Floridian here. Even from the fridge with the extra filter it tastes a little bit bad. I’m used to it, but when I visit out of state the water tastes “fresh” or “crisp”. My brother who came to visit said my tap water tastes “slimy”. It’s not algae or anything just Florida water universally sucks in some manner.
It’s not necessarily an infrastructure thing impacting safety, but sometimes a water source thing effecting flavour and temperature.
Toronto is on the north shore of Lake Ontario and has amazing tap water, Kingston is 200km east also on the north shore of Lake Ontario and has horrible tasting tap water. The difference is that Toronto is next to a deep drop off in the lake, whereas Kingston is on a huge shallow section of the lake where the water doesn’t flow nearly as much. Both are perfectly safe to drink but in Kingston they have to add more chlorine / treatment chemicals which add an off taste to the water, plus in Kingston the water comes out of the tap much warmer in the summer.
Water treatment plants just make the water safe, often you will need to filter it to remove anything else contained in the source water. Americans often buy filters to remove other contaminates, then you can go a step further with additives: magnesium sulfate, potassium bicarbonate, or potassium chloride and floride are pretty common. The minerals create the taste profile, it’s the reason bottled water often tastes better than tap and why Dasani and Aquafina taste different.
Our governmental system only contains enough feedback to account for 200 million people. Beyond that, the level of signal quality degrades and democracy breaks down.
Is this something I am too European to understand?
Tasty tap water.
Floridian here. Even from the fridge with the extra filter it tastes a little bit bad. I’m used to it, but when I visit out of state the water tastes “fresh” or “crisp”. My brother who came to visit said my tap water tastes “slimy”. It’s not algae or anything just Florida water universally sucks in some manner.
It’s not necessarily an infrastructure thing impacting safety, but sometimes a water source thing effecting flavour and temperature.
Toronto is on the north shore of Lake Ontario and has amazing tap water, Kingston is 200km east also on the north shore of Lake Ontario and has horrible tasting tap water. The difference is that Toronto is next to a deep drop off in the lake, whereas Kingston is on a huge shallow section of the lake where the water doesn’t flow nearly as much. Both are perfectly safe to drink but in Kingston they have to add more chlorine / treatment chemicals which add an off taste to the water, plus in Kingston the water comes out of the tap much warmer in the summer.
Depends where in Europe you are. In England it mostly tastes like swimming pool water unless I filter it.
And when it comes to tasty, colder is better.
Water treatment plants just make the water safe, often you will need to filter it to remove anything else contained in the source water. Americans often buy filters to remove other contaminates, then you can go a step further with additives: magnesium sulfate, potassium bicarbonate, or potassium chloride and floride are pretty common. The minerals create the taste profile, it’s the reason bottled water often tastes better than tap and why Dasani and Aquafina taste different.
Bagels shops often import water from new York for it’s unique bacteria and mineral profile (similar to the magic soil in Italy for winemakers) https://www.ediblemanhattan.com/food-for-thought/why-is-new-york-tap-water-good/
Our governmental system only contains enough feedback to account for 200 million people. Beyond that, the level of signal quality degrades and democracy breaks down.
This results in bad tap water