Staying Cool from the Inside This Summer

When the dog days of summer hit, it’s hard to stay cool. But when you don’t want to miss summer’s outdoor fun, it is essential to find a way to keep from getting too hot. You can do so by seeking out shady spots, spending all day in the pool, standing in front of a portable fan or even wearing light, loose clothing.

Additionally, instead of just keeping your body cool from the outside, you can keep it cool from the inside. Foods and drinks can bring down your body temperature, but you also need to make smart choices.

Is Ice Cream Making You Hot?

You’d think ice cream would be a great choice on a hot day. Ice cream and other cool foods can temporarily cool you down, but when you eat foods that contain a lot of calories, such as ice cream, your metabolism fires up. That creates heat in the digestive process, which can increase your body temperature.

Ironically, hot — as in spicy — foods can have an overall cooling effect. Capsaicin, a component in chili peppers, makes you feel warm, so you tend to sweat more, cooling the body. 

Spices aside, the best foods for cooling you down are ones with high water content and few calories. Vegetables like cucumbers and lettuce top the list, but radishes, celery, tomatoes, peppers, cauliflower and cabbage also are good. Fruits, including melons, grapefruit and strawberries, are excellent choices too.

Not only does their high water content lower your temperature, fruits and vegetables also are loaded with vitamins, minerals and antioxidants that help prevent free radicals from damaging your cells and protecting you from sun damage.

Keeping Your Cool

Eating cool foods may make you feel comfortable, but it’s not just the temperature of the food itself as it goes in your mouth. Very often it’s the hydration the food provides. When your body gets hot, it begins to sweat to cool the skin and core temperature. On a hot day, your body can lose a lot of sweat, over 6 cups per hour. That’s why it is crucial to stay hydrated in the heat.

Women need more than 11 cups of fluid per day and men need over 15, which may include water as well as other liquids, according recommendations from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine. 

A word of caution: While drinking a cold beer on a hot day might sound tempting, alcohol is a diuretic that causes your body to be less hydrated. It may decrease your ability to cool yourself by sweating.

Soup’s on 

While you may not be thinking about eating soup in the midst of summer, this recipe below for a cold soup is easy and refreshing. It features cucumbers, a vegetable that can help keep you cool, as well as beans for protein. It’s a perfect light meal to enjoy on a hot day.

Chilled Cucumber Soup Recipe

Serves 4-6

Ingredients:

1 cup Great Northern beans cooked and drained

3 ½ large cucumbers peeled and seeds scooped out (save the remaining cucumber half for topping)

1 garlic clove

3-4 sprigs fresh dill

1 tsp. salt

½ cup water

3 Tbsp. apple cider vinegar

Topping:

½ cucumber diced with the peel on

1 ear of fresh corn, cut from the cob

1 Tbsp. fresh dill, chopped

1-2 green scallions, thinly sliced

Preparation:

1. In a blender, add beans, cucumbers, spices, water and vinegar. Blend 2-3 minutes until smooth and creamy. Chill in the fridge for 1 hour or substitute 1 cup ice for water in blender.

2. For the topping, mix diced cucumber, corn, dill and scallions in a bowl. Refrigerate.

3. When you’re ready to serve, place the soup in a bowl and garnish each serving with 2-3 Tbsp. of topping.