At the recent Slow Food Nation held at San Francisco, I received an email the day before, telling us to bring our water bottles. That I did, and in it, I included half a lemon sliced thinly with a 3-4 sprigs of mint mixed with the home-filtered Sacramento tap water & ice. That worked out really well as my husband and I wandered around the pavilions and washing down our tastings with lemon-mint water.
The bottled water versus tap water news buzz saw a revival recently since then. A few days after that weekend, Chef John commented in an entertaining piece on drinking tap water at Food Wishes Video Recipes. Gail at The Pink Peppercorn did too, along with her thoughts on food in general. Suddenly, everyone's talking about food choices and their impact.
I still don't know which camp I belong to yet. I can say that my stand regarding prepackaged water is founded on practicality, and money-smarts. The idea of carrying a large 24-bottle case of prepackaged water from store to car trunk, and subsequently from car trunk to home up a flight of stairs is not appealing, and can get painful. How many of us have actually pulled a back muscle doing that? On the other hand, turning on the faucet requires minimal effort. Since my household already pays a fee to the water utilities for our water, I see no point in going out and buying more water.
But if you really think about it, all canned soda is is flavored water, right? So what's my beef with tap water? Sure the chlorine might put some folks off, but reasonably priced water filtration system such as Pur or Brita can easily take care of that. Me? I just find it tap water plain. Boringly plain.
So my curiosity was naturally roused when I saw a good friend, Sandra, drink out of a water bottle filled with lemon slices and peppermint sprigs over the 4th of July weekend at her home. At the first sip of what she prepared from lemons and peppermint from her garden, I was hooked. It was a great idea, and so healthy. Simply brilliant! The more adventurous Sandra would sometimes add slices of cucumber, apples or even tomato, but I find after some personal experimentation, lemon & mint is all I need to pump up my water.
It has been two months since and I have been drinking mostly that. I would take a week's supply of mint & lemon to my workplace with Mondays' bentos, and leave it in my workplace refrigerator. Preparing it is quick and easy, a few slices of lemon, a few sprigs of mint or peppermint, and lots of ice and water in my Jamba Juice Reusable Mug. When the drink runs out, I'll just add more ice and more water and it's good to go. I've been buying less canned sodas, saving me some money and actually drinking more water now (about 1.5 to 2 mug-fuls a day and the jamba juice mugs are huge).
So the next time you are feeling a little tired of your usual beverage choices at the store, why not head over to the vegetables aisle and grab a bag of fresh lemons with a bundle of mint for a refreshing change instead?
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