When I was a kid, being sick meant one thing: soup. Cold? Soup. Cough? Soup. Nauseous? Soup.
When I got older, earned my own money, cooked my own food, advocated for myself at the doctors, and got sick? Yeah, soup.
Years ago, I too was embroiled in the heated debate of “Is cereal soup?” I mean, is soup defined by being warm? Then explain gazpacho, vichyssoise, or tarator. Is soup mostly water? Cream of mushroom would beg to differ.
Without rekindling the fires of such debate, let’s go with wikipedia’s definition of “a primarily liquid food, generally served warm or hot (but may be cool or cold), that is made by combining ingredients of meat or vegetables with stock, milk, or water.”
It’s that very last word that explains why you’re reading about soup on a water filtration site.
See, contaminants in tap water can be absorbed into food, whether the water is used as an ingredient, like soup, or when it comes into direct contact with food items, like boiling.
The absorption of contaminants depends on various factors, including the type of contaminants present in the water, the cooking method, and the nature of the food being prepared.
Boiling pasta or rice lets minerals and salts enter the food. Boiling or poaching meat and seafood can transfer chlorine byproducts, like trihalomethanes. Even the steam generated during cooking processes can carry volatile contaminants. In certain situations, like when the water evaporates during cooking (for example, reducing a soup to make it thicker), any contaminants it contains become more concentrated in the remaining water.
Some contaminants like chlorine and chloramine can change the taste or add an odor to food. Others, like calcium and magnesium, can be absorbed by foods like grains and vegetables. The worst ones, like lead or copper, may leach into food, especially if the water has been in contact with those metals in your plumbing.
So how do we keep these contaminants down to a bare minimum? Different cooking methods can influence the absorption of contaminants. For example, cooking in open pots without lids may allow volatile substances to escape, while cooking with lids may trap contaminants in the steam, increasing absorption.
Another option is to use an undersink water filter. Some of these use a separate drinking water faucet, which can be a hassle when you’ve got a pot of pasta to boil. But there are a lot of undersink filters that are ‘full-flow’ filters that filter every drop coming out of your faucet, at the normal rate of speed.
Before you start worrying about your tap water, and slamming that “Click to Buy” button, remember that the concentration of contaminants in tap water is heavily regulated. Your local water treatment plant works hard to meet safety standards and are constantly checked and rechecked by hard working professionals.
But if you drink a lot of soup, or make a lot of pasta, and you’ve already tested your water and found some contaminants you don’t want to be exposed to, consider an undersink water filter.
Not because “oh god, you’re gonna die if you don’t have a water filter!” but because “my mom’s soup recipe tastes different in my apartment and I’m pretty sure I followed it exactly.” or “my doctor said I should watch my copper intake and, while the levels in my tap water are pretty low, I’m concerned I might be concentrating them when I make soup”
There are a lot of good reasons to get an undersink filter. Fear and panic are not any of them