Tap Water Only at Fine Restaurants?

by Michael Mascha

Branzino from the Mediterranean, Sauvignon Blanc from New Zealand,  Truffles from Piedmont, Pinotage from South Africa, Lobster from Maine, Serrano Ham from Spain, Cheese from France, Chocolate from Madagascar, Toro and Hamachi from Japan and water from the tap?

What’s wrong with this picture?

A new, hopefully short-lived fad is in the pipeline, with some upscale restaurants ditching bottled water in the name of conservation. The bottled water backlash, which recently spread to the venerable Chez Panisse restaurant in Berkeley, is spurred by environmental concerns over the energy used in transportation as well as the disposal of all those containers. "We just decided this was something we had to do," said Mike Kossa-Rienzi, general manager of Chez Panisse, where owner Alice Waters has pioneered the eat local, eat fresh concept. "It just makes sense to us to not have to use all the energy and resources to bottle water in Italy and then truck it to our restaurant and then after that deal with the recycling of it."

Chez Panisse stopped serving bottled non-sparkling water last year and expects to stop serving bottled carbonated water in a few weeks, just as soon as the restaurant's new carbonator is installed, said Kossa-Rienzi, who visited a San Francisco restaurant, Incanto, to see how it made the switch some years ago.

Bottled water is a natural product with its own terroir similar to many other food and beverage products we enjoy in restaurants today. The same attention for sourcing the best produce, fish and meat needs to be applied to water.

Consumers demand a choice of waters according to personal preferences. Low mineral content still water for the subtle fish dishes, naturally carbonated water with a higher mineral content for meet dishes and a soft water for deserts.

Considering water only as a medium to hydrate, as some suggest, is akin to drinking wine just for the intoxicating affect of alcohol. There was probably a time when alcohol was considered the main benefit of wine, but we have moved on and wine is now an important part of any epicurean experience.

It is time that we give naturally bottled water the same attention and integrate it into the dining experience instead of imposing a “no choice policy” when it comes to water.

In Italy, with the highest per capita consumption of bottled water in the world; one will be very hard pressed to find a diner drinking tap water in a restaurant. Bottled water is the way to go, but the water is usually local or regional.

There are many fabulous natural sources for water in the United States. These waters from usually small producers have to compete in the market place with purified tap water that is distributed by large multinational corporations due to a lack of consumer knowledge and brand equity of the domestic brands.

In Europe the consumers are aware of the difference between naturally bottled water and the commodity products.  In 2004, Coca-Cola tried to launch  Dasani in the UK. After it was discovered that Dasani was, in fact purified  tap water from Sidcup outside of London, the media went wild and the brand was withdrawn from the UK market.

Industry estimates put 40% of bottled water sold in the US in the purified tap water category and this fact has a detrimental effect on the domestic bottlers, finding themselves competing on price with a commodity product. A battle that cannot we won.

Instead of embracing tap water Chez Panisse and other restaurants could have developed a relationship with a number of local bottlers of a natural spring water in the same way as Alice Waters has pioneered it with sourcing local food products.  I am sure bottlers would have jumped at the opportunity to be the waters of Chez Panisse and the environmental concern would be addressed without the sad move to tap water and a “no choice” policy.

Bottled water is a natural product and deserves attention.