Well, we're looking for water that tastes like water. Nothing else.

Unless, of course, that's not what you like water to taste like.

The perfect glass of H2O, it seems, is much like the perfect glass of wine. Beauty is in the palate of the drinker. But people of like palates can generally reach a consensus.

Since taste is one of the reasons people give for drinking bottled water, we thought any discussion of abandoning the plastic bottles should involve the alternative: drinking straight from the kitchen faucet.

Colleagues brought in clean, empty wine bottles full of tap water from Raleigh, Cary, Johnston County, Durham, OWASA (Orange Water and Sewer Authority) and Garner, which gets its water from Raleigh. We chilled them, and four of us sat down to a blind taste test.

What surprised us most was the range of tastes and how the water felt in our mouths. The difference was clearly discernible.

The water from OWASA, which serves Chapel Hill and Carrboro, had a mineral aftertaste and felt a little heavy on the tongue. Raleigh's water had an earthiness that one taster really liked, while another described it as reminiscent of swimming hole water, like when you go for a dip in a lake and inadvertently get a mouthful. Oddly, the water from Garner tasted more processed and milky, even though it had been through the same treatment system as the Raleigh water.

Offerings from Johnston County and Durham both smacked of chemicals and seemed lighter on the tongue, almost disappearing before we could swallow them. Durham water was especially pungent, with overtones of swimming pool that were off-putting.

The water from Cary, wouldn't you know it, most closely approached the ideal. It had no chemical taste and no mineral taste. It did not feel overly heavy on the tongue, but didn't disappear as if it were trying to slip by before you really tasted it either. It was clean and crisp and refreshing.

In Cary, apparently even the water conforms to code.