‘Tis the season for making memories in the kitchen. While we know you are a pro at seasoning your family’s favorite holiday dishes, your home’s water quality could be quietly sabotaging your final product. Don’t believe us? Keep an eye out for these four signs that your home’s water is impacting your beloved holiday cooking routine.
Grandma’s Famous Recipe Isn’t Coming Out Quite Right
If you notice an off-flavor in your dishes, take a hard look at your home’s water. Water is the first source of flavor in cooking, especially as you build a delicious broth, brew a cozy cup of tea, freeze ice cubes for a festive cocktail, or put together a delightful bread dough. If your home’s water has an off-putting taste, even if it’s subtle, it can impact the final taste of your favorite dishes. Sometimes, this shows up with dulled flavors or even a metallic taste. If your family’s favorite recipes aren’t turning out quite right, it’s worth cooking with softened, purified water from the start.
Pasta, Rice, and Veggies Take Longer to Cook
Excess minerals found in hard water, like calcium and magnesium, raise the boiling point of water, meaning your food will take longer to cook all the way through. As you boil or simmer pasta, rice, and veggies, the extra minerals in hard water make their way into the food. While not harmful to your health, the excess minerals can cause an earthy or metallic flavor and can make the final product dense or crunchier than expected.
Bad Water Can Cause Proofing Problems
In the delicate chemistry of bread baking, water quality can make or break the final loaf. Excessively hard water can interfere with the gluten-forming process, creating bread loaves that are dense and flat.
Apart from water’s hardness levels, the small amounts of chlorine that are often present in municipal water can also hurt the fermentation process in bread making.
Your Favorite Appliances Keep Breaking Down
Our appliances and kitchen gadgets are designed to make our lives easier, but they can become a huge headache if they keep breaking down. One of the biggest causes of appliance slowdown is hard water mineral build-up. Over time, this build-up prevents the efficient flow of water through your dishwasher, coffee maker, etc., leaving you with spots and chalky residue on your dishes, fixtures, and appliance components. Shorter appliance lifespans mean more money spent on fixes or replacements and less time and funds for culinary creativity.
Install a Water Purification System!While there are some tricks and hacks out there to counteract the impact of hard water on cooking, the simplest and most effective method to purify your home’s water is to solve the problem at the source. Installing a whole-home water purification system or reverse osmosis drinking water system will ensure you get a fresh, pure taste and delicious, consistent dishes every time. Chat with our team today to learn more about how a whole home system or a drinking water system may be right for you.
