4 Healthy Fruit and Veg Juice Tips
We all know that fruits and vegetables are incredibly healthy and good for us, yet many of us are guilty of failing to consume enough of them.
Health experts recommend that we consume a minimum of 5 portions each day to benefit from the healthy effects of these amazing foods, yet a lot of us are lucky to get anything close to that each day.
If you struggle to eat your fruits and veggies, perhaps you might consider investing in a juicer, making delicious fruit and vegetable juices, and drinking them instead?
Fruits and vegetables are loaded full of vitamins, minerals, and antioxidants and can provide a whole host of benefits from healthy hair and skin, to a stronger immune system and potential protection against illness and disease. If you grow your own, they’ll be even tastier and even more nutritious.
If you’re thinking of starting your own juice journey, here are 4 healthy fruit and veg juicing tips.
Aim for an 80/20 ratio of veggies to fruits
When people start juicing, they’re initially apprehensive when juicing vegetables like kale, chard, broccoli, and spinach and as a result they’ll juice mainly fruits instead.
Now, don’t get us wrong, fruits are indeed loaded full of vitamins and antioxidants, but the downside to fruit juice is the fact that it is loaded full of fructose sugars. Too much sugar can lead to weight gain, unstable blood sugar levels, and it can potentially rot your teeth.
When making juice, resist the urge to pack your juice with fruits and instead aim for around 80% veggies. The 20% fruits will give the juice the right taste and sweetness, without overloading your system with sugar.
Follow recipes
When you buy a juicer, it is tempting to just throw whatever fruits and veggies you can think of in there and hope for the best in terms of taste.
Sure, throwing a mix of fruits and vegetables in there will produce healthy juice, but the taste will likely not be too pleasant.
A quick search online however, will unveil countless juice recipes, so go again and make notes of ones which sound nice, buy or grow your ingredients, and get started. Following recipes will give you the health benefits, with the added bonus of the juice actually tasting nice as well.
Drink your juice on an empty stomach
When juicing, some people will fast, meaning they won’t eat any solids and will instead drink water and get their nutrients from fruit and vegetable juices. Other people will drink a glass or two of juice a day along with healthy meals.
If you decide to eat and juice, always drink your juice on an empty stomach as this will increase the rate in which the nutrients are absorbed into your system.
Lemon is the secret
If you’re worried about the taste of a juice containing a lot of green vegetables, one of the secret ingredients which is not so secret is lemon.
Lemon is not only ideal as it’s full of vitamin C, it’s also ideal because the citrus taste helps to overpower the taste of green veggies.
