Water hydrates the body & coffee dehydrates, so I hear. How good are fruit juice & herbal teas for hydration?

The caffeine, contained in coffee, alone can cause dehydration, but the water contained in the beverage greatly compensates. So, in short, coffee hydrates you almost as well as water.

Herbal teas have the same effect as water, except some do contain caffeine (such as Green Tea, White Tea and Yerba Mate).

Fresh fruit juices tend to be isotonic, meaning they have a negligible osmotic potential to your blood plasma. This means they hydrate you if you have an empty stomach, but would be less effective if you had already consumed sugars and/or salts.

I would avoid drinking fruit juices as they can cause tooth decay and are high GI. Eat the whole fruit.

Hope this was useful :)

Like coffee, teas have caffeine…a HUGE diuretic that dehydrates.

For each cup, you’re supposed to drink TWO extra cups of water as to not dehydrate and then you’re constantly looking for the nearest restroom.

Diuretics are drinks like alcohol, tea, coffee, sodas (anything with caffeine), cranberry juice, and food like cucumbers, watermelons, fresh tomatoes, asparagus, artichokes, beets, carrots, lettuce, raw onions, oats, melon, celery, parsley and any veggie from the cabbage family...cabbage, Brussels sprouts, broccoli, Chinese broccoli (kay-lan), Chinese cabbage (bok choy), cress, cauliflower, turnips, kale, collard greens, mustard, canola (rapeseed), radish, horseradish, rutabaga, and 20 others...

To avoid dehydration when eating diuretics, I will use salty vinaigrette with artichokes or asparagus, or combine cauliflower/ham in a casserole, or a slice of ham with a sandwich containing lettuce, tomato and onion (lettuce/fresh tomato/raw onion are the trifecta of diuretics in a sandwich) or eating sauerkraut with sausages and corned beef with cabbage.

I do not drink teas as I don’t want to bother about having to drink more water and having to pee a lot.

Water hydrates the body…you should get enough water with a healthy diet containing high water content food, like eating half a grapefruit would be like drinking a glass of water and a bowl of homemade vegetable soup should do the same.

NOW…water (drinking water) WILL dehydrate the body if you drink too much and flush out your sodium that enables you to retain water…so you get huge water weight loss and dehydration because you cannot retain water. As they say…the more water you drink, the more water you lose. Dehydration should always be avoided.

Fruit juices? You’d be better off peeling and eating an orange, with all the fiber, the fresh vitamins/minerals than having to press 3 oranges to get a glass. Hopefully, you’re reusing the pulp…I love the pulp as is. I have to refrain myself from munching on the pulp so I can use it when making bread or soup (it freezes well).

Now, if you do not make homemade fruit juices, you’re a lost cause about commercially processed fruit juices (don’t even go there and research, it’s disgusting).

If you have some issues about hydration, give up caffeine (coffee, tea, sodas…), eat fruits instead of drinking fruit juices unless you press homemade fruit juices and reuse the pulp. Drink the juice as soon as you make it (does not store well when exposed to oxygen in the air), snack on the pulp or freeze it to use later.

Sip water and make sure you do not flush out your sodium.

Edit:

I enjoyed Chaos’s comment about “fresh fruit juices tend to be isotonic, meaning they have a negligible osmotic potential to your blood plasma”.

I have no idea what that means but I like Sheldon Lee Cooper (The Big Bang Theory) and that is something he would probably say.

Herbal teas are great for hydration and their very natural. Fruit juices are also good but keep to 1 glass- full of natural sugars that are high in cals. (this is only relevant if your watching your weight so sorry if your not!)

Not really. Actually tea, coffee and soft drinks contains liquid. But they are not in pure form. So plain water is recommended. But tea, coffee and soft drinks also hydrate your body but not as good as plain water.