Vegan Favourites: Coconut Water!
- Lily Green
- Nov 27, 2015
- 3 min read
The new gatorade. Powerade is soo last year. Mild taste, but with SUPER NUTRITION. Drumroll please….
Oh wait, you already know what I’m about to talk about? Oh yeah. I guess you could say I’m a little bit excited about the holy water that is coconut water– the slightly sweet liquid found inside young green coconuts. DON’T DRINK THE WATER FROM REGULAR BROWN COCONUTS. You will be very disappointed and disgusted…learn from my mistakes. So many fitness gurus pretty much eat the same thing in their native habitats (eg. commonly found roaming gyms, local parks and Rebel Sport stores)–guzzing protein powder shakes, sculling 3 litres of water from an aluminium flask, and most importantly, clutching bottles of fluorescent Gatorade/Powerade like babies with a rattle. And I can understand why, the sales pitch is pretty seductive, but only because the advertisements SCARE YOU into thinking you need these “formulated sports hydrators” or your cells will shrivel up and die.
It’s a pretty simple flowchart. When we exercise, we sweat, when we sweat, we lose water, salts, ions and electrolytes. These all need to be replenished in order to maintain our bodies, otherwise we can experience dizziness, nausea and severe dehydration– if we don’t drink something. How about some water? What ever happened to water? The thing is, water (in it’s purest form) doesn’t contain electrolytes or salts or many minerals, which is fine for most people, but for people who do larger amounts of strenuous physical activity (such as athletes, gym junkies, or once-off charity marathon runners hehe) it helps to have a little bit of an added boost, especially if you exercise vigorously and often.
Just one 32-ounce bottle of Gatorade or Powerade can contain an enormous 52.5 grams of sugar. That’s almost as much as a 590ml bottle of Coke with 65grams of sugar! What are you REALLY drinking? I'm not sugar shy, and formulated sports drinks do contain sugar that replenishes the glucose in our cells after exercise but not only that, but sports drinks are loaded with colourings, flavourings and chemicals– some even contain the neurotoxin-turned-sweetener aspartame!
So what were we talking about? Coconut water!
You could call coconut water a sport drink formulated by NATURE. It’s full of the mineral Potassium– an electrolyte found in our sweat, blood and other body fluids. It contains mild amounts of salts to replace those lost through sweating. Other benefits of coconut water include:
-Sources of vitamin C and B
-Sources of calcium, iron and zinc
-Slightly sweet taste (sweeter depending on the brand) but with very little sugar
-Zero fat
Coconut water is your best bet for a natural hydrator other than water, it helps plump up your skin cells with hydration, give you shinier hair with it’s mineral content, and keep you going during exercise. Beware of labels that say “coconut juice”, as they are likely to not be 100% pure and are probably loaded with sugar and additives that you don’t want. I’m always taking cans and tetra packs of coconut water with me to the gym, to sporting events and gymnastics competitions– it’s the best helping hand before AND after a workout!
Coconut water is generally quite cheap to buy, I prefer to buy 1 litre tetra packs from Cocobella for around $5, or I buy 12pack of cans from an asian brand that works out at around $1 per can!!
My favourite brands:
Cocobella (pictured)-- the flavoured ones are great post-workout
C Organic coconut water
Nudie ‘Straight Up’ Coconut Water
Jt’s Coconut Essence pure coconut water
Loco for coconut water? What do you think?
Leave all comments below!