Ginger-Lemon Revitalizing Water

Improve your health and mood by staying hydrated without sugar or artificial sweeteners.

Staying hydrated is a small step we can take to enjoy summer. Yet the heat of summer can lead to consuming too much sugar.

Coffee, tea, sports drinks, beer, wine, soft drinks, or kombucha are not water.

Gatorade has over eight teaspoons of sugar in a 20-ounce bottle. A 20-ounce bottle of Mountain Dew has almost twenty teaspoons of sugar. If the gods are obese and suffer from metabolical illnesses, then Mountain Dew might be the “nectar of the gods,” as Mountain Dew aficionadoes call their favorite beverage.

Coca-Cola is not much better at about sixteen teaspoons of sugar in a 20-ounce bottle.

Celebrities and athletes peddling sugary swill want us and our kids to regard energy drinks and soft drinks as our beverages of choice. Few decisions are worse for our health.

Are those who endorse such toxic beverages profoundly ignorant and seduced by money, or am I a scold ignoring the principle of all things in moderation?

One serving of eight, sixteen, or twenty teaspoons of sugar is not moderation. Worse, some who consume these beverages drink more than one bottle daily. My millennial children report knowing peers who drink four or five bottles a day.

Sadly, Mountain Dew mouth is an actual condition. I don’t imagine any celebrities or athletes peddling soda will be donating to organizations providing dental care for the afflicted.

Most of us already get plenty of sugar in processed foods and especially in the ice cream we consume in hot weather. We don’t need to add to our load of processed carbohydrates.

Perversely, sugary drinks don’t quench your thirst but make you thirsty for more sugary drinks. Contrary to what many believe, sugar does not improve “mood or alertness,” but it will increase your “energy slump.”

An astonishing 42% of adults and nearly 20% of children are obese (not merely overweight). Obesity-related illness is costing America “$190.2 billion or nearly 21% of annual medical spending in the United States.”

Adult-onset diabetes is now so common in children that the name of the illness was changed to type 2 diabetes.

Are you feeling depressed? Try reducing your sugar consumption. You might find that not only your physical health but your mood improves.

Our livers are stuffed (from the sugar our bodies turn into fat) and we’ve literally turned ourselves into foie gras. Our guts used to be full of beneficial intestinal bacteria that munched on fiber and kept everything in our bodies copacetic. Now, that food has been stripped of its fiber, and those bacteria get so hungry they eat the mucin barrier off our intestinal cells, setting us up for inflammation and leaky gut.

—Robert Lustig, Metabolical

Water should be your primary beverage. On warm days, I drink more water if I complement my plain water consumption with water with a tad of flavoring. My choice is a bit of peeled and freshly grated organic ginger and a splash of lemon or lime. Ginger contains anti-inflammatory compounds and antioxidants. (Of course, if you have a medical condition, be aware of any contraindications.)

Ginger-lime with slices of fresh cherry is a great combination. After exercise or yard work, a handful of salted nuts pairs well with this hydrating beverage.

A ceramic ginger grater will be easy on your fingers. The grated ginger will settle to the bottom of your glass, and thus, you can keep refilling your glass with water; a quick stir will raise some of the settled ginger.

If you’re wondering, A 20-ounce bottle of Canada Dry Ginger Ale contains almost 15 teaspoons of sugar and virtually no ginger.