With­out wa­ter, many of our bod­i­ly func­tions are ren­dered com­pro­mised. Apart from reg­u­lat­ing body tem­per­a­ture and re­mov­ing waste from the body, wa­ter en­ables many of the chan­nels through which sub­stances like di­gest­ed food and nu­tri­ents dis­solve and dif­fuse around the body. We lose wa­ter every­day through phys­i­cal ac­tiv­i­ty, sweat­ing, me­tab­o­lism and even just breath­ing!

Many peo­ple have trou­ble get­ting the rec­om­mend­ed 7-8 glass­es a day, how­ev­er, a lot of the wa­ter you need can come from the food you eat. Adding some of these wa­ter-rich foods to your di­et can help stave off de­hy­dra­tion and keep you feel­ing re­freshed.

Fish Broth

Most lo­cal soups in­volve re­duc­ing the stock un­til its thick as chow­der. Fish Broths, on the oth­er hand, are known for be­ing light and smooth due to their high­er wa­ter con­tent than oth­er tra­di­tion­al Tri­ni soups. Packed with a med­ley of veg­eta­bles and well-mar­i­nat­ed fish, this soup is one of the few main course dish­es that boast com­plex carbs, pro­tein and co­in­ci­den­tal­ly lots of wa­ter!

The Five-Fin­ger (star fruit)

The Caram­bo­la (lo­cal­ly called the Five-Fin­ger) is na­tive to trop­i­cal re­gions and pop­u­lar in South­east Asia. While rep­utable for its ce­les­tial shaped slices many are sur­prised to learn Five-Fin­gers are ap­prox­i­mate­ly 90% wa­ter (ac­cord­ing to Health mag­a­zine). As a bonus, they al­so pos­sess galac­tic lev­els of good­ness—be­ing rich in vi­t­a­min C and high in the same an­tiox­i­dants found in red wine and dark choco­late. Per­fect for boost­ing your im­mune sys­tem and your heart while you re­hy­drate!

Oat­meal

The ben­e­fits of oats have been a sta­ple in the rhetoric of healthy eat­ing for ages! Any­one can tell you that oat­meal is high in fiber, min­er­al-rich and sup­ports good cho­les­terol, but not many as­so­ciate oat­meal with hy­dra­tion. When boiled oats ex­pand and ab­sorb the wa­ter or milk you cook them in. A hearty serv­ing of oats for break­fast can keep you full and help you get in that ex­tra serv­ing of wa­ter.

Yo­gurt Smooth­ies

These let you dou­ble down on nu­tri­ent and wa­ter in­take. Ac­cord­ing to Health­line.com the av­er­age serv­ing of plain yo­gurt is around 80% wa­ter and skimmed milk is around 90% wa­ter. Com­bin­ing them in a smooth­ie makes for an ef­fi­cient method of up­ping your wa­ter in­take while en­sur­ing every sip is filled with cal­ci­um, pro­tein, vi­t­a­mins and elec­trolytes. Per­fect for re­plac­ing lost body flu­ids and re­cov­er­ing af­ter stren­u­ous ac­tiv­i­ty. You can even make things more in­ter­est­ing by adding fruits and berries!

Grape­fruit

It’s com­mon for these to act as globes for dis­cus­sions of weight loss to re­volve around, but did you know that grape­fruits are some of the most wa­ter-rich cit­rus fruits? The av­er­age large grape­fruit con­tains about a cup of wa­ter in the form of juice. They al­so pack an im­mune-boost­ing punch by sup­ply­ing over 20% more vi­t­a­min C than is need­ed each day.

Wa­ter­mel­on

Any list of hy­drat­ing foods would be re­miss with­out Wa­ter­mel­on—it even has wa­ter in the name! Mel­ons are some of the most hy­drat­ing nat­ur­al foods in ex­is­tence. The tend to con­sist so much wa­ter that very lit­tle of their vol­ume can be ded­i­cat­ed to con­tain­ing caloric ma­te­r­i­al. This al­lows wa­ter­mel­on to fill you up with­out over­load­ing you with calo­ries. Beat the heat and re­plen­ish your body’s wa­ter re­serves with a nice, chilled serv­ing of wa­ter­mel­on.

Cu­cum­bers

Cu­cum­bers are an­oth­er low calo­rie, wa­ter-rich fruit. A cup of cu­cum­ber has on­ly 16 calo­ries and is rough­ly 90% wa­ter. With a lit­tle shadon beni and gar­lic you can turn cu­cum­ber slices in­to an ap­pe­tiz­ing chow or shred it in­to a rel­ish to go with a va­ri­ety of lo­cal dish­es.

Ar­ti­cle by Noor-ud-din Mo­hammed

Noor-ud-din Mo­hammed is a lin­guis­tics and com­mu­ni­ca­tions stu­dent at the Uni­ver­si­ty of the West In­dies, St Au­gus­tine. Mo­ti­vat­ed by his pas­sion for healthy liv­ing, Noor shares de­li­cious recipes and ar­ti­cles fo­cused on Trinidad and To­ba­go’s di­verse cul­ture and cui­sine.