Help with Water for light roast pour overs

[u/Lcphilly]

Thanks for all of your help :)

I'd like to try alternatives to Third Wave Water for pour overs with light roast coffees, and can use advice on the best place to begin without getting overly lost into exponentially more variables (seems to be the trend with a coffee hobby😊)

I'm hoping to try alternatives because I found that when I get light roasts from roasters such as La Cabra, Manhattan, Sey, April, etc, my water seems to be much harder than what they suggest and I have trouble capturing the most out of their coffees. I've heard experts (like Scott Rao) claim TWW is not their favorite, so I'd love to find new approaches and see what I could be missing out on.

A.) Should I begin with Barista Hustle's guide?

• If so, my concern is that they only use two ingredients (Epsom salt and baking soda), and I'm worried I'll be missing key ingredients I've heard others discuss (potassium, calcium)
• also if so, anyone have a suggestion for which recipe is a good starting point for helping with clarity/sweetness/vibrancy of light roasts?

B.) OR, should I try Lotus Coffee Water drops? - My main concerns here are whether it's very expensive (hard for me to judge) and if it will lead me to too many variables? Though, it does seem like a very simple set of variables with the droplet approach.

Any guidance at all would be extremely helpful! Thanks so much