Why Heat Hydration Flavors Are Truly Clean

Benjamin Payson
13 hours ago
3 min read

Intro

It feels like the supplement world really hasn't caught up to the new age demand for clean, healthy nutrition. Yes, they advertise that they are “clean,” boasting about their natural flavors. But if brands are too scared to list out all the ingredients inside those “natural flavors,” how can they really be clean?

I was sick of this, which became another driving factor behind creating my own electrolyte supplementation. Nowhere, and I mean nowhere, can you find electrolytes flavored exclusively with 100% fruit juice. So we made it our mission to make this happen. At Heat Hydration, we flavor our blends exclusively with freeze-dried fruit juice, and just a tenth of a gram of stevia. That’s it. No hidden labels. No mystery ingredients. Just real fruit.

The Supplement Market’s Flavor Problem

If you look around at sports drinks, pre-workouts, and electrolyte powders, almost every single one uses “natural flavors” to sweeten and flavor their products.

Brands use this wording because it sounds clean, but in reality, “natural flavors” can contain dozens of hidden ingredients, from solvents to preservatives, that don’t have to be disclosed. In fact, the FDA allows “natural flavors” to include substances that are derived from natural sources but then chemically modified ¹.

So when a label says “natural strawberry flavor,” that doesn’t mean you’re drinking strawberries. It means you’re drinking a lab-processed compound designed to mimic strawberry taste.

What Are “Natural Flavors”?

According to the FDA, natural flavors are defined as:

“…the essential oil, oleoresin, essence or extractive, protein hydrolysate, distillate, or any product of roasting, heating or enzymolysis, which contains the flavoring constituents derived from a spice, fruit or fruit juice…” ²

The key phrase is “contains the flavoring constituents.” In other words: companies can take a tiny fraction of a real fruit, then process it with chemicals, stabilizers, and carriers, and still call it natural.

That’s why when you see “natural flavors” on a label, you don’t actually know what you’re getting.

How Heat Hydration Is Different

We decided to do something different, no shortcuts, no vague “natural flavors.” Instead, every Heat Hydration blend is flavored with freeze-dried 100% fruit juice.

This means when you drink our Strawberry Lemonade flavor, you’re actually tasting strawberries and lemons, not a lab’s interpretation of them. By pairing this with just a pinch of stevia for balance, we keep flavoring clean, simple, and transparent.

How Freeze-Dried Fruit Juice Is Made

Freeze-drying (also called lyophilization) is a process where water is removed from fruit juice while preserving its nutrients and natural flavors.

Juicing – 100% fruit is pressed into pure juice.
Freezing – The juice is rapidly frozen at very low temperatures.
Vacuum Drying – Under vacuum, the frozen water transitions directly from solid (ice) to gas (vapor) — a process called sublimation.
Powder Formation – What’s left behind is a light, crystalline powder that contains all the flavor, color, and aroma of real fruit juice.

This powder is what we use to flavor Heat Hydration. Nothing artificial. Nothing hidden. Just real fruit, in a shelf-stable form.

Why We’re Cleaner Than the Competition

The difference is simple:

Them: “Natural flavors” (a catch-all for lab-modified flavor chemicals).
Us: Freeze-dried 100% fruit juice.

By cutting out the vague “flavors” and sticking to fruit, we keep Heat Hydration as transparent and clean as possible. When you mix up a scoop of our electrolytes, you know exactly what you’re putting in your body, amino acids, electrolytes, real fruit juice, and nothing else.

That’s why we say Heat Hydration is the cleanest electrolyte on the market. Because when it comes to your health, we believe real fruit is better than fake flavor.