Citrus fizz

A beautiful, floral, fruity citrus fizz drink. Healthy & nutritious – ready in seconds. Made with winter seasonal citrus for your vitamin C fix.

I am very excited about this drink at the moment. It is fresh, healthy, beautiful and a pleasing alternative to the sparkling wine that I otherwise might fancy.

It was born of a desire to plan away my laziness. Armed with a clear goal for the year to eat and drink healthily and happily, I wanted to make sure that I drank lemon water every single day. But the thing that was holding me back was a strong reluctance to slice, juice and strain, then wash up the equipment required to do so, every single day as well.

Ice cube trays are the answer.

A large batch of juice doesn't take very long to produce, and frozen into handy-sized ice cubes, can just be popped in a glass of water and turned into a lovely fizzy citrus drink in roughly three seconds. Freezing the juice also keeps the vast majority of nutrients intact.

I normally stick to lemon and lime with this fizzy citrus drink, but today my kitchen was sporting a very ripe grapefruit that looked as though it might not make it through the night, so I decided to add its copious juice to the mix.

What a great combo! Much better than with lemon and lime alone.

I love the flavour of grapefruit, but that onslaught of bitter can be a bit much even for me at times. Mixed with plenty of lemon and lime juice, the harshness of the grapefruit is softened, as was the sour edge of the lemons and limes.

This is still a tart drink - all the fruits are very low in sugar and there is nothing else added. But it is also refreshing, floral and delicately flavoured. The strength of the drink changes as it melts, running the gamut from the lightest touch of tart to mouth-puckeringly sour. Yum!

The finishing touch really is the fizzy water. Of course you can drink it with regular tap water, but the fizz makes it so much more exciting. If you're like me and get excited about drinks that fizz. It somehow seems to make it more of a special, celebratory drink - the champagne of the non-alcoholic world.

A worthy contender to actual delicious-but-hangover-inducing wine. Sparkling water and a heady mix of seasonal citrus fruits - my new favourite drink to start the morning with and to come home from work to.

And it defeats my laziness.