whats the advantage of using deionized water when cooking?

brandon
  • Posted by: brandon
  • March 28, 2011
  • 6233 views
  • 3 Comments

3 Comments

RobertaJ March 29, 2011
None that I can think of. Deionized water reacts differently than normal water, so I wouldn't recommend it, actually..FILTERED water, maybe.

But DI water is usually only used for medical/manufacturing applications. It's especially important in avoiding mineral deposits and buildups in things like car batteries, dehumidifiers and other applications where corrosion or deposits are an issue. DI water may not necessarily be more pure than filtered water. It can be used in the manufacture of cosmetic products, because removing the mineral ions will limit unwanted chemical reactions with the other components of the finished product.

But its not an indicator of purity or quality.

If your tap water is of poor quality, or has an off taste, on-faucet or in-line carbon filter is your best bet. Even distilled water is not necessarily more "pure" than carbon-filtered water.

If you're really, really concerned about your water quality, then go for bottled spring water. But be sure it's true *spring water* and not just *purified water*, which is just the tap water at the bottling plant, run through carbon filters.

I can see DI water maybe being useful in immersion circulators/sous vide baths (in modernist/molecular gastronomy applications), but again, that would only be to avoid corrosion/buildup in the equipment, not to impact the quality of the finished food.
 
boulangere March 28, 2011
Where did you come across the reference? In what context?
 
usuba D. March 28, 2011
The only advantage I know of are pH and mineral specific contents in water when used for specific meat processing applications. . . . applications that you would never use at home. And only because your water source maybe too hard or contain too much chlorine or pH out of whack.
 
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