Coconut water...not just for Robinson Crusoe

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Coconut water is pretty damn good. 

Drank it for the first time yesterday. I love coconut (shredded coconut, toasted coconut!, dark chocolate covered coconut, coconut cake, German chocolate cake, coconut gelato, coconut cooking oil, coconut body oil, even coconut incense) but always avoided the water for fear that it would taste like coconut. I am a complicated man of simple tastes: I like my socks white, sky blue, and my water to taste like water and nothing else. The thought of actually drinking coconut makes me wince.


But it does taste like water! Aside from a subtle trace of flavor which is more olfactory than taste the liquid is plain and, to my wonderment, refreshingly cool almost cold straight from the nut. 

I am a complicated man of simple tastes: I like my water to taste like water and nothing else

I was finally intrigued to give it a try after reading a blip in, of all places, the latest issue of Details magazine (a pity the publication has evolved into such a fag rag), which I pilfered from the book exchange last week. Here is the tip in its entirety:

"Coconut water is what Gatorade wishes it was," says Oz Garcia, New York nutritionist. It has the potassium and the sugar you need to feel restored after a workout but none of the artificial ingredients or the food coloring

Hmmm. Cheaper and just as beneficial a sports drink as what's on the market? Okay.... It just so happens the gym owner's father sits outside with his makeshift coconut water stand. So I paid him $15pesos and gave it a shot. The old man calmly sat aside his book, pulled out the machete (these fruits are hard ass nuts to crack), and bore a whole in the top. Then he popped a straw into it and handed me the green, slightly pointed bowling ball. It takes two hands to hold it. Inside was more water than I

imagined. Afterwards, if you like, he'll hack up the green outer shell to get to the more familiar looking brown nut and then cut out the white meat for one to nibble on later. I tried the coconut but it wasn't sweet to the taste so I passed on it. Maybe next time.  


You might be able to find the following products in a market near your neck of the woods.

Zico Pure Premium Coconut Water