Eat Your Fruits & Veges

The U.S. Center for Disease Control says mom’s advice to eat your fruits and vegetables was good advice. Why?

• Healthy diets rich in fruits and vegetables may reduce the risk of cancer and other chronic diseases.
• Fruits and vegetables also provide essential vitamins and minerals, fiber, and other substances that are important for good health.
• Most fruits and vegetables are naturally low in fat and calories and are filling.*

I don’t mind eating these good things, but sometimes it’s overwhelming and expensive to eat enough every day.

A lot of people talk about juicing. I’ve been making breakfast smoothies for years. My basic recipe includes orange juice, 1/2 frozen banana, frozen berries (I rotate) and protein powder. But eating green things is more challenging.

Years ago I bought a juice machine. The thing didn’t work very well; it seemed like I was throwing out 3/4 of the vegetables and getting very little juice. It was a huge waste of time and money.

Recently I discovered how to get healthy juice–and did I mention DELICIOUS?–without throwing out anything! It’s an easier way to get a lot of goodness in my diet.

By purchasing my veges at a farmer’s market and wholesale club, buying them is a whole lot more affordable.

When you have the desire, you find a way.

Juicing can be a painless way to improve your health. After watching a friend make easy and delicious juice that didn’t waste anything, and watching a documentary, I decided to give it another try.

You’ve probably heard of the Juice Master, the mother of all juicers advertised on TV infomercials and state fairs. It wasn’t in my budget to buy one, so I got a Nijna blender at a fraction of the price (from Costco). Any high-powered blender could work. You put in the fruits and veges and get juice with the pulp (which is, in fact, good for you). It slices and dices all that goodness into a delicious, powerhouse drink.

The information part:

Why juice? Most people have a hard time getting the minimum servings of fruits and vegetables  they need of every day. Plus, cooking destroys some lot of the goodness.

Why juice? There are macro and micro nutrients. Macro nutrients are the things we get from typical diets and fast food. All that meant and those starches fill us up by giving us protein, fat, minerals and sugars. But they don’t nourish our cells.

Nutritionist Dr. Fuhrman describes it like this: “Nutrient Density is a critical concept in devising and recommending dietary and nutritional advice to patients and to the public. Not merely vitamins and minerals, but adequate consumption of phytochemicals is essential for proper functioning of the immune system and to enable our body’s detoxification and cellular repair mechanisms that protect us from chronic diseases.”**

We don’t get micronutrients from most of what we eat: meat, grains, sugars and dairy. We get them in the fresh stuff God gave us from plants.

The emotional part:

It’s complicated how we make choices, including those with food. I have friends in parts of the world who have few food choices based on availability and economics. But most of you reading this do.

Motivation is most of the battle. As I mentioned, I saw a documentary that showed me the power of juicing. It’s called Fat, Sick and Nearly Dead (available streaming or on DVD from Netflix and Amazon). The film is described as, “Two men whose bodies have been trashed by steroids, obesity and illness, document their rigorous healing path in a bid to regain their health.” It’s pretty inspiring.

The bottom line:

I’m not advocating an all-juice diet. However, after years of nutritional study and dealing with health issues, I am convinced God gave us goodness to ingest to help us be healthy, strong and feeling great.

Man does not live on beer and chips alone. If this article helps you helps you go to the next level, like adding just one serving of fruit or vegetables to your diet every day, you will have accomplished something.

Success is breaking down what we need to do into doable, bite-sized goals.

Below is Dr. Oz’s green drink juice recipe. It’s a good starting point, though you can experiment, like adding more sweet fruits to suit your taste.

Dr. Oz’s green http://www.doctoroz.com/videos/dr-ozs-green-drink. It’s high in fiber, low in calories, and rich in nutrients.

* Read the CDC’s “Nutrition for Everyone” article at: http://www.cdc.gov/nutrition/everyone/fruitsvegetables/ They even have a fruit and vegetable calculator to help you know how many servings you should get every day based on your age, gender and activity level.

**Read more of Dr. Fuhrman’s advice here: http://www.drfuhrman.com/library/article17.aspx