Tap or distilled ??

[Happy G]

I have been drinking kava for many years now but never knew there was different strains of types of kava I just baught some Waka from a Polynesian store then I was introduced to kava time then my adventure begin wooooooooo ! now I’m trying many types of kava. I’m getting much better quality kava now . Anyways that is my intro but I just had a question if anyone notices a difference in potency when using tap water compared to distilled water ?

 

[WaltonGroggins]

I'm not sure how it would affect potency, but I wouldn't drink tap water for many, many reasons.

Here are a few good reasons to avoid tap water (unless you have appropriate water treatment at the source):

• Municipal water fluoridation
• Perchlorate, a component of rocket fuel (thank the US military-industrial complex)
• Herbicide/pesticide runoff
• Pharmaceuticals
• Microplastics
• Mercury waste (from coal fired power plants)
• Radium 226 & 228
• Lead water pipes

 

[Groggy]

I use hot tap water, I never noticed any problems. I have used filtered water on the Alubottle because it's convenient for that prep. method.

 

[kastom_lif]

Tap water is generally cleaner than bottled water. If you wanna do it traditional style, catch water off your roof.

My local tap water supply treats for all that bad stuff at the source, and then some. We get some from wells and some from the river, so we're pretty much drought-proof. Can almost see the water tower from my house.

 

[Plantacious]

Tap water is generally cleaner than bottled water.

Or synonymous.
In many cases, bottled water was found to BE tap water.

 

[verticity]

I actually have distilled water that I use in my CPAP machine. It's not the same as bottled water; it's distilled to remove all (or most of) the stuff like minerals, chlorine, etc, so it doesn't gunk up my CPAP. It's also used for humidifiers or coolant mixtures in cars, and other things.

I doubt it would make a difference to use it to make kava. But if you want a wild ass idea how about this:

Kava is, in part, a suspension/emulsion (some of the kavalactones actually dissolve in water, but most are emulsified or in suspended particles). In the chemistry of separations there is something called "salting out" which means if you have a mixture that forms an undesired emulsion, you can add a little salt to break up the emulsion. Now in kava, the emulsion is desirable, so maybe if you used distilled or even better deionized water (with no ionized minerals in it), the emulsion in your kava drink would be more stable?

 

[Happy G]

Thanks for the opinions guys very good points . I will have to expiremnt with it , I just thought because distilled is basically empty water that it would more easily extract the kavalactions . It’s prolly not to much of a difference I will try them both and see

 

[Groggy]

Thanks for the opinions guys very good points . I will have to expiremnt with it , I just thought because distilled is basically empty water that it would more easily extract the kavalactions . It’s prolly not to much of a difference I will try them both and see

Ultimately it's the agitation of the water (any water) in conjunction with root that releases the KL's. I suppose the water type/quality can vary depending on your geographical location.

 

[WaltonGroggins]

Thanks for the opinions guys very good points . I will have to expiremnt with it , I just thought because distilled is basically empty water that it would more easily extract the kavalactions . It’s prolly not to much of a difference I will try them both and see

Water with the proper amount of minerals (magnesium and calcium) definitely makes for better tasting coffee. I have no idea if it's due to better extraction of compounds in the coffee beans or anything like that, but I can certainly taste the difference

 

[kalmia_latifolia]

Yeah, whether your water is pure or contains a tiny amount of dissolved solutes shouldn’t make any difference in terms of extraction efficiency. But I use deionized water (which I make at home) because it tastes better. I also don’t trust our municipal water supply. I microwave it to get it up to temp (this definitely affects extraction efficiency!).

Thanks for the opinions guys very good points . I will have to expiremnt with it , I just thought because distilled is basically empty water that it would more easily extract the kavalactions . It’s prolly not to much of a difference I will try them both and see

 

[WaltonGroggins]

I wasn't endorsing bottled water by warning against tap water, by the way. I'm aware that 40% of brands are just bottled tap water.

Hopefully this makes my stance more clear (from historyofwaterfilters.com):

"The threat of harmful contaminants in drinking water can no longer be reasonably ignored. The correlation between contaminated drinking water and many significant diseases and health problems is far too strong to discount.

Of course, municipal water treatment facilities have lowered the presence of many of the more harmful contaminants, and the EPA has set maximum contaminant levels, below which it is assumed that contaminants may be safely ingested into the body. Municipal treatments facilities are not infallible, and EPA levels do not represent a safety level for every person. Children, the elderly, and those individuals who already have weakened immune systems, are particularly at risk to drinking water contaminants. Two of the most volatile drinking water contaminants, chlorine and fluoride, are actually treatment additives. Also, lead, another of the more harmful contaminants, enters drinking water after treatment and cannot be regulated by municipal water systems. Therefore, municipal water systems cannot and should not be trusted to provide healthy, clean drinking water."

 

[Happy G]

Alright so I have tried both distilled and tap water with kava in my opinion there is really no diffrence in potency , but after learning about all the junk in tap water I just feel like filtered water is the way to go to have a more clean experience , plus the sacred kava root deserves some good quality water !
Bula !

 

[Krunkie McKrunkface]

Alright so I have tried both distilled and tap water with kava in my opinion there is really no diffrence in potency , but after learning about all the junk in tap water I just feel like filtered water is the way to go to have a more clean experience , plus the sacred kava root deserves some good quality water !
Bula !

Of course, "tap" is different for rural folks with wells. Then it is just up to the quality of your aquifer. My guess is collected rainwater would be too soft, though.