Month: April 2013

Most of the time I use stainless steel pitchers for the smoothies and juices I make…

But sometimes I find that (depending on what I toss into my juices/smoothies) that some of the ingredients can react with the metal. While I much prefer my stainless steel pitchers (I love the way stainless steel looks!) If I’m concerned about metal reaction I usually reach for one of my glass pitcher. The thing is, unlike my stainless steel pitchers none of my glass pitchers have tops. If I need a pitcher with a top,  I’ll pull out my lonely  plastic pitcher.

Yesterday is an excellent example… You remember that Mango green smoothie that I made? That was put into my plastic pitcher because it had a top, but I wasn’t thrilled about doing that. However since  I don’t like leaving my juices or smoothies ‘topless’ in the refrigerator into the plastic pitcher it went!

I’ve never been fond of plastic storage containers. I like the heaviness of metal/glass. Which is why you’ll find that all my food storage containers are made of glass. Initially I was concerned about breakage, but I’ve had my containers for over nine years and they haven’t broken yet.

Well guess what? I finally found a heavy duty glass pitchers (with tops) that I like! I should be receiving them sometime next week!

I’ll recycle my plastic pitcher by cutting a bit off the top and turning it into a storage container for some of my daughter’s crafts.

Yesterday evening I made a pitcher of a Mango green smoothie. My daughter liked it and consumed two cups of the smoothie over the next hour or so.

Although the smoothie was loaded with vegetables you couldn’t taste them because of the sweetness of the mangoes and other sweet fruits. My daughter and I both like vegetables so I make our own version of V8 juice (minus the high sodium and other additives that the body doesn’t really need.)

Mango Green Smoothie

1 medium sized mango

1 cup of ripe strawberries

2 celery stalks

1 cup of dark leafy greens (I used kale and spinach)

1 cup of ginger root tea

1 ripe banana

Unsweetened apple juice (to desired consistency)

I’m not sure the exact measurements. If you’ve read this site, Celebrate Life, or my much older site VM  for any length of time you might already know I don’t follow recipes. I create my own and rarely do I measure what I’m making.

Drinking instead of eating…

The past few days I’ve been only drinking liquids. I do this a few times yearly. I’m consuming about the same amount of calories as I would if I were eating solid foods, the only difference is that I’m blending or juicing. Even though I have a lot of energy (enough to blast through my intense workouts with no problems) I find that I have even more energy when I swap to liquids. There is a logical reasoning behind that and I’ll be sure to go into it in a later post, but now it’s time set the table for my daughter’s breakfast!

Yesterday, I made a juice blend of carrots, ginger, garlic, spinach and kale.

The carrots added sweetness to the blend and the ginger added a bit of spice (along with energy). Garlic was added since it’s great for the immune system (just like ginger.) Spinach and kale were added since they both have numerous vitamins and minerals. Vitamins A, C, and K are some of the numerous nutrients that can be found in Kale. Kale also contains lutein and zeaxanthin compounds which are excellent for eye health.

About seven years ago, my eye doctor commented on the improvement he saw in my eyes. The only difference, was I’d started juicing several times weekly.

I’m not much of a supplementation person, I find that I stay in “top shape” (not just my words but my health care providers also) by making correct health food choices, exercising, and handling issues I face in a non-stressful manner. When it comes to foods, I mainly eat whole foods. Which means, I stay as close to the natural food source as possible. Because of that,  you won’t see me purchasing too many processed foods or supplements. I figure I don’t need them if I’m making healthy whole food choices. It seems my health care provider agrees with me.

A quick and easy way to increase the amount of nutrients I consume is by juicing. I’m able to consume much larger quantities of nutrients than I’d ever be able to eat in one sitting. My Green Star juicer has a permanent stop on our kitchen counter top. The juicer cost me over $300, but was well worth the price I paid. I figured with a high quality juicer I most likely wouldn’t need a plethora of supplements, and I was right. In the late 1990s (a few years after being vegan) I did purchase supplements. Marketing is good for those products, but I was skeptical and after a lot of nutrition research I figured I most likely could get the same results simply by eating whole foods.  I was right.

Two days ago, I made a big batch of ginger tea and added it one of my Mason Jars that I normally use for canning.

Ginger has many benefits and is a natural energy booster.

I use ginger in numerous ways, but my favorite has to be drinking the blend. Sometimes I get a bit fancy and add mint, peppermint to the brew.  I drink it unsweetened but occasionally I’ll sweeten it with raw honey or stevia.

Ginger has many uses in our household… I brew it in a tea, juice it with my juicer,  toss chunks of it into my blender when I’m making smoothies and some of the smoothy ingredients get added to popsicle molds. The spiciness of the root adds a nice kick and gives a delightful jolt of energy! I never use artificial stimulants. There’s no need with ginger in the house.