Whats your best hangover cure?

Question

Please don't bother with the don't drink answers because I can work that one out for myself.

Answer 1

A hangover is caused by a combination of the toxic by-product of alcohol metabolism (acetaldehyde), dehydration, and Vitamin A, B (particularly B6) and C depletion caused by the chemical action of alcohol on your system. The symptoms are usually a dry mouth, nausea, fatigue, dizziness and headache and are caused by a combination of these factors.

Apart from the obvious toxic effects, you should realise you're suffering the effects of a mild overdose of a depressant drug and your nerves are reacting accordingly, and you have also flushed a signifnicant quantity of vitamins and nutrients from your system causing a degree of metabolic shock that your body is struggling to compensate against. This is why hangover symptoms often include disorientation and "the jitters".

Some drinks give you worse hangovers than others due to the actions of impurities called Congeners. While it's the ethyl alcohol (ethanol) that gets you drunk, amyl alcohol, butyl alcohol, methyl alcohol, propyl alcohol, and isopropyl alcohol is also found in most drinks to varying degrees, and the concentration of these Congeners will go a long way to determining the severity of the hangover.

Vodka and gin (clear liquors) are generally lower in congeners than whisky, rum and bourbon, due to the filtering process involved, and hence usually give a less intense hangover. Unfortunately the congeners also give flavor, smell and appearance to alcohol.

Another contributor to the hangover is the "freshness" of the alcohol since the natural oxidation product of ethanol is also acetaldehyde. Finishing off an already open bottle of red, or drinking beer that's been in the boot of your car for a week, will provide you with a ready made supply of acetaldehyde so you don't have to wait for your liver to make it in order to have a really good hangover.

Most hangover "remedies" simply attend to one or more of the symptoms and don't really provide a cure as such. The hangover won't stop until the alcohol is out of your system:


Berocca - Puts the vitamin B back in, as well as the big glass of water it's mixed with. It's probably best to do this before you go out.
Coke - Fizz for the nausea, liquid for the dehydration, and a caffeine and sugar hit to make you feel a bit more lively.
Coffee - Same as Coke but without the bubbles to help ease the nausea. Try it with honey instead of sugar since the fructose is absorbed quicker than the sucrose in normal sugar, and it's better for you.
Ginseng - It's been noted that since caffeine is a diuretic like alcohol, it can actually make the dehydration worse, so try the herbal equivalent instead.
Vegemite On Toast - Something in your stomach is good, and salty is even better. Plus you get a Vitamin B top up. The same reasons also make peanut butter a good choice, but the oily nature might make some sensitive stomachs feel a bit yucky. If you do try try this one, skip the butter and just have dry toast.
Cold Pizza - Who knows, but it seems to work.
Asprin - Simply attends to the headache and does nothing for the level of alcohol in your system. Don't take them before you go to bed.
Bananas - Sugar in the form of fructose, and potassium, which is one of the things you lose lots of when you drink. Bananas are also a natural antacid to help with the nausea, and are high in magnesium which can help relax those pounding blood vessels causing that hangover headache. For a variety of reasons try a peanut butter, honey and banana sandwich on white bread.
Vitamin C - Another thing the alcohol takes out that you're advised to put back in as soon as possible. Orange juice, tomato, a 600mg Vitamin C tablet - doesn't matter, just do it.
A Hot Bath - The heat will sweat out the toxins that are causing all the problems. You'll feel a bit woozy at first but go with it and you'll feel better afterwards.
Chocolate Milk - This one was sent in by Michael and sounds like it's worth a try - "Regarding your hangover remedies, I would like to suggest chocolate milk. The store bought kind seems to work best, due to ease of attainment (unless you blew all your money at the bar hoping to get lucky), quietness (no loud banging of the teaspoon trying to mix the homemade stuff), and ease of use (the opening is the perfect fit when you have the jitters and no messy clean up). The suggested minimum dosage is the pint ( 1/2 litre) size, though the new quart (litre) can be used for extreme episodes. Other than the rehydration factor, I find that chocolate milk offers the tummy a soothing coating for the nausea. It also repletes some of the vitamins your body is now woefully lacking. The sugars (lactose & sucrose) and salt seem to be the perfect balance of the carb/salt fix. Many women can attest to the beneficial, relatively inexpensive, and legal effects of chocolate against depression, whether physiological or psychological. Last, the flavor seems to do wonders for that ghastly "did I try to mop the floor with my tongue?" taste in your mouth. So, on your way home, stop by your convenient convenience store, head on over to the cooler, grab one more "cold one" (chocolate milk, that is), and bring it home for the morning. Your mother shall compliment you on at least one healthy drinking habit."
Here's a few tried and proven ideas for hangover prevention:


Don't drink. (doh!)
Take a Berocca before you start drinking. This gets a reserve of Vitamin B into you.
Alternate fruit juice or water in amongst your drinks to avoid dehydration later on. Avoid fizzy or sugary stuff. The purists reckon that about 200ml of water is needed to effectively counteract each 30ml of alcohol.
The alcohol in carbonated drinks is absorbed more quickly than in non-carbonated drinks.
Reduce the amount of sugar you consume with your alcohol. The forced metabolism of sugar AND alcohol by your body will accelerate the depletion of B vitamins and make the hangover worse.
The 2am pig-out. Pizza or pasta is usually best since cheese and carbohydrates are a good source of amino acids. Actually food is a good idea all round - before, during and immediately after drinking. Food doesn't absorb alcohol, but it does increase metabolism, activates alcohol absorption, and increases the speed with which the body processes alcohol.
And here are a few remedy cocktails. At least they won't make you feel any worse:

Poor Man's Bloody Mary Bloody Mary
5oz Tomato Juice
3oz Light Beer
Salt
Pepper
Lots and lots of lime juice
Dash of Tabasco sauce
Mix and scull.
1.5 oz vodka
Dash of lemon (or lime) juice
Worcestershire sauce
2 or 3 drops Tabasco sauce
Pepper, salt and celery salt
5 oz tomato juice
Over ice in a tall glass add spices, then vodka.
Fill with tomato juice and stir.
Garnish with celery stick and lime wedge.


Fruit And Stuff Bloody Mary Variations
1 banana
1 small can V-8
6 large strawberries
2 tablespoons honey
1 cup orange juice
1-2 cups milk (or soy milk), to desired consistency
¼ tsp. salt
dash of nutmeg
Mix together in a blender and drink.

Use gold tequila instead - Deadly Mary
Use tequila instead - Bloody Maria
Use gin instead - Red Snapper
Add chilli pepper and beef stock - Bloody Bull
Use V8 juice instead of tomato juice - Vege Mary
No Alcohol - Virgin Mary

Aunt Emma's Hangover Cocktail Prairie Oyster
1 large can of tomato juice
3 Tablespoons vinegar
1 lemon
4 slices of onion
3 Tablespoons of sugar
4 stalks of celery
2 teaspoons of Tabasco sauce
salt and pepper to taste
Mix ingredients in a container, let stand overnight.
Strain and serve.
Olive oil
Tablespoon tomato ketchup
1 egg yolk
Salt and pepper
Tabasco
Worcestershire sauce
Vinegar or lemon juice

Rinse a cocktail glass with the olive oil and discard oil
Mix all ingredients except egg yolk.
Place the egg yolk in carefully.
Serve with a small spoon and a glass of ice water.

Banana Cow Van Diemen
1 crushed ripe banana
2 level tablespoons powdered sugar
3 oz milk
1 1/2 oz rum
Plenty of cracked ice
Mix together in a blender and drink.

2 cups of Ovaltine
Chocolate topping
2 cups of castor sugar
3 tblsp of golden syrup
1 pkt of pineapple jelly crystals
2 cups of hot water
2-3 cups of milk (full-cream)
Combine Ovaltine, sugar, topping, 3/4 milk, hot water and golden syrup.
Microwave on high for 2 minutes, adding rest of milk and stirring after 1 minute
Add 1/2 of jelly crystals and microwave on high for 30 secs
Add rest of jelly and a bit more hot water. Microwave for 1 minute.
Pour into cups. Refigerate. Serve with custard.

Answer 2

I don't have a cure because I have a prevention technique that works. Drink a tall glass of milk before going to bed and you'll never wake up with a hangover. It has something to do with the protein and fat in the milk that counters the alcohol. Put a banana in the fridge too; if your face is puffy the next morning, you can mash it up and apply it like a mask for ten minutes and it will make your face look normal.

Answer 3

you no what i get really bad hangovers and i ant found a cure yet.
i do feel abit better if i drink a few points of water be i go to bed..
but next day i just drink lots of water..
recover myslef for the next night/weekend..

you can buy some tables that u take b4 you go drinking to stop you getting hangovers but i ant tried them.

Answer 4

I never have hangovers cause I sleep it through. If I get drunk, I make sure I don't have to get up early the morning after. But If it does happen, Cranberry juice, and orange juice does the trick. Add a couple of aspirins if it's really bad. Don't forget that you are supposed to drink back the same amount of water as you did with alcohol(dehydration)

Answer 5

Four aspirin before you go to bed then plenty of fluids in the A.M. I suggest a power drink like Gator-Aid. The aspirin helps cut down on the chance of a headache when you wake-up because it is a vasodilator which means it dilates/opens the veins and allows the body to processed the alcohol faster. The power drink helps replace the electrolyts you lose while drinking.

Answer 6

Confucius, he say, "Hangover never easy problem to solve".

Certainly, those that advocate drinking lots of water before going to bed are spot-on. The best method I have found is to alternate water with the same quantity of booze as I go along during the evening (drinking wine: glass of wine, then glass of water; drinking beer: pint of beer, then pint of water; you get the picture). This is (for me, at least) preferable to drinking lots of water before you go to bed for two reasons. (1) If you are properly drunk, you'll more than likely forget to drink the water; (2) if you are seriously pissed, you'll probably drink three pints of water and then wet the bed.... never a good thing to do.

As for "cure", this generally implies that you are already hungover and so we are now into remediation rather than avoidance (water plan and other things suggested, such as the better-than-useless milk thistle).

Sir Winston Churchill, for whom alcohol was an everyday lubricant more than an occasional indulgence, suggested "a finger of snipe and a pint of port". Snipe, a very fatty game bird, is roasted with bacon on its tiny back, with its big beak tucked under its wing, and is served three-to-a-plate. This is "a finger" of snipe, should really be called "a hand", as its the number of snipe a hunter or poacher could carry in one hand - three necks between four fingers. Being meaty and fatty, "a finger of snipe" was probably a pretty good English aristocratic approximation to the fry-up.

In short - if we believe Winston Churchill (as I am inclined to do) - then a fry-up, a pint of port (or similar "hair of the dog") and back to bed (as previous contributors have suggested) is bang on the mark.

Only "in extremis" would I advocate the technique adopted by Withnail in the world's best drinking movie, "Withnail and I": "Let's cover ourselves in Deep Heat, get up against the radiator, and try to stay alive until the pub opens".

Happy drinking all. It's nearly 11 o'clock here in England. Port time.

Answer 7

Drink a glass of FULL glass of water with B-12 vitamin, and after every 2 drinks drink another FULL glass of water.

Also if you feel like you are going to throw up, eat a piece of bread, it helps absorb some of the liquid in you stomach.

Answer 8

Milk thistle, you can buy it from health food shops.
It works wonders, take some if feeling unwell and you'll be fine in no time, it helps cure your liver!!

Apart from that try libby's tomato juice.

Answer 9

A glass of milk and a glass of orange juice before you go to bed lots of water and leave a glass by the side of your bed. Also when you get up have more orange juice and water and some toast for breakfast/lunch also if necessary an aspirin.

always works for me! lots of vitamin C!!!

Answer 10

Irn Bru and Golden Wonder Slt and Vinegar Crisps

Answer 11

Lucozade - believe me, I used to be a newsagent, so I know a lot about curing heads full of tympani first thing in the morning.