For those embracing a ketogenic lifestyle, staying hydrated with flavorful beverages beyond plain water can be a delightful challenge. Lemonade, a classic summer drink, often comes loaded with sugar, making most store-bought options unsuitable for a keto diet. However, with a few simple adjustments, you can enjoy a refreshing and healthy keto-friendly lemonade.
The Problem with Traditional Lemonade
Most lemonade products, whether ready-to-drink or powder mixes, are packed with sugar. This high sugar content can quickly kick you out of ketosis, negating the benefits of your keto diet. Even some vegetable juices should be avoided. Similarly, drinks like Gatorade, Powerade, Vitamin Water, and energy drinks, despite being marketed as health products, are often sugar powerhouses. Any coffee drink made with syrup or flavoring is packed with carbs. Beer is also problematic due to being brewed from cereal grains.
The Keto Lemonade Solution: Homemade is Best
Your best option for a refreshing and healthy lemonade that aligns with your keto goals is making it yourself. This allows you to control the ingredients and eliminate added sugars.
Basic Keto Lemonade Recipe
For a quick and simple keto-friendly lemonade, you'll need:
- Lemon juice (freshly squeezed is highly recommended)
- Keto-friendly sweetener (such as allulose, erythritol, or stevia)
- Water (or seltzer water for a bubbly twist)
- Ice
Blend or mix together lemon juice, keto sweetener, and water. Adjust the sweetener to taste.
Read also: A Guide to Enjoying Chick-fil-A Diet Lemonade Guilt-Free
Instructions:
- Combine your keto simple syrup and lemon juice in a glass jug and whisk together.
- Add water and whisk until combined.
- Pour into glasses filled with ice and refrigerate leftovers.
This recipe makes 5 total servings of Keto Lemonade. Each serving has about 1-2 grams of net carbs and 10 calories (approximately).
Key Ingredients and Considerations
Lemon Juice
- Fresh is Best: Always use fresh lemon juice. Bottled lemon juice often has a different acidity level and an odd flavor due to added preservatives.
- Pick the Juiciest Lemons: Look for brightly colored, medium- to large-sized fruits with minimal discolorations. The juiciest lemons will feel heavier than their size indicates, and their skin will give a little when you gently squeeze them.
- Carb Count: Per lemon, there are about 3.3g of carbs in the fresh lemon juice with only 1.2g of sugar.
Keto-Friendly Sweeteners
Any keto-friendly sweetener will work, but it's recommended to start with the sweetener called for in the recipe first. If you have a strong preference for a particular keto sweetener, feel free to use it as a substitute. Consider these options:
- Allulose: Tastes similar to real sugar and has a glycemic index of zero.
- Erythritol: A popular choice with minimal aftertaste.
- Stevia: A natural sweetener, but some find it has a slightly bitter aftertaste.
Water
You can use regular water or seltzer water for a fizzy lemonade. Carbonated water, mineral water, seltzer water, and tonic water contain zero net carbs and are refreshing keto drinks on a low-carb diet.
Customizing Your Keto Lemonade
The basic keto lemonade recipe is a blank canvas for flavor exploration. Here are some ideas to customize your drink:
- Fruits and Herbs: Enhance the flavor with keto-friendly fruits and herbs. Add some blueberries, raspberries, strawberries, mint, basil, and/or cayenne to your lemonade and let it infuse in the fridge as it cools. You can also use frozen low-carb berries as a way to cool your drink and enhance the flavor simultaneously. If you end up eating the berries, make sure you add it to your carb count for the day.
- Lemon Syrup: Omit the water in the basic recipe to create a concentrated lemon simple syrup that will stay fresh in the fridge for up to 1 month.
- Other Citrus: Swap the lemon juice for lime juice to make a refreshing limeade.
- Strawberry Lemonade: Add strawberries for a classic twist.
- Blueberry Lemonade: Blend in some blueberries for a unique flavor.
- Cucumber Mint Limeade: Substitute lime juice for lemon juice and add mint and cucumber.
Addressing the Keto Flu
The "keto flu," a common side effect of transitioning to a ketogenic diet, can cause fatigue, headaches, and muscle cramps. This is often due to electrolyte imbalances. You can turn your keto lemonade into an electrolyte drink to help remedy the keto flu.
Read also: Chick-fil-A's Diet Lemonade
- Electrolyte Boost: Add ⅛ to ¼ tsp of sea salt (for sodium), ⅛ to ¼ tsp of cream of tartar (for potassium), and/or 1-2 tbsp of unflavored Natural Calm (for magnesium) to every 6 cups of lemonade.
Storing Keto Lemonade
Your keto lemonade will stay fresh for at least 24 hours if you are planning to carry it around or leave it out during the day. If you’d like to preserve it even longer, you can also freeze it.
- Lemonade Ice Cubes: Freeze extra lemonade in an ice cube tray to prevent dilution.
- Frozen Lemonade: Blending your sugar-free lemonade can create a frozen treat similar to a slushy.
What to Serve with Keto Lemonade
Keto Lemonade is the perfect keto-friendly drink, regardless of your main dish. Enjoy some of our other summer meals when you make this recipe for the perfect BBQ.
- Keto Strawberry Smoothie
- Keto Cheddar Cornbread
- Keto Margaritas
Non-Alcoholic Keto Drink Options
When drinking on the keto diet, it’s important to be mindful of hidden sugars that could kick you out of ketosis. Below are non-alcoholic drinks you can enjoy any day of the week. Certain beverages like water, tea, and bone broth can be consumed in abundance.
- Water: Water is your best option on keto (or any healthy diet) and should be your number one source of hydration.
- Coffee: Many people turn to coffee for a morning boost, but is it keto-friendly? Yes. While caffeine is a stimulant and therefore should be monitored, it comes with several health benefits.
- Tea: Tea contains zero carbohydrates and has been connected to various health benefits for centuries, making it an excellent beverage choice on keto.
- Bone Broth: Bone broth may help maintain a healthy gut, restore collagen, and support a strong immune system.
- Kombucha: There are varieties of low-carb, low-sugar kombuchas available, so don’t bother purchasing a brand that packs 10 grams of carbs into a single serving size (which is only half the bottle).
- Coconut Water: As with kombucha, you need to pay extra attention to the label when purchasing this product. Only buy plain coconut water, which should only have one ingredient.
- Keto Smoothie: For a meal in a glass, make a homemade keto smoothie. There are endless options for a quick, on-the-go meal.
- Most Non-Dairy Milk: Most non-dairy milk is a keto-friendly drink option. Double-check the ingredients to make sure they do not contain sweeteners or additives like carrageenan. Whenever you can, always opt for the full-fat option. The best choice is to make them at home.
Alcoholic Keto Drink Options
All alcoholic drinks should be consumed mindfully, but practice special caution while on keto. That said, social gatherings are a necessary and enjoyable part of life. Here’s a piece of advice you won’t hear every day: Your best bet is hard liquor. In liquors like tequila or mezcal, the sugar converts to ethyl alcohol.
Drinks to Avoid
There are plenty of drinks that should be avoided at all costs. Soda holds no place on keto or any healthy diet.
Read also: Refreshing Lemon Detox