[smaccona]

Penn & Teller did an episode years ago where they tried to debunk the claim that there was any difference between tap and bottled water. They colluded with a New York City restaurant where the waiters told customers that the restaurant was trying out several new waters and asking customers to taste test each one before deciding which one they should ultimately go with. They made up fake bottle labels such as "Arctic Mist", "Himalayan Snow" and similar (I can't remember the actual names), and in reality Penn and Teller were filling the water bottles from a garden hose in the back of the restaurant with New York City tap water (though admittedly NYC water is very good).

Not only did the customers like the waters, many of them claimed that one was much better than another, expressed a preference, and justified the preference with comments along the lines of "I can really taste the difference in this one, it's more XXX". There was even one customer who refused to believe Penn and Teller when they revealed that all of the bottles contained NYC tap water, and insisted that the waters were different from each other. A true testament to how the mind can fool itself.

The episode in question used to be available on YouTube, but now appears to be paywalled by Paramount+ unfortunately.

[NoZebra120vClip]

I hope that they didn't pull this on devout Jews.

A little-known controversy about NYC tap water is whether or not it is considered Kosher, due to containing live copepods.

Some Jews still insist on filtering their tap water at home, for this reason.

[93po]

clip: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v2qydjVbLJk&t=2s

[ungruntled]

I’m sure people can hallucinate differences in taste, but there are very much differences in taste between water sources and water stored in different containers. For instance, many restaurants in nyc serve tap water in glass containers cleaned with bleach and improperly rinsed so you smell the chlorine. The water supply itself can contain chlorine, for instance in many countries chlorine is added to the water supply for various reasons including known mixing of fresh and sewage water. Plastics used in water bottles affect taste and smell. Aquafina and Dasani bottles for instance have a commonly known strong taste of plastic. Plastic bottles left in sunlight for prolonged periods will have an even stronger taste and smell. Cities will change water sources periodically. For instance nyc recently in the last few years adjusted their sources and building managers sent notices saying the new source will taste more “nutritious and earthy”. My building also has had a hot water boiler and cold water mixture issue as well as a contaminant issue that they solved by introducing additional chlorine. However the cold water also is frequently rusty and brown from boiler water mixing in, which probably has its own flavor.

Taste can differ from building to building, city to city, container to container.