Does anyone else make their own water?
I live in a hard water area. Until now, I've been using a standard water filter like Brita, which has worked fine, but I could never achieve the clarity I was looking for in my coffee.
So last week, I dipped my toe in the world of water recipes. I got myself a zero water filter, read up about remineralisation and made a few litres of coffee brewing water.
I wasn't sure what to expect or if it would make a difference, but man was I surprised! The difference is insane. It was the missing piece to tasty coffee that I had been searching for for so long. Needless to say, I'm sold now and theres no going back for me.
What concerns me us how much of a pain in the ass it is. I have to have a bottle for the mineral water concentrate, a filter jug for the distillation and another jug for the remineralised water. I don't know if I want all that hassle every day for the rest of my life.
So the question now is how can I streamline this?
I live in a rented city apartment, so space is limited and I can't make any big changes like under-sink ro installations. I have looked at countertop ro units, but they're very pricey
Is there anyone else here who makes their own water? How do you manage this? Any advice for someone who is just starting out?
51 replies
There are a ton of countertop reverse osmosis filtration units in the $100 to $300 range. Find one that has a remineralization stage and go with that. Should give you a TDS in the 50ppm range which will be fine for pour over.
I was hoping for a hydrogen reactor to make the water.
Reverse osmosis is so passé, it's time for reverse electrolysis!
-- Frost
Definitely for ease of use, it's gotta be store bought gallons of distilled water and premeasured mineral packets.
Get a gallon, dump in the packets, store your gallon of coffee water. One jug, no liquid minerals to be finicky with, and you're done.
Plus a gallon of distilled water, at least in my area, is about $1.50.
For me, the gallon jug lives behind my coffee equipment, it's hardly noticeable unless I need it, and mineral packets sit under my filters.
This is a great solution if you can get distilled water from a shop. That's sadly not available where I live, so filtering is the only alternative
Can you share a source for mineral packets?
Third Wave Water is what I use. I like it, haven't tried others, so I couldn't tell you if its better than others.
Its a bit pricy, I wouldn't say overpriced, but luxury, so I dont use it for every cup I make, but sometimes you just wanna be fancier about it, and I use it then.
Thanks. Are there different packets for different styles of coffee. I'm just dipping my toe in...
There are, but I don't have experience in the differences between them, either.
Can you start with distilled water, like from a store? Then you at least cut out the distillation step (and the filters) and may even be able to just remineralize directly in the jug it came in. In the US it's about $1 per gallon (3.79L).
Or buy spring water and skip all of the steps
6-staged filter and reverse osmosis system with a remineralization stage as the last. This gives me treated water for cooking, espresso, drinking basically on tap. My unit installed under the sink and needed a connection to water line, drain, and a dedicated spigot, so not sure how feasable that is for an apartment.
I also have a 6-stage RO filter under the kitchen sink. Cutting the hole in the sink/counter for the dedicated spigot is probably where a landlord will take issue. But tapping water and drain lines also would be problematic, but at least it's out of sight.
I also put a whole-home UV filter on my cold water line after the sediment filter and softener.
At this point, I could put pond water into the beginning of my water system and have a clean glass of drinking water out of the ro spigot.
Well water, amirite?
Does that live under your sink?
Honestly, that seems like the best solution, if you own your own home. I'm renting, so I'm unsure about modifying the kitchen
Plenty of reasonably priced countertop RO systems. Pick one with final stage remineralization.
There are small simple 3 stage systems. I have one that gets ppm down to 0-4. I don't think most people need a big elaborate one.
Probably not, but in my area I have to worry about pfas.
I rent and have a 3 stage water drop RO that lives under the sink. The tap is screw on and can be removed when I leave, and the drain is similarly attached between the dishwasher drain and sink connection with hose clamps also easily removable. At my last place there was no hole for the spout so I just 3D printed a bracket to attach it to under the sink. My new place has an unused sink hole that I plan on putting it on here.
That sounds really interesting. Could you share the system you are using?
It's the waterdrop g3p800. I actually got it for free because the company accidentally refunded me when they sent me the wrong one at first lol. Most under sink systems I've seen are easy to attach and remove because the water supply is just a splitter that you screw on in between where your cold tap connects to the pipe from the wall. The drain fitting wasn't included for mine but I found the "Watts universal drain line to garbage disposal" adapter on Amazon which lets you connect a push fitting tube to where the dishwasher already connects to a garbage disposal. Typically the system I got includes a "drain saddle" where you are expected to drill a hole in the drain pipe and clamp a thing in that lets you connect the drain from the filter to the drain pipe and I wanted to avoid that (RO systems flush their filters periodically so the flush water needs a place to go). Beyond that, the only challenge is where to put the filtered tap if you don't have an existing hole up through the sink deck, but like I did in my old place, just having the filtered tap underneath the sink works fine if you don't mind your guests seeing under your sink.
Thank you, I'll take a look at that unit.
Did I understand correctly that your system isn't connected to the drains? Could you elaborate on how you dispose of the waste water?
Like I mentioned I used a drain line adapter for garbage disposal for the drain on mine. As long as you have a dishwasher, there should be a spot you can disconnect it and connect an adapter in between for the RO drain line to also drain.
Sorry, you replied while I was editing, I had accedently clicked post before I was done. See above.
Thank you!
Yes, it sounds like quite a big piece of work for a rented space...
That is the dream setup, though.
What do you do with the waste water for the ro process?
I did a quick search and found there are countertop versions
https://bluevua.com/products/ropot-countertop-reverse-osmosis-water-system
For the waste, it goes to the septic, but I'm going to start collecting it since it is already been through all of the other filter stages before the RO,planing on useing it for water changes in the fishtank.
Thats right, I have seen those units, but I dont know how reliable they are and they are not cheap!
fwiw I've had this one for like 3 years now, no complaints. think it's slightly cheaper on ex amazon tho https://aquatru.com/products/carafe-countertop
That's actually the unit I've been looking it. It's pretty expensive, so I'm glad to hear you are getting good use out of it.
Would you recommend it? Is there anything about it you would change?
What a yucky/scammy/click baitty website vibe, what's with the "click here to reveal your secret discount" and the forced subscriptions &auto billing on filters?
Yeah that one cost more than I paid for my set up with 3 years of filters
Zero water filters are great, but when the filters go bad, they go BAD. Other filters I have, you can just kinda keep using an old filter and it’s fine, they just don’t filter as well. With zero water filters, the water starts tasting like lemony sour fish as soon as it starts testing like 10 TDS… the water from the tap reads like 330 and doesn’t taste that bad.
That's because the TDS meter doesn't measure contamination from organic sources, unlike your taste buds and nose.
I thought you meant with reverse electrolysis
It's also an archaic way to discuss the production of urine. lol.
That's the plebarian way. I run my fuel cell on hydrogen and oxygen. The energy generated is used to roast the beans and heat the water it creates. I pour my beans with 100% H20.
I'm not familiar with reverse electrolysis. What does it do?
Electrolysis is where you use electricity to decompose water molecules into hydrogen and oxygen. Reverse electrolysis is where you turn hydrogen and oxygen into water.
This is the way. Buying water from a store or distilling it yourself, you really never know where the oxygen and hydrogen is coming from. With a reverse electrolysis system you can source oxygen from the rainforest of Brazil and hydrogen from the volcanoes of Costa Rica. The in cup effect really makes this worthwhile.
I find the flavor notes ruined when Costa Rican hydrogen is paired with Rwandan Peaberry. Mufumbiro sourced hydrogen is required for true connoisseurs.
I just buy water and refill my five gallon jugs from one of the local water filter shops, we use it for all drinking and cooking
I just buy distilled water from the grocery store and remineralize that. They come in 4L bottles in Canada, but I’ve heard in the US they come in gallon sizes, then you just get your mineral packets, combine and mix. Really easy.
The water quality straight out the tap is so good I’ve never felt any need for warer alchemy. But I do get that some places have way too heavy water.
Thats very lucky.
Tbh, a regular filter works fine. I get a very nice coffee from it, but it's not perfect. With remineralised water, it is another level. I was a bit sceptical that it would make such a big difference, but here we are...
I also have hard water and use a Brita for my drinking water, but never considered it for my coffee. Now I'll have to give that a try. I haven't gone with the Zero water filter system because that takes pretty much everything out. I think it's important to keep the minerals in your drinking water.
Some amount of minerals is good, but you don’t want too much. If it’s just for drinking it’s not a big deal, it might just not taste as good. But if it’s going into any kind of a machine, you don’t want super hard water.
When I got my pouring kettle, at the same time I switched over to mineralizing my own water. Tap water has never touched my kettle, only what I formulate. I have not had a single bit of scale buildup anywhere, the inside of my kettle still looks brand new. In a kettle it isn’t as big of a deal but in a coffee machine, especially espresso, scale buildup can cause actual damage over time. Yes, you can use descaler, but it’s easier to just use proper coffee water. Get zero water, distilled water, RO water, whatever, and add mineral packets to it. Saves a lot of time in maintenance and also tastes better too. A win-win.
If you're using a coffee machine, that makes sense. I just use a French press now. I stopped using coffee machines when I couldn't easily find one with no plastic parts. I really don't want my hot water being piped through plastic tubes.
Fair. The only machine I use is my Gaggia Classic Pro, but honestly 99% of the coffee I drink is from my manual lever espresso maker. Zero plastic parts in it. The only bit of plastic in my entire setup is my grinder’s catch cup which I’m considering replacing in the future anyway.
Here’s my regular setup if you’re curious:
I'm a huge nerd but I actually found that buying good mineral waters and such, didn't do much for me. I guess I grew up with shitty water and I need a bit of that in it.
I did find that Britta's extra strong filters were more than sufficient to deal with my otherwise hard water.