Amazing tips, tools and information regarding natural nutrition allowing you the benefit of complete physical, mental and social wellness. Covering topics on everything naturally through healthy eating. Such topics include vitamins and minerals, causes of illness and disease, healthy eating, natural cleansing, juicing, hydrotherapy and natural cures.
Thanks to all who continue to read my blogs on nutrition and more healthy alternatives to eating and staying fit. Yesterday, we finished off our vegetable juicing guide and discovered that carrots may be mixed with almost any other vegetable to make healthy drinks. We also learned that juicing has many health benefits and lots of healing properties. We learned that another juice, the green juice is an awesome detox tool. So, if you missed any of these previous blogs, you may always check out my website blog page at http://www.bargainsdirectly.com/blchopma.html or simply look to the right and click on the topic you want.
So, moving on with the final portion of our juicing guide, we discuss juicing fruits and its benefits. Creating healthy fruit drinks is probably one of my favorite things to do. Its not only healthy, but delicious too. It replaces the urge to eat the junk food we sometimes consume too much of and offers a tasty treat. There are so many things you can do when creating fruit juices. My favorite is freezing them in ice trays and making Popsicles for the kids or making an afternoon fruit smoothie as a treat.
However, there are a few important tips to remember when juicing fruit. First and foremost, do not combine your fruits with your vegetables when juicing. And, for the best health benefits, like fruits should be juiced with like fruits. For example, melons with melons, acid fruits with acid fruits and sub acid fruits with sub acid fruits.
Here's a list of fruit types according to their category:
Sub Acid Fruits - Mangoes, peaches, plums, pears, green grapes, dark grapes, papayas
Fruit Juices and the Benefits:
So, now that we have a basic concept of fruit and the categories they fit into. We can begin juicing. Remember, this is only a partial list and you should feel free to mix the fruit with other fruits according to their categories to create your own delicious treats.
Apple Juice - Helps to clean the blood and acts as a natural laxative.
Pineapple Juice - Fights congestion and removes mucus.
Cranberry - Fights cancer, cleans the blood, great for the bladder and cleaning of the kidney.
Papaya - Helps relieve indigestion.
Grapefruits, Oranges, Lemon - Helps immediately lower blood pressure, especially the lemon, fights colds and builds the immune system, clears sinus congestion, and clears vaginal discharge.
Grapes - Cleans the blood and aids in the elimination of mucus residue.
As mentioned earlier, try mixing the fruits according to category for tasty treats. An all time favorite of mine is a refreshing peach and mango juice.
1 Peach Washed and pitted 1 Mango Skinned
Place them both in the juicer and drink up. You will feel an automatic surge of energy that will last for hours. In addition, it makes a great in between snack, eliminating hunger and helping you get through until your next meal.
We mentioned in previous articles that in certain areas of the country, it is not always easy to get good quality, fresh fruits and veggies. However, there are many options and alternatives, like shopping online. Here's one of my favorite online grocery stores. They deliver right to my home, it saves me time and gas, keeps me from impulsive shopping for unhealthy treats and they accept coupons and club cards all online, allowing me to save a bundle.
Save $12.95 on your first order of $50 or more at Safeway.com.
Get Free Delivery for your Home or Business at Safeway.com.
This concludes our juicing segment, but be sure to join us as we discuss how the colors surrounding you in your home or in your wardrobe can affect your mental health. As always, we have a few resources for you, allowing you amazing savings.
Thanks to all who continue to read my blogs. I gladly welcome your comments, especially while going into the juicing portion of my blogs. I know what juicing has done for me and would like to hear how it has affected you.
Last time, we discussed hydrotherapy and the ability to easily set up a hydrotherapy spa at home. In previous blogs, we discussed vitamins an their various health and skin benefits. If you remember, one of my blogs in particular discussed alternative ways of getting those vitamins. Juicing is one of those alternative ways to get the vitamins your body needs the natural and healthy way. Juicing is a popular choice simply because its easy, tasty and takes less time to juice your vitamins than it does to prepare and eat them. In addition, you are not cooking out all the nutrients.
The first juice we are going to discuss is the green juice. I'm starting off with the green juice because for me, this was the juice that had the biggest impact on how I felt. It increased my energy level, cleansed my body, worked to minimize colds throughout the year and simply made me feel great. I was less fatigued and more productive. I even experienced significant weight loss.
What Is The Green Juice?
Green Juice is a juice made up of green leafy vegetables. It has healing properties that simply put, works. Its also called a chlorophyll drink. When I first heard of the green juice, because of my skeptic nature, I thought there was no way a vegetable juice with green leafy plants could do anything for me. But, the person who introduced it to me explained that when animals are sick, the first thing they do is eat grass. Animals eat grass because it has chlorophyll in it and it helps them heal.
Chlorophyllis are green plants grown in the earth and charged by the sun, which provides energy for plants to photosynthesize the materials needed for human growth like carbohydrates, protiens and fats. Chlorophyll detoxes and rejuvinates cells, tissues, blood, arteries and nerves.
What are the Benefits of the Green Juice (Chlorophyll Juice)?
The more we consume chlorophyll in the form of eating green leaves like salad and herbs in addition to drinking green vegetable juices and wheatgrass, the healthier our hair, bones and skin will be. In addition, it cleans our mind to promote peace and harmony. Once we clean our minds and body temples, the better we are able to deal with relationships with others, whether it be family, children, friends or spouses. And if the aforementioned information is not enough to convince you, simply think with common sense. During the creation of earth, the foods provided for us to eat were all fruits and vegetables that grew from nature. During that time, a person's lifespan was long and extended over several centuries. So, its only natural to believe that there must be some benefit to consuming vegetables and fruits. And, not only does the green drink make you feel better, detox you and repair you, it has a bulk load of vegetables that are still pure. Meaning we have not cooked all the nutrients out.
How Do I Get My Daily Dose of Chlorophyll?
One of the things I found out when I began juicing was that its easy to get overwhelmed or excited and wanting to try various things for various problems. But, I had to stop completely and let each thing work before incorporating other things into my diet. For instance, once I tried just drinking the green juice for two weeks straight, it was then that I could actually tell what the green juice did for me and how I benefited from it.
In addition to the benefits of feeling great, drinking my green juice actually allowed me to cut out two entire meals. The green juice with all the vegetables actually made up for the meals. The aspect of cutting out a couple of meals assisted in my weight loss. Within one week, I lost 7 pounds. And, because my energy level increased by the end of the first week, I actually fely motivated and energized enough to work out. By the end of the second week of me drinking my green juice, I lost 12 pounds and felt amazing.
Of course the best vegetables to get are the organic vegetables. However, we all know that its not always that easy or cost effective. But, if you can get all the vegetables in organic form, that would be the best.
The vegetables you will need to make one green juice:
1/2 - 1 Bunch of Parsely
3 Sprigs of Watercress
3 Leaves of Kale
1/2 Cucumber
1 Carrot - this aids in the transitioning of juicing. The green drink is super strong. After a few times of drinking the green drink and once you get use to it, you may leave the carrot out so that you get the full effect of the green juice.
Supplies Required
1 Sharp Knife
1 Juice Extractor - A juice extractor helps you get the most juice vs. a plain juicer.
First start by washing your vegetables well. Carrots if using them should be scraped, getting rid of the the dirt and dead skin.
Turn on your juice extrator and place all the aforementioned green vegetables in the machine. You will see your green juice extract immediately. Once all the juice has extracted from all the vegetables into your cup, drink immediately. The longer a pure fresh juice sits, the less nutrients your body is getting.
Make this your first drink in the morning and then drink it again for an evening snack. What this does is give you the boost you need to get through the day, especially if you work. And, the evening drink allows you to not have to worry about juggling work and middle of the day items. Most people fail on their diets due to conflicting schedules in their lives. Drink you green drink for two weeks straight and allow yourself to self reflect on your physical and emotional feelings. You will feel a positive difference.
As we mentioned previously, drinking vegetable juices and fruit juices allows you to get your daily dose of vitamins much easier than trying to eat fruits and vegetables. For the pure green drink shown above, here's a list of the vitamins found in each of the ingredients.
Parsely - Parsely is actually an herb. Its great for cleaning the liver. Parsley neutralizes toxins in your liver, inhibits abnormal cell growth, preventing tumors and cancers, and boosts the immune system. Parsely has vitamins C and A, chlorophyll, calcium, sodium, magnesium, and iron. It improves digestion, promotes urination and relieves mucous based conditions such as excess weight, swollen glands, and bladder and kidney conditions and infections. Parsely also fights those free radicals, promotes healthy lungs, bones and the heart.
Watercress- Watercress is actually a member of the cabbage family. Watercress is one of the most highly nutritious vegetables. It provides an excellent source of
vitamins B1, B2, B6, C, and E. Watercress also is a great source of fiber and iron. Watercress is another one of those vegetables that fights free radicals and is an antioxident.
Kale - Kale is one of those vegetables that goes unappreciated for their health and nutritional benefits. This is another antioxident vegetable and contains a wide variety of vitamins and minerals. Kale has a high natural source of manganese, iron,
copper, calcium, vitamin C, vitamin B1, B2, B6 and vitamin E. However, kale is best for its high content of Vitamin A. Although kale has only about 35 calories per serving, it carries 190% of your daily vitamin A requirements.
Cucumber - The cucumber belongs to the pumpkin and squash family. Some call it a vegetable and others call it a fruit. Whichever you prefer, it is still very beneficial to your green drink. Cucumbers provide a large variety of vitamins and minerals, including Vitamin B1, Vitamin B2, Vitamin B3, Vitamin B5, Vitamin B6, Vitamin B9, Vitamin C, Calcium, Iron, Magnesium, Phosphorus, Potassium, and Zinc. Cucumbers work well alone and with the other green juice ingredients. Cucumbers can heal the skin, provide relief from heartburn and has many more benefits. Be sure to juice your cucumber with the skin on so that you are getting all the nutritious benefits.
This concludes our first segment on juicing. Be sure to join us tomorrow as we discuss the benefits of various carrot juices and their healing properties. Be sure to see our resources throughout the page on how to find some othe the items we talked about, including the best juice extractor at the best price.
