Month: February 2014

My first ‘juice’ of the day was actually hot ginger tea. I cut about 2″ of ginger root into 3 cups of boiling water. I let that steep for about 30 minutes and then sipped it slowly. Ginger is amazing and has numerous health benefits, one of them being it’s works wonders for the digestive system.

So… what have I juiced today? A few hours ago this is what I was drinking.

Pineapple tart

• 1 Pineapple
• 1 unskinned lemon
• 2 handfuls of spinach
• 2″ ginger root
• 4 celery stalks
• 3 apples

It tastes really good! I used my new Breville just to see how it did with greens, and I must say I’m not impressed at all but I already knew that.  Later, when I juice my dark leafy greens I’ll be using my Green Star (masticating) juicer. The juice yield for greens simply blows the centrifugal juicers away. I purchased the Breville BJE510XL Juice Fountain Multi-Speed 900-Watt (centrifugal) juicer because the juice output with centrifugal juicers is much higher for things like pears, apples, grapefruit, etc. Thanks to that purchase, I can now pick the appropriate juicer based on what produce I’ll be using.

Sometimes when I drink only juices I feel a bit tired. This usually happens at the beginning. I wasn’t tired yesterday, but today was a different story. As noon approached and slowly passed I started to feel drowsy, and so I listened to my body and took a nap. Good thing it’s the weekend and I can just take a nap, right? I awoke feeling recharged.

Much earlier today, I gave myself an enema. I was constipated. No shame in talking about bodily functions on this site! Since nothing was moving, and my abdomen was feeling very uncomfortable, I gave myself a warm enema to help out my colon.

During this juice cleanse, I’ll be mainly juicing dark leafy greens so that means I’ll be mainly using my Green Star, but the Breville will be used also to prepare juices for my daughter.

A few moments ago I made a deliciously yummy orange colored juice, with a new juicer. Which is perfect timing since today marks the day that I start my juice cleanse. The last juice cleanse I had lasted 12 days, but I’ve done much longer. Is it healthy? Well let’s see… I’m only consuming produce in liquid form. I mainly juice green vegetables. What do you think? Of course it’s healthy. I’m not doing it for weight loss. I don’t need to lose weight, but now and again I do like taking a break from eating solid foods. I’m not cheating my body in the least since I’m flooding it with a whole host of nutrients that our bodies need and crave.

Thanks to next day delivery by Federal Express, my Breville arrived about about an hour ago. This won’t be replacing my Green Star (masticating) juicer. That juicer is awesome and there’s no way that’s being put to the side. This centrifugal juicer will be used in addition to my Green Star for produce that does not do as well with the masticating technology. The Breville will be juicing such things as; apple, pears, lemon, grapefruit, etc., since centrifugal juicers seem to do much better job with them than masticating juicers. For everything else, I’ll be using my much loved Green Star juicer.

 

I’ve listed what is included within the juice below. I call it ‘bittersweet’.

Bittersweet

• 4 apples unpeeled
• 1 grapefruit
• five large carrots

I could have added other produce. I stopped by the local farm yesterday and stocked up on dark leafy greens and apples. I’d have to pull out my twin gear juicer for that.  This morning, I stopped by the grocery store and purchased grapefruit, ginger and carrots. I should have enough produce to keep me juicing for at least a week.

I will say that the Breville clean up is much easier than my Green Star juicer, but as I already mentioned there is no way I’m setting aside my Green Star, since with several produce it still does a much better job since the juice yield is higher.

I really don’t know how long I’ll be only drinking juices but I’ll try to make an effort and put the recipes I create here. As with cooking, I just toss together produce that works well together, sometimes I’m selective depending on the nutrients I want to flood my body with, but for the most part it’s a toss up on what will end up in my juices.

 

 

Recently I’ve been  thinking about juicing… a lot! Since I normally take this as a sign of my body telling me what it needs I’ve been upping the amount of freshly prepared juices (and smoothies) that I consume and reducing my solid foods.  I have to say that I feel awesome!

This past year, when I talked about candida, I mentioned the things I occasionally craved were flour based products and while my choices whole grain bread my body still rejected them and caused me to itch and have a whole host of other unpleasant symptoms. It’s still a bit of a puzzle on the how and why it got so out of control. I’m not a big sweet eater, in fact, I didn’t eat too much bread. The main foods I consume are whole foods, despite the why candida raised it’s itchy big head, I’m happy to say that most of the symptoms are gone. In fact, I can consume wheat without a reaction, but you know something? I don’t crave that anymore.

I do believe I’ll be transitioning once again to drinking juices. Currently, I’m not sure how long I’ll be consuming them, but I would like to go a few weeks. I have a lot of energy, but I’ve found that consuming only juices gives me even more.

 

To get myself properly charged for the upcoming juicing adventures, I’m rewatching Fat, Sick & Nearly Dead. I’ve written about Joe Crosses documentary before. While I can’t relate to the stories on a personal level, I still find the two men featured in this documentary to be extremely inspiring!  I knew, if they could conquer all their health issues and come of their medication. I don’t take any medication;  and I never have had to take them for anything besides the minor cold. In fact, the past several years I haven’t taken any of those,  instead I chose foods that not only taste good but equip my body with natural resistance to a variety of health issues.

In addition, I ordered the book Reboot with Joe Juice Diet by Joe Cross. It’s a book I’ve enjoyed reading, but up until recently I hadn’t purchased it for myself. It should be here tomorrow.

While weight loss and health isn’t my issue, I do enjoy reading books on how other people have turned their health. That to me is encouraging! In addition, this serves as another great reference when working with others who are looking to make natural changes with their life. In the past, a few people I’ve worked with were able to come off their medication. They took the initiative and realized that their choices can make them healthy or stand in the way and make them ill.