Drink Your Troubles Away Juicing Herbs for Vitality
A glass of fresh vegetable herb juice has the ability to deliver more than just vitamins and minerals, the other group of nutrients is known as enzymes. Enzymes are your body’s workforce. Acting as catalysts in hundreds of thousands of chemical reactions that take place throughout the body, enzymes are essential for digestion and absorption of food, for the conversion of foodstuffs into body tissue, and for the production of energy at the cellular level. In fact, enzymes are critical for most of the metabolic activities taking place in your body every second of every day.
Fresh juices are a tremendous source of enzymes. In fact, the “freshness” of juice is one of their key features, because enzymes are destroyed by heat. When you eat cooked foods, whether its meat, grains, fruits, or vegetables if the food is cooked at temperatures above 112 degrees, the enzymes have been destroyed by the heat. Since fruits, vegetables and herbs are juiced raw, the enzymes are still viable when you drink the juice.
Coincidentally, many of the phytochemicals that nutritional researchers are focusing their attention on are either enzymes or more often, substances that help build or activate enzymes that play essential roles in protecting cells from damage.
Since juicing removes the indigestible fibre, these nutrients are available to the body in much larger quantities then if the piece of fruit or vegetable was eaten whole. For example, because many of the nutrients are trapped in the fibre when you eat a raw carrot, you are only able to assimilate about 1% of the available beta carotene. When a carrot is juiced, removing the fibre, nearly 100% of the beta carotene can be assimilated.
Fresh herbs, fruits and vegetables provide one more substance that is absolutely essential for good health – water. More than 70% of most of the cells, and some tissues, in the human body are made of water; for example, brain cells can be made up of as much as 80% water. Water is absolutely essential for good health, yet most people don’t consume enough water each day. Plus, many of the fluids we do drink, coffee, tea, soft drinks, alcoholic beverages and artificially flavoured drinks contain substances that require extra water for your body to eliminate. Fruit and vegetable juices are free of these unneeded substances and are full of pure, clean water.
Everyone can benefit from juice regardless of their physical condition. Juicing can be likened to getting healing nutrients “wholesale”, in that in the juiced form they are so easy to assimilate. Everyone should consider purchasing a juicer, and engage in the drinking of raw fruit and vegetable juice for the following reasons:
Juiced foods require little or no digestion; thus, the healing nutrients of fresh fruits, vegetables and herbs are readily available for assimilation.
Juicing will serve to motivate one to continue on with the proper diet, as you see the results through juicing.
A glass of fresh juice is the best “multivitamin/mineral supplement” money can buy. A 4-8 ounce glass of herb juice is like gold to your body. Juices provide a living, organic, alkaline, whole, complete, balanced form of nutrients.
When juicing, keep the following guideline in mind. Sip – drink slowly – a glass of juice. This allows for better assimilation.
SPARKLING MEMORY JUICE – This drink is surprisingly delicious, has a slightly ‘nutty’ flavour, and is good for improving the memory. It is especially rich in B vitamins that increase acetylcholine, a substance that is the message carrier of the brain.
4-5 medium-size organic carrots
3 stalks of organic celery, with leaves if you like
1/4 head of organic small cabbage, cut into sections that fit your juicer
1/4 lemon (peel if not organic) (optional)
A few fresh ginkgo leaves or a sprig or two of fresh rosemary
There’s nothing like a fresh glass of organic vegetable herb juice. Drink up! To your health!