Homemade, fresh ginger cooler

I'm obsessed with ginger root.  I love the peppery, floral taste.  I love the fresh, clean, energizing scent.  I also love that as an added bonus, ginger root has a long list of health bennys.

If you do a quick search on "Health Benefits of Ginger," you'll get a host of websites from different resources detailing the power of ginger.

 The common denominators of ginger benefits (I find) are as follows:

• Promotes good digestive health (ie: helps induce appetite, reduces intestinal gas, alleviates nausea, rids body of bloat)
• Serves as an anti-inflammatory agent
• Aids in clearing sinuses
• Helps the body absorb nutrients

I can vouch for all the above.  I have IBS and fibromyalgia.  Since incorporating ginger into my diet, I have seen marked improvements in the severity and frequency of both my IBS and fibromyalgia flare ups.  When I have tummy troubles (especially when I was pregnant with my son) chewing fresh ginger totally helps reduce the intensity of those nasty, symptoms.

I brew a lot of tea-like drinks at home in an effort to thwart cravings for sodas (I miss you, Diet Coke!)  One day I decided to try and make a ginger drink with some of the extra root I had on hand in my freezer. The experiment was successful by my standards and now I regularly make this ginger cooler and personally find it to be incredibly refreshing and dare I say, spa-worthy.

Try it for yourself!  It's stupid-easy to make.

What you need:

• 7.5 - 8 cups of water
• Pot to boil water in
• Fresh ginger root, peeled and sliced*
• Honey, Stevia, Truvia, or Sugar in the Raw (or regular sugar, if you like) I use about 1.5 tablespoons of honey in my cooler for a very mild sweetness.  Play around with amounts of sweetener to please your pallet.  

*Use as much or as little as you'd like depending on how strong you want the ginger taste to be in your cooler.  I generally use a root as big as my hand and about as wide as but my thumbs pressed together.  That translates into about 1.5 cups sliced. The thinner you slice the ginger, the stronger the flavor will be as well. I generally slice mine about .25-.50 inches thick

How you make it:

Put ginger and water in a pot.  Bring to a boil.  Boil for about 5 minutes, full roar.  Turn down the heat and let simmer anywhere from 10-15 minutes.  Add your desired sweetener and mix with a wooden spoon. Remove from heat.  Allow ginger to steep in the mixture as it cools.  The longer you simmer, the longer you steep, the stronger the ginger flavor will be.  

Hello, gorgeous.

Remove ginger from pot with a slotted spoon before allowing mixture to cool if you want a more subtle flavor.  I, personally, let the ginger slices steep upwards of 45 minutes sometimes as it cools.  Do remember, though, I'm a ginger freak.  The spicier the better!  

Once cool, transfer to a container that is easy to refrigerate.  I'm partial to large, Ball canning jars with their plastic, reusable caps.  Should yield about 5.5-6 cups of ginger cooler (depending on how long you boil.)

I mean, everyone will wonder what the big jar of
urine in your fridge is all about but that means
more ginger cooler for you, right?

One batch keeps about 2-5 days in the refrigerator.  Serve over ice.  Throw in some fresh-squeezed lemon or lime juice and a few wedges of your desired citrus for an extra element of refreshment.

Cheers to good health and sunny, summer days!