Water beverages are flooding the market in a tsunami of new launches, and most are overflowing with better-for-you ingredients, such as vitamins and minerals, botanicals and nutraceuticals, plant proteins, and fibers. Often, these waters need to include natural flavorants and sweeteners, as well as flavor maskers for those unwanted notes from certain vitamins, botanicals, and minerals.
The first and most obvious reason consumers drink water is to hydrate. The Oxford dictionary defines the word “hydration” as the process of causing something to absorb water. “The intention of hydration is to rehydrate the body, i.e., to replace water and solutes lost through sweat and excretion,” clarifies Kantha Shelke, PhD, a food and beverage scientist and principal of the food science and research firm Corvus Blue, LLC.