Best options for espresso with hard water

July 18th, 2016, 10:33 am

I just moved to an area with very hard water. I'm having trouble getting an exact hardness from the city but it's ranging from 7-8.5 gpg it seems. This is much harder than I'm used to. I rent so I'm not going to install a water softener. What's my best option for buying drinking or bottled water? I searched and found that some of the bottled waters are pretty hard too. What are my best options in this situation? I'd prefer not to install something in my kitchen. I don't have a ton of space for that.

#2: Post by **sweaner** » July 18th, 2016, 10:45 am

I mix my tap with distilled to get the TDS down.

July 18th, 2016, 10:53 am

Interesting. What hardness should I target for espresso? What's your tap water hardness and mix ratio?

#4: Post by **Dpablo** » July 18th, 2016, 11:27 am

A zero water pitcher could help, too. It's the only pitcher I've seen that can noticeably help with tds.

#5: Post by **Bill33525** » July 18th, 2016, 12:13 pm

Locate a nearby RO water machine, usually at local grocery store and try the Perger Water recipe
Matt Perger's water recipe for coffee - Is it ok/safe for espresso machines? What do you think?

#6: Post by **nuketopia** » July 18th, 2016, 1:01 pm

I live in an area with moderate to very hard water, depending on the month.

I put in an under-sink RO system, Whirlpool branded, sold by Lowes. It's less than $200 and easy enough to put in yourself. If you have a water softener, feed it with the softened water because the membrane lasts longer and it will easily reject all the sodium ions the softener replaces the calcium with.

If your tap water is just very high in minerals, but nothing undesirable, you can just blend tap and RO water to arrive at the right mixture of minerals.

In the meantime, boiling your tap water, stirring it, then let it rest and cool down quietly will remove the scaling hardness and make it suitable for espresso.

Best bet, get a water test and figure it out.

#7: Post by **jitters** » July 18th, 2016, 3:18 pm

I have very hard water here in San Diego. Last year, I went through lots of research about plumbing in and water treatment before I got my current espresso machine. Where I have my machine is actually optimal for doing the plumbing and mounting the treatment components. I finally decided to delay plumbing in and water treatment, and just use Crystal Geyser. This still works for me and for now I have no plans to change. I use about one bottle a week, maybe that comes to $50 a year. I thought I would tire of filling the reservoir at some point but I didn't. I typically make 2-3 doubles and 2 Cappuccini a day.

#8: Post by **yakster** » July 18th, 2016, 5:01 pm

I have a water cooler that dispenses bottled RO water that I mix with mineral additions based on reading the Water for Coffee book. My recipe is here: "Water For Coffee" book discussion thread

#9: Post by **sweaner** » July 18th, 2016, 6:59 pm

givemeespressofirst wrote:Interesting. What hardness should I target for espresso? What's your tap water hardness and mix ratio?

I usually aim for about 50-75 range, as far as I can recall.

#10: Post by **ira** » July 19th, 2016, 1:00 am

nuketopia wrote:In the meantime, boiling your tap water, stirring it, then let it rest and cool down quietly will remove the scaling hardness and make it suitable for espresso.

Can you explain how this works?

Ira