Expert Reveals That One Phrase You Should Watch Out for in Bottled Water Labels: ‘It Says...’

Ever since he was a child, Martin Riese (@martinrieseofficial) has been fascinated with the idea that “water has taste,” he shared with Food & Wine. His fascination materialized into a full-fledged purpose when he started working in a Michelin-starred restaurant in Berlin. One day in 2005, while he was catering the tables, a guest called him and pointed out that while the restaurant had dozens of varieties of wines, there was just one brand of water on the menu. The dialogue triggered a train of thought in Riese’s head, and he was left wondering, “Why?”

Over the next few years, he enquired about this idea of why water, the most precious beverage on the planet, is treated with so little respect. Fast forward to today, Riese is a Mineral Water Sommelier, certified by the German Mineral Water Trade Association. In a popular TikTok video, he shares how to choose the best bottle of water while flying. Riese explained that one needs to stay adequately hydrated while flying because the closed-loop air in the planes can turn their throat “very, very dry.” The video showed Riese walking through the shops and kiosks of the Los Angeles airport, checking out bottled water of different brands. “So, what kind of waters would I purchase when flying?” he pondered.

Riese explained to Food & Wine that when one sees the label “purified water,” one should avoid buying it and move on to the one that reads “mineral water.” "When you look at the labels, and it says purified water, that actually means it's processed tap water. They're filtering everything out. So it doesn't have any nutritional value," he said. In the video, he first picked up a silver and blue bottle of DASANI’s Purified Water. “Obviously, a big no-go,” he exclaimed. He said the same applied to the bottle of SMART Water’s Vapor Distilled Water.

Next came a black-colored bottle of PATH’s Alkaline Purified Water. “I would never buy that. Or glamorized tap water from Montebello,” he told the viewers, and added, “Proud Source, absolutely!” Rolling a bottle of Proud Source Water on the camera, he said, “I would buy that cause it's a natural green spring water. And what I really enjoy about Proud Source, they're even writing down what's in the water. TDS is 152. So that is a great water.”

Riese then picked up a bottle of Pellegrino’s Sparkling Water and described it as the “number one sparkling water around the world.” He said, it’s actually “still water,” and the company adds “artificially adding the carbonation” to it, but “it has a TDS of over 1000,” which means he wouldn’t choose to drink it. Another bottled water item he reviewed was Evian’s glass-bottled water. “Pretty cool water,” he specified, adding that the company also sells a sparkling version. The next candidate was Topo Chico’s Natural Mineral Water, featuring a TDS rating of over 600. “That's a great water to buy,” the water expert commented.

Another brand, he said, he would prefer to buy would be Cyan’s Natural Spring Water, mainly because its TDS is under 40 and it comes from a natural spring. For Maison Perrier’s Sparkling Water, he said, “You can see there are some options that are totally fine with me and some other options I would never purchase.” Further in the video, he expressed his preference for choosing glass bottles over plastic bottles.

“I love glass bottles. For me, this is the best container for water. Water is a universal solvent and always looks for stuff to dissolve,” he told Food & Wine, noting that water pulls in the taste of everything around it, including chemicals like bisphenol A, phthalates, and even plastic particles. “When you have an open water bottle right next to an open bag of coffee, trust me, a day later, the water will smell like coffee.”

You can follow Martin Riese (@martinrieseofficial) on TikTok for more tips.