I’m not eating and I need to keep my electrolytes up. I’ve been trying different drinks and there pretty much all awful. The best I’ve had so far is pineapple coconut water. The worst is Powerade Zero fruit punch.
It seems like whatever stuff they put in there in these drinks is the problem because many of them have this horrible bitter taste they try to hide with flavoring.
Any suggestions would be appreciated.
And yes, I know Brawndo has electrolytes. Very droll.
I am going to second making your own. Most electrolyte solutions are only sodium chloride, potassium chloride and sugar.
Morton’s makes a thing that is literally this without the sugar. It’s called “lite salt”. https://www.mortonsalt.com/article/morton-lite-salt-mixture-nutritional-facts/
Any “lite salt” should do the trick. You will also need a multivitamin/multimineral as well but if you are just looking for an “electrolyte” replacement drink… It’s just lite salt, water and sugar. If you want to get fancy you can add magnesium and calcium.
Is it salty? Yes. It’s salt. Electrolytes are salts.
How do I make it not salty? Add sugar.
Why are the things like propel bitter? Fake sugar + salt tastes bitter to some people. Most Gatorade/propel blends also need to be low cal so they use fake sugars. Gatorade originally had like 60grams of sugar in a bottle. That doesn’t sell well anymore. You, however can go nuts and use as much sugar as you like.
Is there electrolytes that don’t taste salty? No. They are salt.
What other options do I have? Pills. But if you aren’t eating you might not absorb them well.
Edit: after reading some other posts I am going to add the following.
Gatorade is potassium and sodium salt + sugars, artificial sweetener and flavors. You can check the nutritional facts. It only provides sodium and potassium… No calcium or magnesium. Gatorade is literally “lite salt” plus sugar, flavorings, artificial sugar and water.
Monk fruit, stevia and the like all have bitter aftertastes.
Personally my favorite artificial sweetener is erythritol. Incidentally it is the only artificial sweetener that doesn’t cause an insulin response. Monster zero energy drinks are sweetened with it for a flavor profile.
Don’t forget magnesium! I like Natural Calm, which becomes magnesium citrate when mixed with water. Avoid magnesium oxide, which is typically used as a laxative.
Mix it all with your preferred flavoring, such as Mio drops. Keto forums call this ketoade/ketorade.
Side note: different sweeteners are radically different. Stevia, sucralose, saccharine, aspartame, erythritol, etc all have different properties. Some have weird flavors, feels, or gastro effects, and affect each person differently. Saccharine is often called bitter; stevia is often described as metallic; erythritol has a cooling mint-like feeling.
Careful with that erythritol…
Morton’s lite salt contains magnesium carbonate, which is an over the counter laxative. I tried using lite salt in lemonade as a sports drink while exercising in really hot weather and the results were… explosive.
Interesting. I wonder how much you used? I can imagine that a 1/4 tsp of the salt has enough magnesium carbonate to be effective… But I don’t know how much is in it (otherwise it should be on the label since magnesium does have an rda)
Quite a lot. I was road biking long distances in the summer in the American southeast and replaced all of my table salt with lite salt thinking it would help with recovery. It was 3-4tsp per day, about half in food and half in lemonade. The drink would set me running for the can.
Potassium citrate mixed that with table salt for a recovery drink wound up working really well instead. Based on that, I assumed it was one of the other minerals from the lite salt that was setting me off. Magnesium being the most likely suspect.
Brawndo of course.
Just get Pedialyte or Liquid IV packets. They work wonders for me.
For the Pedialyte, pour a third of the bottle into about a liter and you’ll get more out of it.
For Liquid IV, a half packet into a liter of water is probably enough to not be overwhelmed by flavor. But you can use more or less depending on your taste.
Honestly, not a drink: the Pedialyte freezer pops.
Someone recommended that to me before. I’m not a huge fan of popsicles, but I may have to resort to those. Thanks.
Get the drinks then. They also have powder to mix with water. Fruit punch, berry blast, and orange are my and my kids favorites.
You can make your own. Rehydration solutions are sugar, sodium, and potassium. You can use regular table salt for the sodium and “cream of tartar” in the spice section (it’s a powder) is a source of potassium.
If you are interested, look up how much to use and then go wild. The premade bottles like Gatorade are exactly the same ingredients. They might have a bit of citric acid to make it tangy so the salty is covered and it gets rid of dry mouth.
I think those flavors are the problem. Although the coconut water doesn’t have them. So I’m not sure.
I’m on a keto diet, and I NEED the electrolytes. I found this recipe and it’s been helping me so far. https://www.ketofitnessclub.com/blogs/drinks/electrolyte-drink
I’d be interested in anyone’s takes on that recipe, hopefully I’m not poisoning my liver or something…
Edit: I just read your previous post, so you probably shouldn’t try this recipe as it uses apple cider vinegar which I believe would aggravate your ulcer.
You’re getting a little sugar from the fruit juice.
Vinegars always been difficult for me to drink. But it looks super interesting do you like it?
Weird that I don’t seem to get notifications for comment replies using Sync, so sorry for the delayed response.
I don’t enjoy drinking the apple cider vinegar, HOWEVER, it has has a huge positive impact on me in combination with keto. It goes down hard, but extremely worth it for me!
