Making your own popsicles to stay cool
Bradical - October 10, 2022A nice frozen treat is a perfect remedy after a hot day outside. And while we are now in October and most of us aren’t thinking about having frozen foods, (I’m always late to the game, sorry) I hope this can be a resource in the future.
Now I’m no scientist, but I think cold drinks and frozen food are a great way to stay cool because they go inside of you and cool down your organs and blood that is then circulated throughout your body. Whereas something like a fan or air conditioning cools your skin but takes a while to cool your core.
Popsicles and ice cream are readily available and cheap at the store, but have you looked at the ingredients? While they taste amazing, they aren’t that amazing for our bodies. I wanted a healthier option. I could make my own popsicles using the style of mold that I grew up with which has a stick, but you have to constantly hold those and mostly just suck on or lick them, and they melt and get all sticky down your hand. Plus how do you eat the bottom without stabbing yourself down the throat with that stick?
I liked the otter pop style of popsicle. These can be sealed if you want to take a break and set them down for a minute, the little caps prevent any melted juice from running out, and they are thin enough that you can bite down on it and swallow a piece of frozen popsicle that will then melt inside your stomach and cool you down more. This pack from Amazon is $10 for 6 silicone popsicle molds.
During this past month, I’ve made several batches of these using a few different recipes. To be healthier and to make this more of a useful prep to cool me down and rehydrate my body, I started by making a homemade electrolyte drink and freezing that.
Homemade electrolyte popsicles
- Squeeze a lemon or lime
- Magnesium glycinate powder
- Salt
- Cream of tarter (potassium)
- Liquid stevia sweetens and does not add calories or spike insulin.
- Water
I’m not going to put down ratios because I don’t remember what I used and don’t claim to have the perfect mix. This tastes good as a drink, but when frozen as a popsicle, all the flavor migrates to one side and then the rest just tastes like an ice cube.
The next recipe I tried was a store-bought electrolyte powder mix and I added half the recommended water so the flavor would be more concentrated when frozen. This worked better than the first attempt, but still had a majority of the flavor in the first few licks, leaving the rest pretty plain.
I also tried using some leftover lemonade we had in the fridge and this by far was the best tasting because it had so much sugar in it. Go figure…
If you aren’t so worried about tracking the amount of sugar you are consuming or don’t care for all those additional minerals then just some plain fruit juice can makes some good popsicles.
quentin
