LEMON's

LEMON

The lemon (Citrus × Limon) is a small evergreen tree native to Asia, and the tree's ellipsoidal yellow fruit. The fruit's juice, pulp and peel, especially the zest are used as foods. The juice of the lemon is about 5% to 6% citric acid, which gives lemons a sour taste. The distinctive sour taste of lemon juice makes it a key ingredient in drinks and foods such as lemonade

USES OF A LEMON
Every part of the lemon is used in sweet or cooking delicious dishes. From the rind to the juice it is used. 
Traditionally a drink of lemon juice, hot water and a teaspoon of honey have been used as a remedy for colds, obesity, and constipation. Lemon juice contains oil, which studies show to help to relieve rheumatism by stimulating the liver to expel toxins from the body. Lemons are good for oral diseases, throat disorders, fevers, cold, beauty aid, stomach problems, obesity etc.

A squeeze over grilled fish or wedges are used and traditionally served as an accompaniment to fish dishes or salad dressing. Lemon slices are a popular addition to tea and cold drinks. 

Lemons give a wonderful flavor to sweet dishes. They can be used for jellies, jam, lemon curd, or cheeses, mousses, ice cream, soufflés etc. Lemon peels contain pectin, which helps to set jams and jellies. Strips of peel can be added to candy to serve with coffee or add to cakes and puddings. It is widely used in pickle and sherbets. It is used as a strain remover due its bleaching property. Due to their high vitamin C content it prevents oxidation, so lemon juice is often brushed over cut fruit or white vegetables to stop them from turning brown. 

Lemon juice is a good base for oral electrolyte solution for the treatment of dehydration and diarrhea. Few drops of lemon juice added to a glass of home made ORS will provide adequate amount of potassium apart from other minerals. Since lemons are a good source of vitamin C they are beneficial for building up resistance against infection.

BENEFITS OF TAKING LEMON AND HOT/ WARM WATER

1. Helps with weight loss:   Lemons are high in pectin fiber, which helps fight hunger cravings. It also has been shown that people who maintain a more alkaline diet (see #2) lose weight faster.
2. Balances pH: Drink lemon water everyday and you’ll reduce your body’s overall acidity. Lemon is one of the most alkaline foods around. Yes, lemon has citric acid but it does not create acidity in the body once metabolized.

3. Is a diuretic: Lemons increase the rate of urination in the body, which helps purify it. Toxins are, therefore, released at a faster rate which helps keep your urinary tract healthy.

4. Freshens breath: Not only this, but it can help relieve tooth pain and gingivitis. The citric acid can erode tooth enamel, so you should monitor this. I admit, I’m slightly worried about it. 

5. Clears skin:  The vitamin C component helps decrease wrinkles and blemishes. Lemon water purges toxins from the blood which helps keep skin clear as well. It can actually be applied directly to scars to help reduce their appearance

6. Relieves respiratory problems: Warm lemon water helps get rid of chest infections and halt those pesky coughs. It’s thought to be helpful to people with asthma and allergies too.

7. Boosts your immune system: Lemons are high in vitamin C, which is great for fighting colds.  They’re high in potassium, which stimulates brain and nerve function. Potassium also helps control blood pressure.

8. Aids digestion:  Lemon juice helps flush out unwanted materials. It encourages the liver to produce bile which is an acid that required for digestion. Efficient digestion reduces heartburn and constipation.

9. Helps kick the coffee habit:  After I have a glass of hot lemon water, I actually don’t crave coffee in the morning. This is weird, I can’t explain it, but I’ll take it.

The one thing I couldn’t find a concrete answer for is why the water has to be hot. Having studied Chinese Medicine, I can only assume that cold water likely provides a shock or stress factor to the body. It takes energy for your body to process cold and really hot water, believe it or not. I asked Blueprint Cleanse how much lemon the recommend you put in your water. They suggested just a wedge or 1/8 of a lemon.

10. Keeps you Zen: Vitamin C is one of the first things depleted when you subject your mind and body to stress. As mentioned previously, lemons are chock full of vitamin C.

Tip:  Drink your warm lemon water in coffee cups that has coffee or tea stains.  The lemon water will help remove them.

Tip:  Grind the used lemon rinds in your garbage disposal to help deodorize it.

If you drink lemon water first thing in the morning, how is it going for you?  This is my bowl of lemons in my Tiffany Atlas bowl, which will be empty by the end of the week.

DISADVANTAGES

Citrus fruits have been linked with migraine and some people are allergic to them. It is implicated as triggering factor in few asthmatics. Since lemons are highly acidic it can destroy tooth enamel.

 How to make homemade lemonade

Lemonade.  This refreshing drink is linked to sunny wether.  Who doesn’t love to sit down and have a refreshing glass of lemonade?  One of my favorite treats is when you can get a glass of homemade lemonade.  There’s an amusement park we go to where you can get a glass of freshly squeezed lemonade and it is a treat.  I always thought it was hard or a pain in the butt to make but I was wrong. 

The first step I did was search on the internet on how to make lemonade.  There really aren’t a lot of lemonade recipes online.  For the most part they are all the same.  The proportions change based on the quantity of lemonade you want to make, but the instructions on how to make homemade lemonade are pretty much the same.

So how do you make homemade lemonade?

It’s simple. Here’s what you need for the recipe:

6 to 8 fresh lemons (enough to make 1 cup of lemon juice)
4 to 5 cups water, divided
1 cup sugar

That’s it. That is all you need to make your own homemade lemonade.

The first thing you need to do is to make some simple syrup out of the sugar and one cup of water. 

I used to be intimidated by the thought of making it – what if it burns or boils over?  But it isn’t difficult to do.  You can buy simple syrup in the store but when you see how easy it is to make I don’t think you would want to spend that money for it.  Combine the sugar and water in a small saucepan and cook it until the sugar is dissolved completely.  Once the sugar is all dissolved, remove the pot from the heat.

If you plan to make lemonade on a regular basis you can make a large batch of simple syrup and store it in the refrigerator in a tightly lidded container for up to one month.

While your simple syrup is cooling it’s time to juice your lemons.  Roll the lemons on a table or hard surface to get the juices flowing. 

Slice each lemon in half.

Use a juicer to get all the juice out of your lemons.

Once the lemons have been juiced I put it through a strainer to catch any seeds or pieces of pulp.  I guess if you like pulp you can leave it in your lemonade (I don’t so I strain it out).

when you get one cup of lemon juice add it to a pitcher with the water. I used four cups of water to dilute it a bit.

Add the simple syrup and mix well.

Now you’re ready to serve your lemonade.  I added some slices of lemons to the pitcher (since I had one lemon left over) and garnished the cups this time with strawberries because my kids love strawberries.

Yummy!
 

Some hints about making your own homemade lemonade

If you leave the lemon garnish in the pitcher for a long time (as in the refrigerator) the lemons start to break apart and you get pulp and seeds.  Also you can decrease the amount of sugar in the recipe to ¾ cup if you want to watch the sugar intake.  This lemonade recipe is easy to make in quantity –the proportions are equal for the sugar and water for the simple syrup and the same amount of freshly squeezed lemon juice.  Add the additional water to taste.

Homemade Lemonade Versus the Powdered Stuff

Once I figured out how to make lemonade at home and that it is simple I decided to look at the ingredients on the can of powdered lemonade in my pantry. I started to do some research on it and was shocked at what I found.

Here is a list of the ingredients and what they are:

Fructose – also known as fruit sugar, a simple sugar that is found in many different fruits and vegetables. It is sweeter than table sugar.

Citric Acid – a water soluble acid found in citrus fruits and is a natural preservative . It adds an acidic or sour taste to foods.

Ascorbic Acid – also known as Vitamin C.

Maltodextrin – a food additive that is produced from corn starch and has sweet qualities that comes close to the taste of sugar. It is sometimes used to thicken foods as well.

Sodium Acid Pyrophosphate – a buffering agent used in many foods. It is also used in treating leather, removing iron stains from hides during processing. It is also used in petroleum production as a dispersant to prevent mud from clumping in oil wells. I found this information on Wikipedia.

Sodium Citrate – a chemical added to the mix to control the acidity of the product.

Magnesium Oxide – is added to the mix to prevent the mix from caking but it is also the raw form of magnesium used to make Epsom Salts.

Calcium Furmate – the calcium salt of furmaric acid.

Artificial Color – this is self explanatory. There has been some research reported on the Internet that artificial food color and dyes have a negative effect on children’s behavior (attention problems like ADD and ADHD) but the FDA states that right now their opinion is that the synthetic colors currently allowed in food are safe as long as they are made according to FDA standards. This is an article from the Los Angeles Times from 2008 that gives some more information.

Yellow 5 Lake – the artificial color approved by the FDA that gives the drink mix it’s lemony yellow color. This dye is also found in cosmetic and personal care products. Read more about this here.

Tocopherol - it is the antioxidant Vitamin E, used to preserve freshness in the product. It is a compound found in vegetable oils.

Oh yes, and less than 2% natural flavor.

What are the ingredients in homemade lemonade? Water, sugar and lemons.  That’s it.  After learning what all these ingredients really are I’m not sure I’ll serve the powdered lemonade drink mix to my children again.

I am not a nutritionist but I wanted to get an idea of what the calorie count would be on a cup of my homemade lemonade. I got six servings out of the recipe, about 8 ounces each. There are 774 calories in a cup of sugar and that divided by six is 129. Freshly squeezed lemon juice has between 1 and 7 calories per ounce less if you are using fresh, more if you are using frozen. To split the difference I’ll say 4 calories per ounce and I used 8 ounces in the recipe. That means 5.34 calories per serving. So each serving of my homemade lemonade recipe (very unscientifically derived) is about 135 calories. Not a low calorie treat, but this would be OK once in a while. If I was to cut back on the sugar I’d be able to save some calories there.

It isn’t hard to find out how to make your own homemade lemonade. Give it a try sometime because there isn’t anything quite like the taste of freshly squeezed lemonade on a hot sunny day!