home made gu

Yep.

Mine is agave nectar, honey, medjool dates, lemon/lime/orange zest, little salt.

Sometimes, I mash up some graham crackers and saltines, then mix the crumbs, and then mix that with the agave nectar, honey, dates. That's a grainy substance, but good for long workouts.

I tried using kool aid powder mixed into brown rice syrup. Just tasted like tangy brown rice syrup.

I'm interested in this too. I read that mashed up banana and honey is good (a banana has roughly the same calories as a gel) is good. I don't remember if there was anything else in there to thin it out. I've been meaning to buy a gel flask and try it.

I make my own, and am finally able to make a pretty consistent product with less hassle after several tries and almost giving up all together. I only use shelf stable products as I like to make a large batch, less often. Here's my current ingredient list:

- just under 1 quart of maltodextrin (condenses greatly when mixed with water)
- 3 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa
- 4 teaspooons lite salt (sodium and potassium)
- about 20 tablespoons wtaer, sometimes more
- Agave nector (last ingredient, added until it is 1/4 to 1/3 of the overall mixure.
- yeilds about 32oz of gu made of mostly complex carbs.

steps:
- add about 1/2 the water, cocoa, salt to a mixing bowl and make a thin liquid using a hand electric blender on slowest setting.
- add maltodextrin in batches while stil mixing. add the rest of the water a little at a time to keep the mixture mixing. blend all the lumps out (malto clumps...) i shoot for a thickness/viscosity close to agave, so it flows though gel flask.
- add agave by eyballing and continuing to blend on slow settings untill it is 1/4-1/3 of total mixture

tips/observatiions:
- spread newspapers or something before you get started, this can be messy
- malto is tricky to work with. when its dry, it is so light that it waft around, and the second it picks up any moisture, it is VERY sticky.
- dont sample the mixture before adding the agave (or honey if you prefer). Malto has little taste, and it will taste like salty unsweeted cocoa before sweetening it up (yuck)
- i fill two flasks right away, then refridgerate everything until ready to use. all of the ingredients are shelf stable, but adding water changes that. but it will last a long time in the fridge. when the two flasks are used up, i bring the remaining quart up to room temperature before trying to refill. the mixure gets very thick when cold.
- i used to just use agave based gu last year, but made the switch for these reasons 1) it was too sweet for my taste 2) after reading up I learned that thesimple sugars take something like 3x more water to process in your system, and 3) agave/honey is by far the most expensive ingredient, so the less you use, the more economical the whole process.

Good Luck with whatever you go with, and tweak your methods to find what's right for you...