Yes, you shouldn't drink hot water from the tap. I have a water dispenser, as in an equipment where you put a 20L mineral water bottle and you can pour either cold or hot water.

If you live in a place where there are still old lead pipes in the system, which almost everyone in the US does, you should start pushing your city representatives to get it fixed. It's a major hazard in all sorts of ways.

I live in one of the very few cities in the US that replaced all of its lead pipes a couple of decades ago.

For sure. I am punching and I know it

I always recommend this site: https://theteahouseltd.com/

We've visited them in person and their tea was so fantastic that even non-tea people loved it. They ship worldwide. I tend to order in bulk these years.

Only one tea has ever come close, and it was a small Asian restaurant out of Vancouver, BC. This store has dozens of amazing varieties.

I've been on a real chai kick and got the biggest available size of this tea a month or so ago and I'm already nearly through it. I love it with milk and sugar, it has some caffeine and a spicy complexity that gets me going in the mornings. It's amazing cold too, if I don't finish the pot before it goes lukewarm I'll put in a glass bottle in the fridge for later.

Oh and buy loose leaf tea. Even cellulose and paper teabags are apparently riddled with micro plastics.

My kettle boils a mug's worth of water in less than a minute, and it takes me longer than that for even a brief toilet visit and washing of hands. I have learned not to switch the kettle on until I get back from the bathroom, otherwise I'll be boiling the water twice.

Important factors: 1) Britain has 230V mains power so electric kettles can boil water incredibly quickly, 2) The stereotype about Brits and tea is true in my case. I get through three to six mugs of the stuff per day. 3) Hot tea must be made with boiling water. Power isn't cheap and re-boiling the water adds up over time.

It would be interesting to test. quick, someone poke Technology Connections.

afaik electric kettles are the most efficient machines around. something like 95% efficiency

Right. The hob needs to heat up entire surface of your cookware, and kettle transfers heat directly from the element below to water - only then some of that heat is dissipated.

If you have both, and a timer on your phone, should be easy enough to check. Put the same measured amount of water in both and see how long it takes to boil.

Right. The hob need to heat up entire surface of your cookware, and kettle transfers heat directly from the element below to water - only then some of that heat is dissipated.

Yes it already happened a couple of time. It starts boiling either when pulling-out or when putting the tea inside.

Apparently you can do it by turning off the microwave as soon as it starts boiling, turning it on again and repeating until everything boils at the same time and explodes.

If you're using distilled water there's not enough minerals in the water to start the boiling process before the temperature crosses 100 C because microwaves heat it up so fast.

It also doesn't necessarily have to be distilled water, but the the closer it is to just H2O, the higher the chance this will happen.

The water continues to heat ~1 minute after microwaving stops, so I guess it could happen if you take it out very close to the boiling point.

For me it's the fact that my cast iron stove takes ages to heat up

My microwave can boil a single cup of water faster than my kettle. My kettle can boil four cups of water a lot faster than my microwave. It all depends on the microwave and kettle (and the voltage available).

Microwave is blasting radiation at 100% efficiency as soon as you turn it on. Kettles heating elements need to heat up before they can heat the water.

I use distilled water for espresso and tea... Thankfully I started because of my electric kettle and espresso machine. Keeping the machines cleaner.

Never microwaved distilled water.

Definitely darker. I've been digging the straight black teas. I don't hate green tea, but I've been gravitating towards the breakfast blends.

Definitely going to give the lapsing a try. Ty for the rec!

Oh, now I see! You don't understand that a microwave can boil water, you think it can only warm it up a little. Thank you for clearing up my confusion.

Have some class!

Whenever I hear Europeans accuse Americans of being arrogant, I can only laugh. Feeling superior about something like how you boil water is hilarious.

Gin is just what I had available. It's a hot toddy, normally made with whiskey but I'm not a big fan of wood cask spirits. I put it in a thermos to take to a funeral. It was about a 3:2:1 gin:lemon:honey mix. It was sippable but sweet like cordial from the honey. I was putting it in hot water.

V is irrelevant. A determines how much actual power something gets.

japanese have 100v and don't have this problem