Kishu Charcoal - Activated Charcoal Water Filter for Pitchers

I got this oak filter about 6 months ago and followed the directions for boiling it. I love the taste of the water. Its always in a full pitcher on my counter and is usually refilled every day. I boiled it again at 6 months. The taste is clean and pleasant. It's inexpensive, organic, easy to use and maintain with the promise of a long life. You really cannot beat the price, durability, safety and convenience.

I grew up with the best drinking water (NYC), so living in LA it really stands out how awful and undrinkable the water is. I grew tired of contributing to plastic bottle waste so I got the idea to try using two of these broken kishu packs (so that's 4 charcoal pieces total) in a 2 quart glass jar and let them soak for 36-48 hours (yes that's a lot of water to Kishu ratio), then I pour the kishu water into a Brita to filter out the charcoal and dust sediment (the brita is useless without Kishu, FYI). I did a taste test between tap, just brita, and then the kishu/brita, and compared it with crystal geiser. Tap and brita tasted the same (gross), The 36+ hour soaked Kishu water poured into Brita was the cleanest tasting water I've ever had out of a faucett here in LA - when I drank it next to the crystal geiser it was honestly super close in terms of smoothness and made me realise crystal geiser is probably just bottled filtered tap water. I was utterly shocked. I don't know how often I'll have to replace this system since the water is so dirty here, but I am really so happy to finally have found something that works!! Edit: I recently graduated to a 1.5 gallon glass jar for soaking because I needed to drink more water and it's working just as well, maybe can taste a tiny bit more chlorine but still good. Also, I don't think I mentioned that this method does not work if you put your kishu directly in your brita pitcher. Something about the kishu absorbs the plastic and it gets into the water (I could taste it at least), so that's why I soak first with a glass jar.

As expected , love it

I bought both the washed and the unwashed versions. They are equally effective but I think I prefer the unwashed simply because they're a better value as far as cost. They make some of the cleanest tasting water I've ever had! Every now and then I throw them in a pot and boil them for about 10 minutes and refresh them. I do that more than they say you need to. I'm not sure if it makes any difference or not but it certainly hasn't hurt the effectiveness of them.

Been using these for years and I love the way the water tastes. I keep one in a pitcher out of the fridge and one in a pitcher in the fridge, that way I have quick assess to great water at room temperature or cold!