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June 03, 2024
15 Drinks to Supercharge Your Intermittent Fasting
Dr Livingood
When you’re fasting, eating may not be possible, but drinks are still definitely on the table!
I have gathered 15 drinks with massive benefits to help you along your health journey. I personally use almost all of these every single day.
I will also be exploring the concept of ‘dirty fasting’ and how it can be even better than the traditional cold-turkey approach.
1: Plain Ol’ Water
Let’s get the obvious one out of the way. Water is the basis of all life. As far as we know, life cannot survive without water; so staying hydrated is key to staying alive, let alone healthy.
Water serves to keep the joints lubricated to prevent injury, delivers nutrients to your cells, and generally makes your organs function.
Ideally, you should be drinking half your bodyweight in ounces per day.
Much of the water we usually consume comes from food, so if you’re going without that for long periods during the day, replacing it with what you drink is critical.
2: Infused Water
For an extra dash of flavor, I highly recommend water infusions.
Cucumber is a classic and lemon is delicious, but there are infinite combinations to explore.
Throw whatever enhancer you would like in the container the night before, and in the morning, you’ll have flavored water with the benefits of the vitamins of the fruit or vegetable you chose!
The average person needs between 11–16 cups of water a day. By adding flavor, you’ll be far more likely to reach that goal!
So find your favorite, and drink up.
3: Mineral Water
Mineral water helps to replace the minerals lost through sweat and other bodily functions, especially on a lower-food-based diet.
The liver — your body’s primary detoxifying organ — is a heavy drain on minerals, so supporting it with the nutrients it needs will allow it to process things faster and more efficiently!
The electrolytes often found in mineral water also serve as a natural, caffeine-crash-free energy boost.
4: Sparkling Water
You may have noticed a pattern by now: many of these recommendations are ways to increase your water intake.
That is because water is incredibly critical to every aspect of your health, so increasing the forms you drink it in will provide different benefits while still fulfilling your basic hydration needs.
Drinking sparkling water has been shown to help lower LDL (bad cholesterol) levels in postmenopausal women and stabilize blood sugar!
Sparkling water may also have an effect on sleep quality, so if you’re tossing and turning, give mineral water a chance!
5: Coffee
Cheers to coffee!
Not only does the energy boost allow us to be productive and prepared for the day, but the caffeine content speeds up your metabolism, helping burn calories and keeping you alert.
Plus, assuming there are no added creamers or sugars, coffee has been found to reduce the risk of diabetes and protect against disorders like Alzheimer’s, dementia, and Parkinson’s.
The natural antioxidants in coffee are especially fantastic when you’re restricting food intake, as the coffee provides a sugar-free way to get those key nutrients in.
If you combine your coffee with a collagen powder, you can get a boost of flavor without the fat and fulfill a good chunk of your daily nutritional needs without calories!
However, I do find that adding a dash of coconut oil (discussed in more detail here and here) helps keep me full for longer.
6: Coconut Milk
While a dash of creamer in your coffee won’t ruin the benefits, the sugars and lactose may lead to inflammation and digestion issues, and run high in calories.
While nut milks like cashew and almond avoid some of those issues, they often have a large increase in sugar and other additives due to the processing to put them in milk form.
That causes insulin spikes, which will make you hungry and stop the fat-burning process.
Coconut milk serves as a way to provide the texture of milk without a ton of added sugars, and its fattier content keeps you fuller for far longer than the alternatives.
7: Tea
If you’re not a coffee fan, tea provides an excellent alternative!
Black and green teas in particular provide the same caffeine boost, increasing your metabolic rate and burning fat far faster.
Green tea especially compounds on tea’s health benefits, adding antioxidants.
Even if you’re not looking for caffeine, herbal teas are warm, soothing drinks that can settle cravings and often provide other benefits, like aiding sleep.
8: Apple Cider Vinegar
Whether taken straight as a shot (2–3 tablespoons) in the morning, or diluted in water and sipped throughout the afternoon, apple cider vinegar has multiple benefits.
It has been shown to lower the insulin spikes that make you hungry while still keeping your body in fast-burning mode.
The digestion-aiding benefits also help to clear toxins from the body, and when mixed with water, the hydration only increases that benefit!
9: Healthy Fats (Like Coconut Oil)
We already mentioned adding coconut oil into your coffee, but adding a dash of healthy fats into your drinks throughout the day boosts your brain’s ability to focus, making you less likely to break your fast.
Dirty fasting — a form of fasting where you are allowed a small amount of calories during fast periods while you still cut out sugar and high calorie foods — gives you the best of both worlds when it comes to nutrition and productivity.
Your brain still has the nutrients it needs during your working hours to stay creative and productive, but cannot rely on sugar as a crutch, leaving it to burn your already-present fat.
Focus on adding MCT Fats (Medium Chain Triglycerides) as your source of fat in these drinks.
10: Bone Broth
As well as being a sustainable, economical way to utilize every part of the meat you cook at home, bone broth is a fantastic source of minerals!
By drawing out the collagen and minerals from the bones, you create an extremely bioavailable source of nutrition, and add a thick, hearty flavor to satisfy your cravings.
11: Fish Oil
Fish oil is a fantastic boost to almost every part of your body.
Omega-3s lower inflammation, vitamin D increases your immune defense, and the fatty acids promote brain function!
Joints, bones, skin — there really is no part of your health that fish oil does not benefit.
If you don’t like fish, then the easiest way to get fish oil is in pill form.
12: Collagen
Replacing collagen is essential to repairing connective tissue in your body and boosting your gut when there’s not as much easily available food.
The previously mentioned bone broth is a fantastic source of collagen, but an equally, if not more effective solution would be to mix a collagen powder into your morning coffee.
These provide excellent flavor enhancers without the sugar and boost your collagen intake easily.
13 and 14: Drink Greens, Not Soda!
Zero-calorie sodas still provide zero benefits!
While sports drinks like Gatorade may provide electrolytes as well, they still have massive amounts of sugar, creating spiked insulin levels and making cravings worse.
The same goes for most fruit juices and even coconut water.
The best way to get these vitamins in drink form is through either cold-pressed vegetable-based juices, or through greens powders.
15: Electrolytes
The goal of fasting is autophagy, which is when your body begins to utilize its stored sugars instead of the ones you are taking in, burning up your fat deposits.
However, this process takes a lot of minerals that you would not be taking in when fasting.
Replacing those is essential! Without them, you may get side effects like coldness, fatigue, or headaches.
Be sure to add salts and other minerals into your water or other drinks you have during the fasting period to avoid those side effects.
Summary
All in all, fasting is one of the best ways to supercharge your metabolism; but staying hydrated throughout the process is essential to success!
Making sure you still get all your key nutrients through liquid forms allows you to stay functioning at your best while burning off the fat.
If you want to dive deeper into the benefits of fasting, healthy fats, and other nutrition advice, check out my free book!
If you want more information on health, products, and a community to support your health journey, my website https://drlivingood.com/ is full of resources to help!
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