All-Natural Sports Drink

I developed this recipe for the newsletter of my friend Hilde, who sells "The Original" Himalayan Crystal Salt on her website HimalayanLivingSalt.com

It contains both a natural sweetener and natural salt and is an alternative to those brightly colored sports drinks that are made from polluted water, refined sugar, refined salt, and artificial colors.

Salt is an electrolyte. These are essential because your cells use them to transfer liquids, nutrients, and wastes across their membranes and to carry electrical impulses through nerves and muscles to communicate with other cells.

When your body perspires (from exercise or high temperature) electrolytes are lost in the sweat and must be replaced to keep the electrolyte concentrations of your body fluids constant. This is why athletes drink "sports drinks" after exertion--to replace the salt they have lost.

Both sugar and and salt help your body absorb and retain water. The ideal proportions for a sports drink are 1/3 cup sugar and 1/4 teaspoon salt to 1 quart water, plus flavoring to taste. Once made, it should be kept refrigerated.

Different swweteners are made up of different kinds of sugars. Since sucrose is recommended, I suggest using maple syrup, or fresh sugar cane juice (this is available in some areas of the country, and contains all the nutrients and enzymes present in raw foods). Lemon, lime, any juice, or flavoring extracts can be used for flavoring (if you use a sweet juice, reduce the amount of sweetener just a bit to keep the balance).

makes about 1 quart

1 quart good quality water
1/3 cup maple syrup or fresh sugar cane juice
1/4 teaspoon natural salt
juice of one lemon, or more to taste, or flavoring extract

1. Mix all the ingredients together.
2. Refrigerate until you are ready to drink it.