‘Still or Sparkling’ Must Be Stopped

All this week, the Eater Today newsletter is dedicated to editor Hot Takes, a way to release the pressure valve of crankiness that comes with sweating your way through the end of summer. This story was previously published as part of that series. Subscribe to Eater Today to see more of our editors’ boldest opinions about dining culture writ large.

Filtered tap. Please, just bring filtered tap. 

More and more often, my meal — even at ostensibly casual restaurants — begins not only with an attempted upsell, but with a question I’ve come to dread because of the weird stigma attached to my inevitable response. 

You sit. Your server materializes. The question arrives: “Still or sparkling?” A beat. “Or filtered tap?” 

Ninety-nine percent of the time, my fellow diners and I want filtered tap. We do not want to pay $11 for Evian, which tastes worse than filtered tap in most major cities (I’ve always thought it tastes vaguely like water from a hotel pool) and reaches room temperature at an alarming rate, and should one of us yearn for a bottle of Pellegrino, we’re well aware that it can be summoned at any point during the meal. But it’s the framing of the ask that troubles me, suggesting that filtered tap is the inferior, lowly choice, like I’ve asked the server to go out back and fill our glasses with a hose in the alley. (Cheers to Khushbu Shah — cookbook author, Eater reporter, and former Food & Wine restaurant editor — who named her newsletter Tap Is Fine!; a perfect name, and I am jealous.)

It’s a strange way to begin an experience ostensibly centered on hospitality. Before I’ve had a chance to look at the menu, order a guava mezcal margarita, or even fully settle into my chair, I’m being asked whether I’d like to turn the most basic necessity on the table into a line item on the bill. Restaurants have plenty of opportunities to sell me things — that is, fundamentally, why I’m there — but surely the first sip of water can remain outside the machinery of the upsell.

The growing prevalence of this question feels suspiciously like we are wriggling under the thumb of Big Sparkling Water. While I occasionally partake in a Spindrift, I have not personally fallen victim to the seltzer fixation sweeping the nation, but I see the squeeze of its fizzy grip. One of my former colleagues told me that he drank a case of La Croix every single day. While it’s hard to make a case that drinking lots of sparkling water is bad, aside from maybe resulting in a lot of gassy people who have to keep an eye on their dental enamel, the mania for it irks me.

Admittedly, some of my annoyance may come from the fact that I’m bothered by people who think they’re above tap water. A Brita in the kitchen? Great. At home, I exclusively drink the filtered tap from my fridge. But about a decade ago, I lived with a friend who would drink only Smartwater, which she insisted had a preferable taste over tap and better nutritional value. Our tiny Brooklyn apartment’s garbage can filled rapidly with empty plastic bottles day after day, and she did not seem especially interested in taking out the trash more frequently as a consequence. Frankly, after a harrowing incident in which I was attacked by rats near our dumpster, neither was I. Between the single-use plastic and her unwavering (and unsubstantiated) belief in bottled water’s superiority, Smartwater became a persistent source of tension in our household. In America, most tap water is fine. In New York City, it’s basically the nectar of the gods. In Los Angeles, its reputation, which I find accurate, is that it is sometimes unpleasant straight from the tap (although I was surprised to find that a couple of decades ago, it used to win awards for its flavor) — but that is what the filter is for.

Here is my radical proposal: Just bring filtered tap, ideally with ice (this isn’t Europe!). For the bottle experience, put a carafe on the table, fill everyone’s glasses, and let us begin our evening without making hydration our first purchasing decision. If water conservation is a major concern, as it is in some regions, ask simply, “Would you like some water?” without any implication that it should be bottled. List mineral and sparkling water options on the menu with their respective prices. 

Nobody is deprived of Pellegrino. Nobody is being forced to drink municipal Ninja Turtle sewer water — I am definitely an advocate of the filter. And nobody has to sheepishly say “tap is fine” with any ounce of embarrassment, regardless of the restaurant’s level of prestige. If you are part of the seltzer cabal, order it as you would any other beverage. 

In fact, filtered tap isn’t merely fine. Modern plumbing and filtration are wonders of civilization: I turn on a faucet and clean, potable, decent-tasting water comes out. Free us from the water upsell. I would be delighted to have filtered tap.