Coconut Water And Hydration

Lauren enjoying a nice cold one before her race

 One of my favorite fruits is the coconut.I eat it fresh,I drink it fresh when I canI get someone to open a fresh green one. For me the carton or  canned is frequently, almost daily. When I find it in my local Hispanic grocery store on sale, I buy an entire  cart full.  I use the coconut oil to cook with,rinse it in my mouth to make my teeth white,place in in our protein shakes to had a healthy fat and a nice subtle tropical flavor sometimes  canned coconut milk, I use the same organic oil to cook and rinse my teeth, as I use on my skin after showering and on our hair too!  just Google Coconut and coconut water to see all the great benefits this magical fruit.

In the recent past there were various misconceptions regarding coconut, coconut oil and heart disease in   laymen and doctors as a result of various newspaper articles and other publications on the subject.These misconceptions have since been refuted and the coconut is in and delicious. The research over four decades concerning coconut oil in the diet and heart disease is quite clear: coconut oil has been shown to be beneficial.” - Dr. Mary Enig  ( For further reading: Mary G. Enig, Coconut: In Support of Good Health in the 21st Century )

   Coconut Water and Natural Hydration

Coconut water is a very refreshening drink to beat  the heat at a hot track any time. The juice is packed with simple sugar, electrolytes and minerals to replenish hydration levels in the body.

Instead of downing the conventional sports drinks that are high in fructose corn syrup and coloring, many people are going for the all natural,  coconut water. It is called “green” because the water comes from coconuts still not ripe.

If you examine the contents label of most sports drinks, you’ll see that there are 16 grams of sugar in it. Then you look a bit more closely, and you discover there are three (3) servings in the bottle. Therefore, you have downed a whole load of sugar in one drink. Not so with green coconut water. So one huge benefit you get from this drink is little to no sugar

Many regions of the world use it to replace fluid loss from the gastrointestinal tract and reduce the need for intravenous therapy. The osmolarity of tender coconut water is slightly greater than that of WHO recommended ORS  osmolarity. Presence of other biological constituents like amino acids, enzymes, other minerals and fatty acids may account for this higher osmolarity. However, unlike WHO-ORS, its water is very low in sodium and chlorides and rich in sugars and amino acids. This well balanced fluid composition with much needed calories would be an ideal drink than any other brand of soft drink beverages in dehydration conditions.

Its water composed of many naturally occurring bio-active enzymes such as acid phosphatase, catalase, dehydrogenase, diastase, peroxidase, RNA polymerases etc. These enzymes aids in digestion and metabolism.

Despite very light consistency, its water has much better composition of minerals like calcium, iron, manganese, magnesium and zinc than some of fruits like oranges. (Compare mineral composition of orange fruit).

Its water also a very good source of B-complex vitamins such as riboflavin, niacin, thiamin, pyridoxine and folates. These vitamins are essential in the sense that body requires them from external sources to replenish.It contains a very good amount of electrolyte potassium. 100 ml of water has 250 mg of potassium and 105 mg of sodium. Together these electroltyes help replenish salt deficiency in the body due to diarrhea.

Here is a great youtube on the value of coconut water and coconuts in general