Been doing a “Dry January” for a decade now and one unfortunate side effect is that I pick up an embarrassing N/A affectation every year to compensate, we’re talking kombucha, La Croix, “drinking bitters,” etc. Still looking for a new stupid way to drink water this year if you have any suggestions
Martinelli sparkling non-alcoholic cider
Curly straw?
I drink a lot of herbal tea during the cold months. I have a slight caffeine sensitivity, so if I do use caffeinated tea it's only 2 tsp or so amd the rest is herbal. I can drink tea hot or cold, almost always unsweetened. It definitely helps stave off my boredom with regular H2O.
Air Up?
LMNT powder? Drinking chocolate?
lmnt powders are good but the lmnt can of sparkling black cherry flavor is the best
Ice
I’ve heard that spring water of dubious provenance is becoming popular in some parts
Fridge water.
@t8oxana.bsky.social
Recently took one step closer into turning into my parents by getting into Crystal Light. Easy to make, flavorful, mostly water.
You could be fancy with your hot tea and have a London fog - earl grey with vanilla syrup and warm milk. Or sparkling coconut water from Trader Joe’s…
Crystalized citrus powders are good as heck. Big fan of the TRUE brand orange, very good in ice water
I'm getting into shrubs. It's humiliating tbh. www.thespruceeats.com/what-is-a-sh...
We have terrible tasting water, just wretched, so I use sugar-free electrolyte packets to make it go down easier. Mix-n-match for some real fun
Amass Riverine is my favorite distilled botanical, even better than any of the Seedlips. I am also a big fan of HopLark hops-flavored teas. The chamomile one especially is really good.
Shrubs are so good
Homemade Gatorade is quite nice and healthier
Hot stock and water
Went through a lengthy Nuun phase, felt considerably healthier while doing so, abruptly stopped for no discernible reason. I recommend!
must be those electrolytes
i’ll add my endorsement to the tea suggesters. also honestly just simple-ass lemonade made from a bunch of actual lemons, buncha water to dilute it & a lil honey (or w/e ur preferred sweetener is) to taste is pretty bomb & u can make a big batch and drink it over a few days
I've been drinking "Liquid Death". It's pretty good once you get past the name and explain to everyone in your office that it is not in fact a beer but water.
Diet Pepsi and fudgecicles
You could try adding grenadine to your sparkling water of choice. Or just into 7up for a Shirley Temple
I've started drinking warm lemon water every day. I'm going to be magically healthy this year. Right?
Make a shrub and enter the wacky world of drinking vinegars.
Tea. Whenever I'm thirsty but can't stand the thought of plain water, I go for a cuppa. At least on the occasions that fizzy caffeine is unavailable/inappropriate.
Nivage.
I'm so sorry
If you have a vitamix a home, chuck some ginger and water together and blend. Filter ginger juice with cheese cloth or whatever and then pour it into a large plastic pitcher and place in fridge for when you need it. I’ll usually add it to lemonade or my sparkling water or smoothies.
Raw dog it from a tap. I’ve been told that’s quite hardcore for the western world in 2025.
Try this: tea
Have you tried Crodino?
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6 years sober here. Kombucha I found too vinegary. I have a gazillion types of tea and infusers and a Drinkmate water fizzer that’s fizzes anything.
I’ve got a drinkmate too, carbonated lemonade in the summer is so good
ferment grated fresh ginger with sugar and a tiny bit of champagne yeast into ginger soda
always wanted to do a ginger bug
Get really into switchel Perfect both for vinegar fans, and also “having opinions about preparation”
Cbd seltzer
Matcha. It looks terrible
I love matcha tea. I drink or hot or iced with cream and honey.
Order those fancy mixed drinks that can be made virgin. Look for fancy options with umbrellas and multiple pieces of cut fruit on toothpicks.
Hop water
made my own for a few years!
So here's a suggestion and I still would consider it as being dry. I personally love black licorice and I saw a recipe for lemonade ouzo and mint and I had a splash of soda water, ouzo is very strong you only need like a tablespoon and you sure ain't getting drunk off that. It's very refreshing.
I always have 3 drinks going when I’m at home. Water, tea, and coffee.
Herbal teas like chamomile etc?
Have I got just the thing for you? H2O not cutting it anymore? Try super charging your water with the power of hydrogen! With the Echo Go + Hydrogenating water bottle, you'll experience 10x the hydrogen for increased placebo related effects. Only $300. www.amazon.com/Echo-Hydroge...
will it give me the ability to light my burps on fire
For $300+ it better!!!
You know bitters are like 40% ABV, right?
Yeah, I’m just talking a dash in some sparkling water. Although I have some bartender friends who swear that a shot of bitters will cure the hiccups
Can't hiccup if you can't breathe
Kvass
If you’re in Australia, I recommend Bickford’s lime cordial. If you’re not in Australia, I still recommend Bickford’s lime cordial, but you’re going to pay more for it!
Order some Pahhni water. Best tasting in the world. Filtered naturally in the Great Miami Aquifer in Ohio. It won awards, be a water snob.
you feel like getting fucking fancy and cutting up slices of lemon and lime? or cucumber water?
oh we’ve always got citrus on hand
Nothing other than the usual lemon water, Crystal Light liquid drops, etc. Good for you!
Liquid Death. No caffeine. No caffeine type substitutes. Sparkling water, natural flavors, & agave syrup.
Technically, there is water in Dewars
a dash of orange blossom water really makes it fancy
I really like the Ginger Lime Seltzer water that Polar makes.
RC Cola with peanuts. By the end, NASCAR will make sense to you.
Raw water, man! It’s the hot new dysentery craze sweeping America! Shed the pounds through night sweats and puking!
Whenever I decide to take a dry spell I end up substituting ginger beer with as much bit as I can find. It gives a similar feel to drinking alcohol and I am usually able to find it at bars because it’s in Moscow mules and dark and stormies.
My dad's doctor told him to cut out alcohol & sugar so I got him a Ninja Thirsti for Xmas. On New Yrs Day I swear the number of times he got up to make himself a 6-oz bubbly sugar-free lemonade, declaring hundreds of times that 6-oz is the only true way to drink anything.
Oh I'm on a lacroix kick again but check this out: I'm adding lime now
holy shit
My dentist told me to stop drinking bubbly drinks bc apparently the carbonation is what ruins your teeth, even if no sugar. I live for LeCroix it is a difficult habit to break. Was making my teeth sensitive. I rinse my teeth now in the sink after drinking it if I can.
get into shrubs bro
I just made a cherry vanilla shrub today lol
fuck yeah!! hell yeah!!!!!!
I also have a sour cherry-almond-rooibos and a blackberry balsamic shrub in the fridge. I’m so into them.
will have to google this.
I generally am not a fan of most NA beers but NA Guinness is terrific
Just a glass of water with a little bit of apple cider vinegar in there.
kombucha adjacent but i like that bougie “hop tea” stuff at Whole Foods
Not Applicable is what I first read
Kebabs Meant to write orange juice but the autocorrect is wild these days
tap but with a little pee as a treat
No one will think you are being pretentious; they’ll think… something else. I told a friend that I unabashedly love Tang and he said “I don’t think I’ve ever heard an adult say that before”
Plus, if you drink after Dry January, you can make a Buzzed Aldrin cocktail (vodka, soda water, and Tang) but just soda water and Tang is good too
I hear all the cool kids are drinking their water raw, these days...
Just drink water from a glass. Clear water. Stare at your neighbours through the kitchen window. Make them feel concern.
Liquid IV energy is pretty good
one time at a farmers market in colorado i bought a six pack of something called water kefir which was like a non-alcoholic fermented fruit juice that was pretty good
Kombucha is slightly alcoholic due to the nature of it being fermented. Commercial ones are 0.5% or lower, but it’s a live product and continues to ferment over time. It may contain more.
I hear drinking vinegars are all the rage now among the insufferable set
my people
I’m doing ‘no soda’ for 30 & and still trying to figure what can replace addiction
Try herbal or berry teas. Brew them and put them in the fridge until cold. Not soda but more flavorful than water.
Pineapple water is my favorite treat drink
There are a lot of real nice (but a little pricey) Amaro-inspired N/A sodas these days. I've liked the Ghia, Casamara Club, and Dram Le Dram ones.
And of course there are the standard Italian chinotto sodas if you want a more classic affectation
Try running it through pulverized coffee beans
Make, and drink, your own Chai! www.thehathicooks.com/how-to-make-...
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Going to try this recipe! 🤤
Has anyone suggested one drop at a time from an eyedropper? You can call it microdosing on moisture.
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Have you ever tried HopWater? I don't drink and that is my go-to nonalcoholic beverage. There are quite a few similar drinks on the market right now.
I’ve been doing dry January for about 7 hours now and…it’s not great.
gets easier my friend
Hahaha I know, I’m just kidding. I usually do Sober ‘Tober instead.
You ever get into homemade soda? I have a golden cola recipe that tastes like pioneer medicine and contains no caffeine… so yeah, please help.
hop water is Actually Great
I like hop water a lot, I just wish it wasn’t the same price as beer
you can make your own!
oh man, I gave it a go and it was an absolute "nope". still scarred by Zima I guess
It is. It's very refreshing. I really enjoy Lagunitas sparkling hop water tbh.
i am extremely pro-hop water!! Also toasted coconut Polar is so good it has gotten me out the habit of my nightly meal beer
oh I see this has been well covered. carry on!
Do it standing on ur head
but in all seriousness another poster suggested this and it sounds really good. not water, but n/a all the same. www.firstbottlewines.com/product/deta...
I love a cranberry and seltzer or grapefruit juice and seltzer when I’m not boozing.
Korean barley tea. A colleague of mine throws some dried figs in there and lets them hang out to sweeten it but I like it straight up.
At a party last night, I added a splash of margarita mix to seltzer water. On ice it made a perfect tasting and elegant looking mocktail. Cheers!
Hop water
Somehow it costs the same as beer, which adds to the fun
I kind of like those hop waters. A few of the breweries here have their own. Kind of nice to order a pint of hop water.
I like them too
Stock up on plain seltzer water and flavor your own. Bonus, you always have seltzer water around to use in tempura batter
If you're a fan of Guinness, the N/A version is very good.
It’s the best NA beer I’ve tried.
It's not water but really strong ginger beer and lime over ice makes a virgin mule that is super easy to make and feels very cocktail-esque. Sanpellagrino is also good.
i couldn't have done it without topo chico sparkling mineral water
I'm jumping on the "tea" bandwagon. I brew Irish Breakfast tea and chill it.... omg so good. Very refreshing and I drink enough to stay hydrated.
DRINK YOUR PISS
taking notes
Club Soda! It’s the tofu of drinks. Add anything to it to change its flavor. Cucumbers, berries, lemons…go for it.
Uh, bitters is beer?
Have you considered raw
is that your recommendation as a health professional
yeah
They’re even doing raw water these days. Maybe check out raw monster
Have you tried combining liquid water with frozen water? It's this thing I invented, it's really great, I recommend it.
Alkaline with lemon. The dumbest way.
Shrubs!
I was gonna suggest the same thing. So good!
50/50 ratio of fruit juice to water. 8 oz. glass equals fruit serving and 4 oz. water.
Been cold brewing my random tea bags for makin space cause large tea collection. Oh if don't like black tea/too strong try Assam! My mom HATES black bc taste thing but likes assam kind. (Have a assam chai stored away) Teadrops, milk tea powder, bobba tea powder are another option
Have you ever tried being a hot tea guy? I never bothered until I got an electric kettle, which really changes the equation for a quick cup in the winter.
How did you boil water for drinks previously?
most americans just use the microwave
Ah, right
Here's the kicker to this: not only do most Americans not have electric kettles in the first place, but even if we do our mains power is not powerful enough to do the kind of rapid boiling UK ones do. Our electric kettles take ages to boil.
Damn, really?
Yeah. I have a fancy one for pour over coffee and to boil about 700mL it takes a good 5+min. I turn it on first thing in the morning then go use the bathroom to give it time to do its thing.
Organisation is your friend but seriously, fuck that
Work bought me this as a thank you gift and it boils water real quick; I use it even just to preboil water I use on the stove: fellowproducts.com/products/stagg
This is the one that I have (but in black). It's still slower than a cheap British one! It's just because they have 220v mains power and we have 110v.
I'm now wondering how things like vacuums are...?
I've never used one in a 220v mains country before so I'm not sure, but I think they're fine. Most electromagnetic motors should be ok since those are more about current (I think?). It's just that resistance-based electric heating elements are going to scale in power with voltage.
Thanks. Apologies that you're dealing with my ignorance
This probably means your hair dryers are also much more powerful than ours for example. Fun fact: we do have 220v lines but they're special ones that are only for large appliances like washing machines.
Gotta get a British one and plug it into the outlet for your clothes dryer. (Very probably a super terrible idea don't do that).
Having read a later comment, I now understand yours!
According to the internet you kinda sorta can do that www.reddit.com/r/askanelect...
Thank you! Satisfying thread
That is wild! I will pass, but good luck to any brave soul who goes for it.
i got the wiring put in to have a plug like this in my new place. probably for a fancy oven but still considering a shady fast kettle as well
I guess now that you mention it, 700ml does take a while. I am usually operating at half that volume and it's all so much faster than on the gas range anyway
Our medium term plans is my wife got us on the wait-list for one of those battery-backed induction ranges that can just plop 23457 kWh into any compatible vessel in fourteen seconds. Like these ones: www.impulselabs.com
That sounds interesting. Never heard of those
Electric kettles are the best
electric kettles are the best! If you're a Matcha Man, getting a bamboo whisk to prepare your matcha is kinda neat
Oooo, be a Matcha Man, I want to read that metamorphosis timeline.
“As Ceej awoke one morning from uneasy dreams he found himself transformed in his bed into a Matcha Man.”
I have not but I can definitely picture myself clutching a hot mug while looking out a cold winter window
Chamomile and manuka honey at the end a stressful, taxing day? Mm!
Get a couple of bird feeders and put them out in your yard. Watching birds whole clutching a hot mug of tea is a 10/10 combination. If anyone asks you any questions on anything while you are doing this, your answers will sound 40% deeper and more profound.
maybe try some lapsang souchong tea (smoke-dried tea) if you haven't gotten around to that one yet--particularly nice for looking out a cold winter window
Electric kettle seconded. Splendid device.
Also, you may already know this, so apologies if this is redundant info, but only boil about as much as you need, not a full kettle. Boiling water over and over just makes it flattish tasting.
I got really into chai a couple winters ago.
Nestle instant Cevada with a splash of half and half is my anytime hot drink go-to. No caffeine. No real nutrition. Warm, tasty, hydrating.
I’m telling you man. Get a $20 kettle on Amazon or whatever. Toss in a pack of Lady Grey. It’s good. And it’s nuts Americans don’t have electric kettles as the norm. Or at least I didn’t grow up with them. Quickly boiling water in something you can instantly pour comes in handy.
Oh man, I studied in Scotland back in college and became an instant electric kettle convert. I’ve actually already got a nice one from Fellow so the only thing standing between me and this new man is a nice bag of tea
as an american, i've spent dozens of hours investigating a lipo battery powered 240v inverter to run a good kettle off. for a while i was looking at just trying to drop a heating element into water & run a controlled DC current source from battery, run 48V direct into inductive heat. make the tea!
this is to say i'm so jealous of your fast tea making
@werd.io recommended some tea recently. i'm a huge green fan. used to really be all Oolong all the time but switched over. bsky.app/profile/jaun...
time to snob it up and find a loose leaf tea shop near you, go nuts with tea pots and warmers and cups, buy like 20 different tea blends, etc.
These folks have excellent tea! They used to have a tea-tasting house and I learned so much from having tea there www.teance.com/tea/
If you like islay whiskey try lapsang souchoung got that same barnyard vibe
now we’re talking
another thing you can do with an electric kettle is become an absolutely insufferable coffee snob - french press, aeropress, clever dripper (secret hall of famer for me) all basically infuse like tea, require basically no technique, and the gear costs like $30
way ahead of you
hell yeah, here's a promo code for 25% off my favorite local roaster r.efer.me/3014708002934
Go for it. And update me if you find any good flavors. I am very much an amateur tea enthusiast.
Setting aside how someone lives without an electric kettle in the first place… I like a “heavy” black tea and Stash Double Irish Breakfast is my favourite thing most days - and pretty strong.
Anything by Fortnum & Mason is great. Any of these are good too and are cheaper: Typhoo, PG Tips, Yorkshire, Lyons, and Barry’s.
I have one here in California but I got the idea from someone on the bird site who was in the UK. Bought it online either Amazon or Target, and it was one of my best purchases ever! Meanwhile my cappuccino machine has broken twice.
It's a quick and hard descent into tea addiction, once you find one or two you really like. Recently picked up this charming habit myself. Highly recommend.
Actually I even like hot water. Or even lemon & honey w hot water (sans tea). It's hydrating and for some reason goes down easier than cold water
Electric kettle guys stay winning. I've been using two - an Amazon cheapie that boils up to 2L relatively quickly, and a fancy temp controlled gooseneck that's great for pourover coffee but sucks for everything else. I even bought a collapsible kettle to travel with.
“Simply Watermelon” Delicious
I discovered 0 alcohol gin, guilt free and zero calories for that end of day G&T (zero calorie store brand tonic)
If you haven't already, my favorite stuck up way to drink water is Lurisia, the Italian sparkling mineral water with a forlorn sailor on the label
this label rips
living near an eastern European grocer at the moment and it's a real trip. so much extremely salty sparkling water to buy with stern warnings of what it might do to your digestive system
If you haven't tried it, seek out a bottle of Kvass (Ceej you should too)
I've had a few brands and some homemade stuff over the years. any specific recommendations?
Not familiar with any specific brands, but I found that the ones with Cyrillic labels that you find at Eastern European stores where grandmas shop were the best
oy do i feel like an old man in saying this but: finding good kvas in this country is really difficult. even what you get at the russian store is often more like a soda than the kind of brown bread-tasting stuff you get from a guy selling it at the local market near your dacha.
anyway, yes buy some kvas at the russian store, but avoid the stuff that's in a plastic two-liter bottle because it tastes more like bread-flavored RC cola.
strange somewhat flat root beer is how i would describe the commercial bottles I've tried.
not a bad description
i wonder if anyone makes cans
Be a tea snob, Something like Vanilla Chai Rooibos might be delightful
I'm a big fan of making my own little soda concoctions. Some limes, cherry syrup, and seltzer is like a cherry limeade from sonic, that kind of thing
This, make a little “Italian soda” with some fun syrups and seltzer! Doesn’t have to be as sugary as regular soda and you don’t have to commit to a full case of one flavor.
I ordered an Italian cherry soda in a movie theater once and I didn’t expect it to be as good as it was. I never drink soda stopped 20 years ago and I could *not*stop thinking about that Italian soda for weeks. Probably because I loved cherry coke as a kid :)
Hop water
