Sipping on yummy drinks for sleeping has come one of my favorite nightly rituals. Hot or cold, there’s just something about curling up with a cozy drink as I wind down and prepare to embrace the night ahead that makes me smile. 🙂
Drinking these bedtime beverages to help you sleep is a good way to relax, but their ingredients may actually help you have a restful night.
Warm milk, nutmeg, molasses and coconut oil are just a few of the sleep promoting ingredients you’ll find in my bedtime drinks list.
So start off your bedtime sleep routine right and try one of these dreamy drinks to encourage your sleep!
Organic Raw Honey is a Staple in Any Drink that Helps Sleep
With the exception of maybe one of my drink recipes, I always use organic raw honey to sweeten sleep drinks. But it’s not just because I want to use an all natural sweetener, raw honey may help you sleep great.
Honey helps sleep because it:
- Contains natural nutrients and enzymes your brain needs to fall asleep and stay asleep.
- Releases sleep hormones to initiate the sleep process.
- Releases tryptophan (that sleep amino acid that’s also found in turkey) which then gets turned into serotonin.
- Turns serotonin into melatonin (the sleep hormone)
- Contains magnesium, a vital mineral needed for sleep.
So when you’re making a bedtime drink you want to help you sleep, it’s important to use raw honey as a sweetener, not sugar!
Sweet and Dreamy Warm Almond Milk Sleep Drink
This is a delicious dairy free recipe that could even be considered vegan. A few years ago I became sensitive to dairy. I really liked having warm milk in the evenings, so I decided to see how almond milk stacked up against whole milk.
Almond milk has tryptophan in it, just like cow’s milk. (that’s the amino acid in turkey that makes you sleepy at Thanksgiving) But it has a good dose of calcium and magnesium, too, which helps your body start the sleep process.
Related: Learn how Magnesium Deficiency may cause Insomnia
This recipe features Ceylon cinnamon that can help you stay asleep. Cinnamon helps to regulate your blood sugar and keep it on an even keel during the night. Have you ever woken up out of a deep sleep all of a sudden? Extreme blood sugar spikes and crashes can disrupt your sleep and wake you up.
It’s important to use only pure Ceylon cinnamon in this recipe. Most cinnamons sold in stores isn’t pure, it’s cassia, a cheap cinnamon substitute. Be sure to buy Ceylon cinnamon if you want to take advantage of its sleep promoting properties.
Unusual but Incredibly Effective Milk and Nutmeg Sleep Elixir
I’m not just saying this, but this recipe is one of my favorite bedtime drinks that help you sleep. Wanna know why? It tastes just like custard.
Dessert before bed? Yes, please!
Nutmeg is an awesome to take before bed because of its sleep promoting properties. Its chemical makeup is similar to that of tranquilizers. It helps you to relax both your mind and body, so it makes it a perfect superfood to add to beverages to help you sleep like a baby.
I like to use whole nutmeg I’ve grated fresh just to use for this recipe. It’s a lot more potent than ground nutmeg. (plus it tastes so much better!)
Cinnamon and Honey Sleepy Time Recipe
This was one of the first tasty warm sleep drink recipe I saw and wanted to try. My mother used to make warm milk for me when I was growing up to relax me before bed. It’s something I carried with me into adulthood, and I just thought adding cinnamon and honey would make it even more cozy and delicious.
This recipe is totally versatile because you can add in other sleep boosting ingredients. Be sure you scroll down to the end of the post, I list a lot of variations you can do to this recipe to make it even more effective.
Have you developed your own bedtime sleep routine yet? If not, I’d totally incorporate this recipe into it. Try turning the lights down low, soak in a warm bath, and then sip on cinnamon milk and honey while you read a book or do some other relaxing activity before you crawl into bed.
Blackstrap Molasses for Sleep Tonic
Do you like gingerbread? If you do, you’ll love this sleepy drink that helps sleep. Blackstrap molasses gives it a signature gingerbread flavor, but I bet you didn’t know that molasses can help make you drowsy!
But this recipe has a surprise ingredient you won’t find in other beverages that help sleep. I’m not going to tell you what it is, but I will say that it contains GABA. GABA has a calming effect on the brain and nervous center, so you’ll feel more chill. Plus, a lack of GABA in your body could be a root cause of your insomnia!
This sleep tonic is totally easy to make, but it does have a few ingredients that aren’t a pantry staple. Be sure to check the shopping list to make sure you’ve got everything you need before you have your heart set on making it one evening.
Honey and Rooibos Tea
Ok, so I know technically this isn’t a sleep drink in the sense of it’s not a milk based drink you whip up. But if you haven’t tried rooibos, you should put it at the top of your beverages-to-help-you-sleep list.
This red tea has been one of my favorite teas for years, but I never knew that it was good for sleeping. But when I was looking into foods and drinks that help sleep, I learned the sleep benefits of rooibos is well known in South Africa. Mothers there consider it a go-to home remedy for their overactive and wide awake kids.
Of course, you can’t forget the raw honey. I’ve already explained how raw honey is good for sleep, so it works really well with the rooibos to give you a double dose of sleepy goodness. (Plus, it just makes it taste so dang good!)
6 Must-Try Insomnia Smoothie Recipes
When I want something different, something absolutely delicious and refreshing to drink to help me sleep, I have an insomnia smoothie.
Don’t get me wrong, warm cozy drinks will always have a piece of my heart, but when the weather starts to warm up I really like to have a smoothie before bed. They’re full of fruits and vegetables that help sleep, and they’re absolutely delicious. I drink them sometimes after dinner as a healthy, sleepy dessert.
You’ll find six different insomnia smoothie recipes in this one post that are tasty and may encourage sleep. There’s chocolate nut, cherry, and even tropical banana, just to name a few, so you can try a different yummy smoothie every night. 🙂
Apple Cider Vinegar and Honey Sleep Remedy
Ok, I know you’re probably saying..um…gross! (Don’t worry, I had the same reaction!) But don’t write this sleep remedy off yet. Once your hear about its benefits, you might just change your mind.
Apple cider vinegar has surprising sleep benefits, like:
- Promoting the release of tryptophan.
- Stabilizing blood sugar to help prevent sleep disrupting glucose dips.
- Promoting good Ph balance to help limit nighttime trips to the bathroom.
- Being full of potassium, B complex vitamins, and trace amounts of magnesium, all that are known to help improve sleep.
Combine ACV with raw honey and you get a natural sleep tonic that is full of sleepy potential. Yeah, there is the whole taste thing, but you know what? It doesn’t taste as bad as you think. This one is definitely a natural sleep drink to try. (I double dog dare ya! 🙂 )
Golden Turmeric Milk Homemade Sleep Drink
Vinegar and now turmeric? I promise I’m not trying to gross ya’ll out. Turmeric milk doesn’t taste nasty, it has a custard-y flavor to me. And don’t we all just want to drink dessert at the end of a stressful day?
Golden milk promotes sleep in ways no other sleep drink can. Did you know that your liver may be keeping you up at night? If you consistently wake up between 1 a.m. and 3 a.m. your liver may be congested. Drinking turmeric milk can help remove toxins from the liver to keep everything chugging along properly.
This is a versatile recipe because you can swap out different sleep inducing ingredients to adjust it according to your taste. There’s no wrong way to drink your golden milk…unless you don’t try it at all!
Ready to Try One of these Dreamy Drinks to Help you Sleep?
If using natural ways to fall asleep without OTC drugs is important to you, adding a sleep encouraging drink to your nightly ritual is a good idea.
It doesn’t matter if it’s warm milk and nutmeg, or a tropical banana smoothie, for occasional sleeplessness nothing beats drinking something delicious to help you feel relaxed and drowsy.
As you can probably tell, I’ve got a thing about sleepy drink recipes. But it’s because I get tired of drinking the same thing all the time, and I like to mix it up a little so my taste buds don’t get bored. I hope you’ll find a recipe you’ll love drinking in the evenings, so please let me know which one is your favorite!
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