Health Department doesn't allow tap water from restaurants here. And honestly I don't blame them for that. I mean like, do you want the flying shits?..
That's nice they're legally forbidden from denying you life saving water, but tap water is ass (even if it's perfectly safe to drink) and should be drunk when you have no other options, not as a pleasurable drink to have with your meal.
And last time I was in Germany (admittedly years at this point) I got free water, but was charged for Ice! That's not my idea of a good non-sugary drink for your meal, ass tap water that might be a little colder than room temp...
Here the free water is well filtered as it often comes from the soda machines own filtering system
There's a lot to like in the EU, but the whole water/ice things has always irked me. It's honestly baffling. You want to discourage people from drinking sugary drinks like soda, but then you make the best alternative, a nice cold glass of filtered water, like some sort of luxury item
Tap water in Germany is perfectly palatable and unless in some large cities, even tastes nice. In fact if you buy bottled water in the store you'll get bottled tap water (just not bottled locally), unless it's some fancy brand like Vittel or Volvic. But those don't come for free no matter where you're at.
And yeah we don't typically use ice in our drinks, unless you order cocktails. Agree it's a bit odd to explicitly charge for it, but I guess if the restaurants pays for ice (usually they don't make it on site), then I can see why they charge for it...
Why the heck would you need 'filtered' water? Tap water is epic in West-EU, the only need for bottles is so you can take it to places where there is no tap. If you live in Utrecht (NL) you get pure Bar-Le-Duc water from the tap!
Sidenote: Never been charged extra for Ice, I also thought icing a soda was cheaper then not for the seller.
Spoken by someone who rates water as the most boring drink on any menu.
Rarely drink bottled water, because the tap water is great where I grew up. I absolutely thought it was weird how much some people drank bottled water. Then I tried Edmonton (Canada) water.
Heck Nestle bottles the tap water from Hope, BC. They claim they filter it, and I'm sure they do, but the municipal water in Hope is great, and I'm sure their purification equipment don't have to do much. Hope isn't even the best municipal water in BC.
Good to hear that if I ever get around to visiting Utrecht I can try some competitive municipal water.
I recently ordered a medium soda for my dad at a McDonald's and I was full of regret. It must have been like 32 oz. It was huge. Probably enough calories in the soda alone to be a meal.
The drink in my post is smaller than the smallest drink there.
Yes, I'm aware that I'm comparing McDonald's to Burger King, but small/medium/large should be similar capacities between restaurant chains and not deceptive between the different sizes.
Yeah that's a medium in Germany. What you call small is our large, and XL has been banned to curb sugar addiction. Drinks come in 0.2, 0.3 and 0.5 liters. (6.75, 10.1, 16.9 oz). XL used to be 1 liter (20 oz), and that was deemed too much.