By Michelle Beck

Hot weather is here, and it is time to lie under the hallway swamp cooler with a cool drink and a book. I have such fond memories of doing exactly that, but we are stuck with a boring air conditioner and ceiling fans, so that will have to suffice.  I know water is the best choice for summer thirst, but I get bored with water, and am always looking for healthy, low-calorie alternatives.

Soda

Soda is not a good choice on a regular basis, but it is a nice treat once in a while. If you are going to have soda, choose a soda without high-fructose corn syrup and with cane sugar instead, such as Pepsi Throwback, Heritage Dr. Pepper or any of the natural sodas, such as Hansen’s or Boylan’s. Just read the label before buying. Virgil’s root beer makes great root beer floats, and their cream soda is wonderful. All of these brands are readily available in most grocery stores.

Teas – with or without caffeine

I drink gallons of iced tea in the summer, both caffeinated and herbal. Almost any kind of tea can be made iced, so use your imagination. Black tea, green tea and white tea all come from the same plant. The difference between them has to do with when the leaves are harvested. Black tea has the most caffeine. Green tea leaves are harvested when they are a little younger (greener), and it has less caffeine than black tea. To make white tea, the leaves are harvested even earlier, and it has the least caffeine of the three.

Celestial Seasonings makes a huge variety of caffeine-free herbal teas. I found a few flavors of Celestial Seasonings sweetened zinger teas at Winco, and they are very good. Basically, they are the zinger tea bags with some stevia mixed in, so you could actually make it at home. For some reason, Winco carries them in the diet food section instead of the tea section.

Constant Comment green tea makes a delicious spicy iced tea. Tazo tea is a favorite, especially their minty, green Zen tea. Tazo can be expensive, so I was excited to see that Target is carrying it for a pretty reasonable price. You may have tried Paradise tropical tea at places like Sequoia Sandwiches, and it is also easy to make at home. Cost Plus World Market also has a large assortment of tea, including a good hibiscus tea by Rishi.

It might seem expensive to pay $4 or $5 for a box of tea, but if you do the math, it turns out to be far less expensive than buying bottled beverages.

About 10 years ago, I was visiting my friend Jessica, who had recently acquired an iced tea maker. As much as I like kitchen tools, I think many small appliances are useless, so I made fun of it for most of the weekend (A machine? For iced tea?) – until I realized how great the iced tea was. I ended up buying one for myself as soon as I retuned home. I think I am on my third machine now, and it is an essential part of the kitchen in the summer. The tea is delicious, easy to make and seems to stay fresh longer than sun tea.

Many different brands of iced tea makers exist. Most have a plastic pitcher

and cost under $20. If you are concerned about hot liquids and plastics, Back to Basics offers this iced tea maker with a glass pitcher. This French press-type iced tea maker from Bodum also looks interesting. For variation, you can put a few sprigs of mint or other herbs on top of the ice in the pitcher before brewing, so the hot tea can steep it.

I also love iced coffee in the summertime. I don’t like when it gets watery, however, so anytime we make coffee, I pour the leftovers into an ice cube tray. I store the cubes in a zippered bag and use them in iced coffee.

Mineral Water

Crystal Geyser makes a zero-calorie, naturally-flavored mineral water that is nice when you are looking for something fizzy. I will sometimes add a few drops of flavored stevia or a spoonful of Torani syrup. It’s also good with a squeeze of orange, lemon or lime.

Pellegrino is a great plain mineral water. It is available at most stores, and Costco has carried it in the past.

Sports and vitamin drinks

Sports drinks are fine, if you have been working out and sweating quite a bit. But they are not necessary after a stroll around the block or a walk to the mailbox.

Crystal Light has a new zero-calorie fitness drink that comes in little tubes and is sweetened with stevia instead of NutraSweet. It still has plenty of other chemicals, so consume wisely.

Companies like Vitamin Water, Snapple and Sobe like to sell their products as healthy replacements for soda, but they are not particularly. Vitamin Water and Sobe both use stevia instead of Splenda or NutraSweet as the sweetener in their zero-calorie drinks, which I consider to be a plus. I buy them occasionally, when I see an especially good deal on them, but I don’t think I’d want to drink them every day.

Juice-based

Beverages such as lemonade or limeade taste great in the summer (especially with a little vodka and soda water). We have a lime tree, and our neighbor’s lemon tree hangs conveniently into our yard, so I make both on a regular basis. To reduce the calorie count, I sometimes put a couple of ounces of lemonade or limeade into a glass and top with mineral water. It’s very refreshing. To make lemonade or limeade, simply combine one cup of lemon or lime juice (or a mixture of the two) with one cup of sugar and five cups of water.

For a variation, try orange pekoe lemonade or jamaica.

Trader Joe’s carries a nice selection of fizzy lemonade, limeade and blood orange juice drinks. If you are near Ranch Market, stop into their deli for one of their fruit waters. They are very refreshing. It can be hard to decide which flavor to buy, but the workers at the deli are very nice about giving samples.

Accessories

I am definitely not discouraging you from drinking plain water, but if you are easily bored like me, you can accessorize your water and make it more interesting. Try freezing slices of lemon, lime or orange and putting them in your water pitcher. Slices of cucumber and/or sprigs of mint are also very refreshing.

Sweeteners

I think you all know I am generally opposed to fake sugar. I am not a devoted drinker of sweet tea (my southern great-grandmother is probably rolling over in her grave), so this doesn’t affect me as much as it does some, but I do like to sweeten drinks once in a while. Stevia, which is a plant-based, zero-calorie sweetener, has come into vogue lately, and quality and taste varies widely. Some of the cheaper stevia powders are really bitter. I like Stevita drops and have them in several flavors. A bottle lasts a long time, as eight or so drops are all that’s needed in a 16-ounce drink.

I have, however, become a fan of simple syrup. Simple syrup is equal amounts of sugar and water boiled together until the sugar dissolves. The nice thing about simple syrup is that it is very easy to flavor. Throw in a handful of fresh mint, lavender or a vanilla bean that you’ve already scraped for another recipe and leave it in the syrup until it cools. Strain it and store it. As good as it is, I don’t want to add a ton of liquid calories to my diet, so I use it sparingly – a spoonful in my tea or other drink from time to time. I store simple syrup in a plastic tub in the freezer, so it will keep longer. Word to the wise – it doesn’t freeze. I tried to freeze some in an ice cube tray last summer, congratulating myself on my brilliance all the while. The cubes seemed frozen, but once in the zippered bag, they turned to mush and made a mess.

Vanilla sugar is also great. To make vanilla sugar, put some sugar in a jar with a lid. Add a vanilla bean pod that you have scraped and used for another purpose (ice cream?). Put the lid on the jar. In a few days, the sugar will have a great vanilla flavor.

Cups, bottles etc.

To help me get my 12 cups a day, I measure out my beverages in the morning. It’s easy to do – there are many different reusable bottles out there. I like using glass at home, but I have a few plastic or metal cups to take with me. I can’t recommend purchasing individual, disposable water bottles, not just because of the waste, but also because the water in the bottles is not that great. Despite the picture of a gushing mountain spring on the front, bottled water is no better for you than filtered water you can make at home. The bottles are meant for single-use only, and are not intended to be reused over and over.

Starbucks makes those cute, plastic, double-walled cups with a straw, but they are very hard to find. Copco makes a similar one that I have seen at Bed, Bath and Beyond. Places like Target have a large assortment of re-usable bottles. The most important thing to watch for with reusable bottles is Bisphenol-A  (BPA), a chemical linked with cancer that is already banned in many other countries.

Quick rant here: Why do we have to read every single label of everything we buy? If something is sold as a water bottle, we should be able to drink from it with confidence.

Here are some good options for reusable bottles and pitchers:

I love these glass refrigerator bottles from The Container Store. They are inexpensive and don’t take up much room in the refrigerator.

Love Bottles are pricy, but beautiful.

These are individual bottles to fill and store in the refrigerator. They are meant for a dorm setting, but would also be great in a home or office to just grab and go.