How to Make Fizzy Probiotic Lemonade for Gut Health

There are so many probiotic drinks on the market today, but did you know you can easily make your own healthy probiotic drinks at home? This fizzy probiotic lemonade is one of the most simple probiotic beverages to throw together, and is ready to drink in just a couple of days! 

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Why Probiotic Lemonade?

Lemonade is such a refreshing drink, packed with healthy vitamin c from the lemon juice. By fermenting lemonade, you are adding lots of good bacteria to your drink, which has so many health benefits.

Benefits of a Healthy Microbiome

Having a healthy balance of microflora is vital to intestinal health. The microbiome is one of the building blocks to overall health, affecting not only digestive health but also the immune system, healthy energy levels, and more. Microflora in the intestinal system affect the gut-brain axis, which involves the communication between the GI tract and the central nervous system. This network involves hormonal, neuron, metabolic, and immune function!

It’s so important to have a healthy intestinal microbiome for overall health.

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Why There is an Epidemic of Unhealthy Guts

When there is an imbalance of microflora in the gut, the gut lining becomes compromised, which leads to many issues for human health. Daily digestion is not the only process that is negatively affected…

I’m sure you’ve heard of these issues before – leaky gut, irritable bowl syndrome, celiac disease, Crohn’s disease, a variety of autoimmune diseases, and so much more. There are many health issues that can be linked back to an unbalanced microbiome. 

Why do so many people nowadays suffer with these illnesses? 

There are a few reasons:

• The modern diet is dramatically different from what it was not so long ago. We didn’t used to have packaged foods with preservatives and gut-damaging ingredients like highly processed seed oils, highly processed thickeners, artificial colors, and artificial sweeteners.

•  We didn’t have many of the genetically modified foods we have today, like wheat and corn for example. 

• Our modern environment has many chemicals around that kill bacteria: not only the bad bacteria, but also the the beneficial bacteria. (Think pesticides, cleaners, toxins in the air, antibiotics, etcetera.)

• Another one of the big ways our diet has changed is how we prepare our food. Historically, fermentation was an important part of food preparation. Not only did fermenting help to preserve food, it also created unique flavors that have been an important factor in the development of cuisines across the globe. Important foods like cheese, bread, yogurt, sauces, and of course beer and wine – none of these would have existed without fermentation. This added many beneficial bacteria, as well as made many foods easier to digest, improving the intestinal health of our ancestors.

All this to say, it’s no wonder many people, especially those eating an unhealthy modern diet, have a imbalance of gut flora and therefore suffer with a variety of ailments. 

What Can We Do to Heal Our Gut?

The first thing to do is clean up your diet. Stop eating processed foods and switch to a whole food diet. This means you take fresh ingredients and make meals with it – what a concept! 

This also means cutting out GMO and difficult to digest foods, including switching from modern grains to ancient grains, or possibly omitting grains all together. You most likely will want to at least take a break from all grains (and possibly other food groups, depending on how compromised your gut health is). 

The next step is to start slowly incorporating different probiotic strains into your diet to help develop a healthy microbiome and healthy gut lining. This dual approach of eliminating the harmful factors, plus adding in beneficial bacteria will help to heal the gut lining. Developing this vital intestinal balance is important for overall health. 

One great way to do this is by frequently enjoying a healthy probiotic drink! Having a probiotic drink is a great addition to your daily routine, because they are an easy and delicious way to add beneficial bacteria to your diet.  

Why You’ll Love This Recipe  

This is my favorite beverage to make when I’m in a pinch because it’s so easy to make.

Some fermented beverage recipes can take a couple of weeks to make, like my probiotic ginger beer for example. This is because you have to develop a ginger “starter”. With this recipe, all you need is fresh lemon juice, whey from straining yogurt, a natural sweetener (my favorite is honey), filtered water, and a bottle with a stopper. The whey is what will give your lemonade the probiotic bacteria and natural fizziness! 

So, if you are looking for a refreshing drink that could also help to improve your overall well being, give this lemonade a try – your digestive tract, immune health, mood balance, and whole body will thank you!

Where to Get Whey

Whey is the leftover product of strained fermented dairy products.

Making your own yogurt is a great way to start incorporating healthy probiotics into your diet. Here is an easy tutorial to follow for making your own yogurt. You can also experiment with adding more beneficial bacteria strains to your yogurt by adding a variety of strains from a standard probiotic capsule, not just the ones in a storebought yogurt as a starter culture. This will provide an added probiotic complex that you may not be able to find in many commercial yogurt types. 

Once you have your yogurt, strain the yogurt through a cheese cloth or butter muslin (if you follow my tutorial, you will already be doing this). This thickens the yogurt by removing some of the liquid whey. This whey is full of probiotics, just like the yogurt! 

If you aren’t ready to make your own yogurt, you can just buy regular organic yogurt and strain it yourself to obtain the whey. Make sure to buy plain unflavored yogurt, and to not buy greek yogurt or skyr as those types are already strained. 

How to Make Probiotic Lemonade for Gut Health

Step One

Warm 1/2 cup water to 100 degrees. ( If using raw honey make sure it is not hot water which might kill some of the beneficial properties of the raw honey.)

Step Two

Add organic honey or organic sugar to measuring pitcher, and add warm water. Stir until honey or sugar is fully dissolved. 

Step Three

Add whey and stir well (make sure the water is not hot). Set aside.  

Step Four

Juice lemons and add to a quart sized bottle with a stopper or tight fitting lid. (Do not add lemon juice to whey without first adding the cold water, as the high concentration of citric acid might kill some of the bacteria in the whey). 

Step Five

Add remaining room temperature or cold water to bottle. 

Step Six

Add the whey/sweetener mixture to the lemon water mixture. 

Optional: add a pinch of salt. 

Step Seven

Close the bottle and shake well.

Step Eight

Set in a cool place to ferment for 24 hours. 

After 24 hours, release pressure. Close bottle again and ferment 24 more hours. 

Step Nine

Release pressure, and move to the refrigerator until cold. 

Enjoy plain and chilled or over ice!

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Bottles with flip top silicone stoppers

Stainless steel old fashioned ice tray

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This post does not contain medical advice.