diet drinks: myth or fact?

[shootingstar]

Very true! Interestingly enough I've found the better the tea, the more carefully you must treat it.... an inexpensive green tea will be more forgiving than a very good one. Some brands can just be icky... I had one Chinese tea that no matter how you brewed it tasted salty and grassy. I don't think I've ever had a Japanese tea I didn't like (and have had plenty of good Chinese teas too).

I also really like Japanese Genmaicha, which is green tea with roasted rice and sometimes pop corn in it. It's very hearty.

I enjoy Genmaicha -it has a pleasant natural green tea with slight toast undernotes.

My palate does distinguish between strong black teas and green teas...in that I dislike straight black tea. I must have a black tea with abit of milk, but no sugar. I never take any sugar nor honey in any tea I drink --black or green.

Sweetened green tea is unnatural to me so I never buy boxed/bottled sweetened teas (greeen or black) at all.

[channlluv]

I love Honest Tea, but I found I can save a lot of money if I brew my own. I go for easy, too. I use Culligan water in a 4-cup Pyrex measuring cup, plus four tea bags, in the microwave for five minutes, then I let it steep while I finish making breakfast. (Go ahead and cringe all you tea pros. I know that's not the best way, but it take so long for the water to boil on the stove, and then steep, too...I can't be late for work.)

I use various green teas. Lipton's green tea is pretty good. I like organic jasmine green tea, too, though. And I rarely use sweetener, but I guess I've gotten used to the bitter notes.

I pour my four cups into portable water bottles and drink it through lunch.

People keep asking me what my secret is for beautiful skin. I tell them green tea. Me and Gwyneth Paltrow. I read it in a magazine. Ha!

Also, I read in another magazine - or maybe it was here - that if you take those brewed green tea bags and let them cool, then rub them on your bare skin and let the green tea dry, your skin soaks up lots of antioxidants.

I don't know if that's true or not, but my skin actually has improved quite a bit since I started doing that. It helps my rosacea a lot.

How do you all transport your drinking water every day? I know you're supposed to drink half your body weight in ounces of water. For me, that's 125 ounces of water every day. That's just shy of 16 cups of water. A full gallon of water. Ai-chi-wah-wah.

I don't drink soda at all, but I do get two or three pieces of fruit every day. I think that helps, but I never get the full amount of water.

How do you all do it?

Roxy

[Miranda]

...but I never get the full amount of water.

How do you all do it?

Thx for the tea tips. As far as water goes, I'm really bad about that. I hate drinking just plain water and am working on that one. For spin class say, I'll make sure I drink one water bottle. That's three 8oz glasses. Now, I've been refilling it before I leave the gym and make sure I drink it before the days over. That makes six 8oz glasses total. I have always just went by the 6-8 glasses (8oz each) a day thing. The other things I drink have caffeine in them (coffee, tea) so I don't count them.

[Miranda]

I like splenda, hate diet soda and make my own green tea blend (cut the grassiness with a bag of Earl Grey).

So there ya go.

That's good to know because I like Earl Grey. I typically use a decaf form for the evenings. A Brittish lady friend of mine instroduced it to me a few years ago. She's since moved away, or I'd have her brewing my tea the "proper way".

[Miranda]

Thanks, those are great tea tips for one thing! I think the jury is still out on the fake sugars. I think I'm going to ditch any drinks with the fake sweetner. I know this sounds crazy, but giving up diet pop again was hard. If it's the fake sweetner that causes me the trouble, I don't want to be drinking it again in anything else. I think on my health food store trip I'll ask them about the alternatives mentioned here for supplies.

[channlluv]

My favorite natural sweeters are Stevia (you can buy it in packets, like Splenda, et. al., but it's natural, not chemical) and Agave nectar, which is a little pricy, but similar to honey in consistency and delivery (in a sqeeze bottle).

Roxy

[Biciclista]

I also really like Japanese Genmaicha. Never use sugar, and i drink it 360 days out of the year. I even take it with me on trips.

Earl Grey i like but i can't really drink it without sugar. weird, huh.

We eschew anything with artificial sweeteners in them.

[lph]

i don't drink diet stuff, but i dislike the taste of most artificial sweeteners and i find most sodas way way too sweet anyway, like drinking syrup. i love fruit juice though, and smoothies, and edible sweets, so go figure. (literally, i guess )

daily i drink black coffee, green tea w/lemon with a small teaspoon of raw sugar and extra lemon juice, white tea with berry flavour unsweetened and peppermint tea or similar in the evening, maybe a tsp of sugar. eat a cookie or two with it. i find my sweet tooth gets accustomed to sugar over the xmas holidays, for instance, and takes a while to get down again. have tried cutting out those final tsps of sugar, but i don't find it worth it.

[badger]

I was going to mention stevia as well, though I don't know how good they taste as one kind I tried was absolutely disgusting. I had to throw my coffee out.

I do think microwaving tea is blasphemous, but whatever works!

Personally I love exceptionally strong black tea, and I'm on the hunt at the moment to find the perfect tea for me. My neighbourhood tea merchant is happily sending me home with one sample after another.

As for green tea, the better the quality, the lighter in colour. A lot of bagged tea (black or green) are basically dregs of the whole leaf variety and usually not the best. So, if you brew green tea and it's brown, it's pretty low quality (I might be wrong on this, as I know a lot of Chinese green tea are supposed to come out light brown).

I also find that really good quality Japanese green tea like sencha make me pee like crazy. Detox? Caffeine? whatever it is, I never drink it past 3pm.

I'm also drinking a lot of rooibos and honeybush. Non-caffeinated and substitutes quite well as black tea if I want something heartier at night. Rooibos chai is nice with the spices.

I don't drink very much water at all. I figure if I'm drinking good quality organic teas (both caf and non-caf), it's probably better than just drinking straight water.

Btw, about the decaffeinated tea, make sure it's not done so chemically. You're better off drinking the caffeine than the chemicals they use.

[PamNY]

I used to drink tons of diet soda, then gave it up. I don't know if there's a connection with weight.

Green tea can be awful or wonderful. I purchase green teas from Upton:

http://www.uptontea.com

As mentioned earlier, don't let it steep too long. Upton sells sample-size teas which are fun to try. They have a variety of single-cup brewing devices so you can avoid tea bags.

If I have to drink bottled tea, I prefer Tea's Tea. They have several unsweetened teas. I love their Jasmine Green.

http://www.itoen.com/tea/index.cfm

Pam

Pam

[ny biker]

FWIW, I drink about 32 oz. of Diet Coke every day. I lost 10 lbs. last year. My ribs are visible.

[GLC1968]

Diet sodas won't 'make you fat' in an of themselves. I have always prefered diet soda to regular just because they are less sweet to me. That said, I don't like most diet sodas (just diet Coke)!

Artificial sweetners do not trigger the desire for more sweets for me. My triggers are chemical, not taste related (except with raw onions...but that's a whole different topic!!), so things like sugar, honey and white flour (simple carbs) trigger the need for more carbs and in my case, that usually comes in the form of a sugar craving. Drinking a diet Coke while I'm actively trying to lose weight is like a mini 'safe' treat and I go ahead and occasionally indulge.

I do know of plenty of people who find that any sweetner (even no calorie but natural stevia) will trigger cravings for more. It's very individual so it's best to know your own reaction to things (studies be damned!).

That said, any artifical sweetner is clearly 'fake' and makes me worry that the chemicals are not good for you, particularly long term.

[shootingstar]

I do eat desserts but have never been thrilled nor interested in any soda/pop drink, regardless whether it was diet or non-diet. And not as a child, but then there was no choice for our family. Any pop was given to us only during special occasional meals (if that) or going out to restaurants.

At most I will drink some Mountain Dew if I had no other type of drink/juice to drink. I actually find a whole can of Coke or Pepsi too strong for my taste. Only a few baby sips. That's it. And better to keep it this way for me.

It is difficult for me to fathom people who have a pop drink for breakfast/early morning. Just a foreign concept unless you're out in the desert.

I've had some incredible jasmine (green) teas. There is 1 brand served by one of the Chinese restaurants in Vancouver that has a powerful floral jasmine smell when tea steeps a few seconds. It is incredible.. The experience is truly fragrant and all-natural. Most definitely higher grade green teas (and not in tea bags, but loose inside clay teapot) must drunk .naked...all natural. Nothing else and it..must be sipped hot within 30 seconds after it has steeped.

These are not expensive experiences at all if you know where to go.

[OakLeaf]

It is difficult for me to fathom people who have a pop drink for breakfast/early morning. Just a foreign concept unless you're out in the desert.

I thought that myself, and I'm very sensitive to cold foods and drinks, but it does sometimes get hot and humid enough in the summer that I've resorted to drinking iced tea at breakfast. (Home brewed of course.)

Actually, in true desert, it gets cold overnight, so a hot beverage at breakfast would probably still be refreshing. It's in the very humid climates that the temperature will drop only 5 or 10 degrees overnight, and it's then, when I wake up sweaty after sweating all night with nothing but the corner of a sheet over my heinie, that's when I just can't bear to brew hot tea.


I was introduced to Gyokuro this summer and I'm totally spoiled for cheap tea now. Oh, I still drink the cheap stuff, I can't justify spending that much on tea all the time, but now I know what I'm missing.

[OakLeaf]

I have always prefered diet soda to regular just because they are less sweet to me. That said, I don't like most diet sodas (just diet Coke)!

that's weird, because diet Coke is so much sweeter than diet Pepsi! I don't drink any of that any more, but when I did, it was real Coke or diet Pepsi, because those are the less sweet versions.