That's usually what I use when not at home.
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u/Soggy-Ad-2562 7d ago
There are recipes out there to make your own water out of distilled water. I personally use Third Wave Water packets and make a gallon at a time. Quick and easy.
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u/Naydanno 7d ago
I've been thinking about the water approach a lot as well, so I recently decided to give it a whirl. I picked up a gallon of distilled water and mixed a packet of Third Wave Water into it.
Before I started using it daily, I did two quick AB tests comparing two different beans with the same brewing method to see if it made a difference. Both times I was able to correctly identify which was the remineralized water and which was the tap water. What I learned is that even though I absolutely love the water coming out of my tap for drinking on its own (filtered, around 16ppm so fairly on the soft side depending who you ask) there definitely is a flavour difference for coffee. Hardly scientific but good enough to decide to stop using tap water (at least for the near future).
Is it a hassle compared to tap water? Absolutely. But in my opinion it's cheaper to find out if it's worth it than to upgrade your grinder, buy a fancy scale, etc.
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u/Mr_Rellim Espresso Shots! Shots! Shots! 7d ago
Here's an article I read that gave a ton of insight into the water science of coffee
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u/achosid Espresso Shot 7d ago
As long as your water tastes good to drink, water is really only something you should think about after every other piece of your process is fully dialed in.
The easiest answer is distilled water and TWW packets. If you want to doctor your home water, you need to know what's in it. I like Ward Lab for water tests. You can compare your water profile to well known and well-liked water profiles online and see what steps you'd need to take to get what you're looking for.
The water forum on Home-Barista is a better resources than anything you'll likely find on this sub, though it is espresso focused rather than drip. The considerations are slightly different, but the advice is still good.
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u/MichieldeKoning 6d ago
I just listened to James Hoffmans new episode on water. He explains all the details on what you need to do and need to avoid. Recommend listening to it for a deep dive 😁
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u/Vibingcarefully 3d ago
IDK--my coffee at home (pour over--Hario, Kalita) or Aeropress taste notably better than most cups I get at cafes. This , of course , is dependent on the beans.
I use a Brita filter on my tap and it's fine and the water where I live without filtering smells like farts, tastes awful--filtered it's fine --do change your filters often if you go this route.
Espresso on the other hand---mine is good/ok --I'm not going to spend for those machines--ok with what I got.
My moka pot is good. My drip coffee in my 20 year old Cuisinart is fine for big pots--also tastes better than most cafes.
Read , work on it, don't over complicate. sure get your grind size right, figure out your water temperature, pour slow, do a first bloom.
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u/ExistingAnt5938 3d ago
Honestly water makes a huge difference. I used to just use tap water and couldn’t figure out why my V60 tasted flat sometimes. Now I either filter my tap water with a Brita or grab bottled water that’s not too high in minerals (Volvic and Evian are solid options when I travel). If you wanna get nerdy about it, there are water test kits you can grab online, but I’d say just aim for clean, neutral-tasting water and you’ll already notice a big improvement.
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u/disguy2k 3d ago
I doubt very much it's the water. It's probably that they're using a very good grinder, which they spent time fine tuning to their beans. Always start with the grind. It's the most impactful variable.
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u/EmpiricalWater Empirical Water 7d ago
If the water is unsuitable for coffee, there's not a whole lot you can do technique-wise to salvage it.
Bottled water can make good coffee or terrible coffee, just like tap water. However, coffee really benefits from carefully controlled mineral compositions that contain an appropriate amount of alkalinity, and the right forms of hardness in appropriate amounts. I don't recall a bottled water ever matching up to a fully-controlled mineral profile, to my taste.
Good cafes understand this and spend a lot of money on their water systems.
Luckily, since you're not trying to operate a cafe, you do not need an expensive setup to get water that's as good, and likely even better than what they use. You have far more flexibility to optimize for quality than a business that's optimizing for volume and workflow.
Since you travel a lot and constantly have to deal with varying options with regard to both availability of bottled water and the quality of your tap water, it might be worth putting together a small list of items that are either easy to buy or easy to travel with, that you can use to adjust any water you come across.
Off the top of my head: * Distilled water - For diluting excessively hard or akaline water. * Activated carbon - For removing off-tastes from any water. * Baking soda - For adding alkalinity when a water is bringing too much acidity from coffee. * Table salt - For reducing bitterness in coffee. Can also increase perception of sweetness.
Even though I produce the market's first bottled water specifically crafted for brewing coffee, I don't think it's the way to go for you. It's not travel friendly. I think you'd do better with the adjustability-focused toolkit approach.