Juicing Tips
When you start juicing, start with some vegetables that you like and enjoy. At the same time try avoiding, or at least minimizing, overly sweet juices. The sweet juices are nice as a treat, but
you do want to minimize the sugar content. So start with vegetables juices that
you enjoy and slowly introduce a vegetable or vegetables that you are not so
fond of in small amounts.
With time, you will most likely find that your taste buds and body might
enjoy the juices that, in the beginning, you did not enjoy.
Start slow. You do not want to overwhelm your body nor do you want to feel
nauseous.
Your stomach will send clear signals if you are juicing vegetables that you shouldn't be juicing, at least, not at
the moment. You might find that certain vegetables are okay as long as you juice
them in smaller doses. Everyone will be different. It is therefore important that you
listen to your body. The vegetables that are okay for you might not be okay for others.
While it's easy to drink fruit juice, fruits are high in sugar and should be
juiced less often and even better, fruits should be juiced rarely. Fruits are
natural cleansers of the body when eaten whole.
When juicing, you will create pulp. You can add some of the pulp back into
your juice to get the benefit of the fiber also. When adding pulp back to the
juice, the amount you add really depends on your personal preference.
Initially, when you start juicing, you will want to avoid the really dark
green leafy vegetables such as kale, dandelion leaves, Swiss Chard, etc. These
dark green leafy vegetables are very high in nutrition but also very powerful.
Introduce these vegetables slowly into your routine after you and your body get
used to drinking fresh juice.
Start with gentle vegetables such as carrots, celery and cucumber. But do not
overdo the carrots. Use ¼ to ½ of a carrot. If you use too much carrots then
you will increase your blood sugar level too much. With time, you will actually
want to remove carrots from your daily juice routine and instead focus more on the
nutritional rich and low in sugar vegetables. This does not mean you cannot nor should not juice carrots. Instead it means get some variety. Don't juice carrots always. This can be difficult because, admittedly, carrot juice is really delicious.
When your body is comfortable drinking the more basic vegetables like
carrots, celery and cucumber, which could be a week or so, then move onto
vegetables like broccoli, cauliflower, zucchini, lettuce, etc. Introduce all new
vegetables slowly but surely. Once your body is acclimatized to these vegetables
then you can try other vegetables.
When you feel ready, begin to mix it up a bit. Try some asparagus, spinach,
endives, etc. Begin to introduce the more commonly eaten vegetables and slowly
introduce some herbs such as parsley and cilantro.
Over a period of time and as your body gets more used to juicing then you can
slowly introduce some dark green leafy vegetables such as kale, Swiss Chard,
wheatgrass, collard greens, mustard greens and dandelion greens. Do not introduce the dark green leafy vegetables too soon.
I never use more than ¼ dark green vegetable juice. The dark green vegetable
juice can be quite powerful. You will know what I mean after trying some Swiss
Chard, kale or wheatgrass for the first time.
Vegetables that are grown underground tend to be higher in sugars. This
includes carrots, beets, yams, etc. These vegetables do provide important
nutrition but they are high in sugar. The key is to not juice them too often and
when you do juice them, use smaller amounts. The nutrition in all vegetables is
important but we want to juice responsibly by being aware of our blood sugar
level.
I suggest people juice a little carrot in the beginning simply because it
tastes great. But I do not like to encourage juicing carrots long term. Carrot
juice is a great way to introduce you and your body to fresh vegetable juice but
the keyword here is "introduce". After your body has been
introduced to juicing, it's time to focus less on carrots and more on vegetables
that are grown above ground.
I still drink carrot juice. I just don't drink carrot juice every day nor do I
drink it in large amounts.
When juicing, it's important that you listen to your body. Your body will
tell you which vegetables your body likes or dislikes. Whenever introducing a
new vegetable, start slow and with a small amount of the new vegetable. In this
way, you safely discover if there is a vegetable that your body does not like.
I like to suggest that people never add more than one new vegetable to their
juice. The reason why is that if you add two or more new vegetables to your
juice and if your body does have a reaction to the juice, then which vegetable
was the culprit?
By adding one new vegetable to your juice, you can then easily identify which
vegetable was the culprit.
When you drink your vegetable juice, the juice should be at room temperature.
This means you should take your vegetables out of the fridge and place on the
counter for a few hours before juicing. Ideally and if you can, leave your
vegetables out overnight to ensure they are at room temperature. Cold food shuts
down the digestive system and this would then defeat the purpose of juicing.
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