Juicing and Smoothies and Greens, Oh my!

Easter is over, It's April 1st and I'm starting a new challenge for myself!  I know, I know.  I'm always doing some sort of challenge, aren't I?  I did a 30 Day Shakeology challenge in February and did those "8 weeks to a Better You" challenges a few times alongside my mom and many other friends.  Not to mention all of the fitness rotations I've done and all my weeks of eating raw foods.  Have you ever read "I Wish that I had Duck Feet?"  It's an old book, it's published by the Dr. Seuss people, but it's not written by him.  (Well, you can see the Cat in the Hat picture at the top).  Anyway, I read this a ton when I was little and read it to my children as they were growing up.  It's a story about a boy who has all of these grand wishes, but each gets him into trouble somehow.  Near the end, he decides to be a Which What Who, by combining all of his wishes (duck feet, tiger tail, elephant nose, and  deer antlers -- they say "deer horns," but we all know that deer don't have horns, they have antlers -- but "deer horns" went better poetically -- I'll give them that!) Back to the story, when he becomes a Which What Who, he scares all the people in town and ends up in a zoo jail cell and realizes that he's not happy that way at all. So he ends up deciding just to be himself and to be happy with that!

This doesn't TOTALLY relate to what I'm doing right now because none of my challenges are destructive, in fact they are all leading me in a path to better health.  But I feel like right now, I'm doing the Which What Who approach by combining them all. And it's not just for 30 days, I want to go at least through all of April and May -- possibly even June.

Looks like a fresh way to juice!

I'm going to clean up my eating through juicing greens & fruit each day AND by drinking my green smoothies AND if I so wish (which I'm sure I will because I love it so much), I will drink my chocolate Shakeology each day, too.  And I want to stick to just eating raw food.........I always felt so great when I was eating raw before.

I am excited to try these recipes!

My favorite from Xtrain!

As for my fitness goals, I have a Cathe Friedrich Road Trip planned for late July and need to get myself in tip top Cathe shape for her classes!  I do her workouts regularly, but need to take it up a notch so I'm ready to work out with her LIVE.  I can hardly wait!  For now, I'm just alternating cardio and weight workout days.  But I'm going to do a rotation with her new Xtrain workouts, as well as some from her other dvds.  Details to come, later on.  TTFN!

Juicing Photo by Tracy Hunter


If you'd like to join in 3 year old Faye and her father reading I Wish that I had Duck Feet, click below:

On the fence about a dehydrator?

I was just placing sliced fruit on my dehydrator trays this morning and was thinking how happy I am that I invested in my dehydrator however many years ago it was that I started learning about eating raw.  (I remember it was the day after Halloween, I'm thinking it was about 5 years ago, in 2005).  The first question I had for my friend when she was exploring raw eating was "How do you eat bread?"  quickly followed by "What about crackers?"

She started telling me about dehydrating crackers and it sounded like a foreign language to me.  Eventually I researched it myself and bought my own Excalibur 9 tray dehydrator.  I posted about dehydrating fruit and fruit leather a while back and have posted my favorite raw cracker recipes.  My dehydrator cost about $400, but I've used it over and over (and it has survived 2 moves!) and it has helped me be able to eat raw & living foods in my normal life and while traveling.

Tomorrow I'm leaving to go on a 3 day pioneer handcart.  I went on a similar trek (4 days though) five years ago.  I brought my own raw foods then and am doing the same on this trip.  When I'm walking that much, I need to be in control of my health.  I can't be that far away from home and have problems with my allergies, asthma or incontinence.  So my dehydrator has been priceless for me over the years.  When I hear that fan going and smell the food on the racks, I just inhale and smile.  I don't dehydrate every week (although sometimes I get on a dehydrating kick and dehydrate 3 or 4 times that week).  I'd say it's more like monthly, but when I do, I love it and it brings back memories to when I first started eating raw and reminds me of how great I feel when I eat this way.

Back to the fruit leather, I decided to try making fruit leather today with kale in it -- similar to how I would make a green smoothie, only dry it out.  HOPEFULLY, it will taste good because I'm sure I could use the greens on the trek.  It's still dehydrating, so we shall see!

I need to run and make some fudge balls before it gets too late.  I'm hoping they will be alright without refrigeration.  Even if I just bring enough for the first day, they'll be nice to have along for the trail tomorrow.

Pomegranates in Smoothies . . . or not

I have a few bags of pomegranates and decided to throw some seeds into my green smoothie the other day.  The taste?  Just wonderful.  The texture?  A big gritty.

This takes me back to one lunch break in high school when I was wandering around Mariposa Produce with my friend, Cindy.  We'd often go there for lunch and I'd pick out some fruit.  She loved to get yogurt covered things -- like almonds and such.  At the time, it sounded very healthy.  (Those yogurt malt balls were quite heavenly).

Anyway, I picked up a few pomegranates to buy and a man working there leaned over and said, "Those are purely decorative fruits."  I'm sure I looked at him like he didn't know what the heck he was talking about.  I'd been eating pomegranates since I was very young . The only person I'd ever seen use them as a decoration was my aunt whose parents had pomegranate trees and she had more pomegranates than she could possibly eat.  So she'd put those jewel-like seeds around the perimeter of whatever dish she brought to Thanksgiving and it looked beautiful.  (She also brought me a few bags of pomegranates -- I absolutely loved it!).

The man continued, "Really.  You shouldn't eat them.  The seeds are NOT digestible."  (Obviously, this was before pomegranates became the new blueberry, soon to be pushed to the side by the acai' berry).   I bought the pomegranates anyway and went back to the school to feast upon them.  Yet, I've thought back to his words many times over the years.  Are the seeds not digestible?  The juicy part obviously is, but those tough, tough seeds?

I used to eat the whole seed every time I'd eat a pomegranate.  Sometimes I'd spit out the seeds, but most of the time I'd just eat the whole thing.  Then one Thanksgiving break I was home from college and was making my way through one of those pomegranate bags my aunt had brought.  Somehow I managed to eat 8 pomegranates in one day.  A day or two later, I thought I would die.  Those white seeds had clogged my system and were painful to pass.  When they did come out, they were pretty much solid white seeds all pressed tightly together like they had no choice, but to exit my body.  I guess my body digested them, but it didn't use them -- just let them go through.

Since then, I only eat a few seeds with each pomegranate -- maybe 10% or so and haven't had a problem.  I've wondered if I were able to chew them up properly or more completely if they would indeed digest and be useful to my body.

Well, (I know -- did you really want THIS much information?), after drinking those green smoothies with the pulverized, yet still gritty, pomegranate seeds, I was able to put this to the test . There's no amount of chewing on the planet that would get them broken up so small.  But a few days later, stomach pains and total stoppage.  I didn't look to examine the excrement as I had before, but I can tell you that it felt just as awful as it had that time while home from college.  Maybe not to the same extreme because this was just 1 pomegranate thrown into the smoothie and that was 8 before.  But it was indeed solid seeds compacted together and my body didn't do much with them before letting go.

Will I continue to eat the seeds every once in awhile?  Yes.  Will I throw them into a smoothie?  Probably not.  If I juiced it first, I might.  But who wants to go to the trouble of that.  I'd rather just sit at the table with a good book and savor my favorite food as I have so many times each fall.

You win some, you lose some (In search of the perfect pumpkin smoothie)

Today as I drove past Jamba Juice, I really wanted to stop and get a Pumpkin Smash smoothie.  I've found that if I ask for frozen peaches in place of the frozen yogurt, it becomes non-dairy/no refined sugar and is still really yummy.  But it gets expensive to go there all the time.  Plus I need to figure out how to make my own.

I saw a recipe online for the Pumpkin Smash by a guy who says he watched what they put in, went home, tried guessing at the measurements and got it right  But I didn't have frozen peaches and wondered if I could make a creamy version with frozen bananas.  Wrong!

First of all, I didn't have fresh pumpkin innerds, which would have probably tasted better.  Canned pumpkin is good for baked goods, but probably not as fresh and tasty (or nutrient-dense) in something fresh.  So I put 1/2 a big can (what I had left from making pumpkin/zucchini wheat bread a few weeks ago) + 3 frozen bananas, a cup of almond milk and a teaspoon of pumpkin pie spice in the Vitamix.  Not very good at all.  I added another banana and it still wasn't great. It needed more nutmeg, cloves and more sweetening (and more of a frozen taste).  It needed the frozen peaches! 

So I put the mixture in the freezer to be on hold until I get some peaches.  It will probably be next week because we'll be out of town this weekend.  I'll keep trying though.  I know that the Jamba Juice spy used soy milk, and soy milk is creamier than almond milk (at least when I make hot cocoa in my Cocoamotion), but I like using almond milk when I can.  Don't know if it did me any favors though tonight. 

And of course, once I perfect it, I'll sneak in some greens.  Stay tuned because I definitely want to find the ultimate way to make these.

Here's a guy who made a pumpkin pie smoothie.  He used dates to sweeten it up.  Good idea (I ran out of dates yesterday though -- need to get more at Costco next time).  Looks like he had the same general idea that I did -- frozen bananas and almond milk.  He did use fresh pumpkin though.  Good for him!

Using a straw

I've made a new discovery about drinking green smoothies.  Using a straw makes them taste even better!  I'm not sure why, but of course I have my theories. 

First I think it may just be a mental connection.  I have memories of going with my dad in his lumber truck when I was little.  He'd always stop for a hamburger and would let me get a milkshake.  Even the way he talked about getting milkshake made it sound like it was the greatest privilege ever.  He loved them with fresh strawberries or peaches.  If I ever got strawberry, it was probably because I liked pink.  Nonetheless, I always thought it was fun to try to get that thick shake up a straw.  Very fun.

Now I take my kids to Jamba Juice and once again, we get to drink them with straws.  Makes it seem like more of a treat for some reason.

Yesterday I took a green smoothie with me to a friend's swimming pool.  I usually pour my smoothies into one of my stainless steel water bottles when I'm away from home. Often the smoothie comes down fast on my face and I end up with smoothie on my nose.  But it never bothers me.  I can find a napkin (and came to grips with being a clutz AGES ago).  But I couldn't find any of my stainless water bottles yesterday and resorted to using my daughter's Jamba Juice cup (not their disposable ones, but one she bought that has a hole in the middle of the lid for a straw).  I could see that it wouldn't work to just try to drink it out of that hole, so I somehow found a straw and took it with me.

My green smoothies usually taste better than ever away from home than in my own kitchen, but this time it was even better than better!  My second theory besides the good memories and the celebratory feel is that the straw allows the smoothie to hit the middle roof of your mouth only whereas a regular drink (or even using a spoon if it's really thick) puts it all over your mouth.  Maybe the taste bud sensor in that top center notices more sweet and not any greens to make it even tastier.  I don't know.  I just know that I experimented with it at the pool and took a sip with the straw, then opened up the lid, drank a little sans straw and the straw sip definitely won out.

Try it out.  You may just be loving it too!

P.S.  Here are the links to my favorite green smoothies and a few other posts about greens if you haven't seen them before:

Berry Green Smoothies
Citrus Green Smoothies
Faux Plum Green Smoothies
Dark Leafy Greens
Nutrient Density (Greens are the sure winners!)

Faux Plum Green Smoothie Recipe

I don't know if you like to eat baby food, but when my children were babies, I had my favorites. I loved the apricots and the plums. Peaches were pretty good too. But the plums have always been a treasure of a snack.

On Saturday, I made green smoothies at breakfast to stretch the last 2 cups of juice to feed all of my family plus my friend and her 3 children. As I was savoring every single sip as I got to the end of drinking it, I realized that it somehow tasted just like that plum baby food. Not a plum in it, but it truly did. Here's my recipe:

Faux Plum Green Smoothie

2 cups Apple Peach Passion Fruit juice (Kirkland brand from Costco *)
2 big ripe peaches
20 (?) frozen strawberries (maybe more -- enough to fill up about 3/4 of the Vitamix pitcher)
1/2 bunch kale

Blend it up and enjoy!

*If you can't find this juice, any juice with a tang will do. When I've made other smoothies, if I use pineapple juice or any juice w/pineapple or juice w/1/2 fresh lemon, the results are similar to this juice.

Raw Recipe -- Citrus Green Smoothie

I just came up with this recipe in my kitchen and it's sooooooooo creamy and yummy. I just had to share!

Usually I use my favorite green smoothie formula over and over (with little variations), but tonight I decided to break out of that mold a bit and see how it would go. I took a cooking creations risk and thankfully, it paid off!

Here's what I threw in my blender:

2 tangerines (peeled)
1/4 c. water
1 frozen banana (I'm sure you could use fresh, but frozen made it seem ice-creamy)
1 c. frozen strawberries (I'm guessing on the amount, it may be 1 1/2 c.)
3 handfuls of spinach
2 large chard leaves, broken off the stalk into smaller pieces

I tried it first w/o the water and it just wouldn't blend the frozen stuff. So I added the water after the strawberries to get it to blend. Worked like a charm!

This filled one 8 oz. glass and one much larger (which I froze for tomorrow). Oh, it was dreamy yummy!

Raw Recipe -- Berry Green Smoothies

When I make my green smoothies, I usually use this basic formula. It's always yummy and gives me plenty of dark green leafy greens. Try it!

Berry Green Smoothie Recipe

2 c. juice (I like to juice apples or pineapple but you can use anything --sometimes I put in 2 c. grapes and blend it up for the juice)
2 c. frozen berries (the triple berries are best)
optional -- fresh strawberries, kiwi, peaches, or mango
2 bananas (or 1 if it's really large)
3 big handfuls of washed greens (kale & spinach seem to work best -- if you use kale, make sure you tear it up into spinach leaf size so it doesn't get stuck in the blender -- the kale stems are really coarse and you don't want them in there).

Blend it all up in the order listed. Drink one glass right away, hand another to a friend and freeze the rest (usually another 2 glasses). It's really good thawed out the next day or even up to a week or two later. I've taken them frozen in a cooler when traveling before and it worked great. In the photo I added a few berries whole as a garnish, but it also tastes good to have some berry chunks inside.

Dark Leafy Greens

Some say there should be a new food group -- dark leafy greens. They are in a class of their own -- far surpassing any other foods in nutrients we know about and those yet to be discovered.

I'm not the expert on greens, but I've read from several. Victoria Boutenko writes all about how our diet should be FILLED with greens in her book "Green for Life." She didn't start out liking greens. I'm like her. It took some work to get me to eat my greens. I have a hard time making myself fix salads. I'd much rather have a salad that someone else made. If I make my own, I prefer a sweet twist to it -- adding mango slices, strawberries, or raspberries. Making green smoothies, like Victoria talks about in her book is a wonderful solution for a sweet-tooth like me because it gives a sweet base -- so much so that I hardly notice I'm drinking down a few handfuls of greens at the same time.

My favorite nutritional expert, Dr. Joel Fuhrman, talks about the nutritional superiority of greens in all 3 of his books that I've read (or listened to -- I'm have his latest book "Eat for Health" on audio-CD). His other books "Eat to Live" and "Disease-Proof Your Child: Feeding Kids Right" tell the vital importance of eating greens in order to have a strong enough immune system to fight diseases, allergies, and asthma. (I separate those 3 although they could all be considered illnesses).

I'll add some nutritional studies and facts to this post later on (check back early next week), but for now, I just want to give you some tips on getting your greens.

1. Learn to make (and enjoy) green smoothies. Smoothies have become chic and popular over the past 5 years or so. I started out making them like milkshakes -- using ice cream and yogurt and fruit. I later learned I could make them without dairy (and refined sugar!) and used soy milk or fruit juice as a base. Now I use very little juice, sometimes fresh juiced juice or just water (or a watery-fruit as a base -- like grapes) and always add something frozen to give it that shake sensation. I usually have berries in the freezer and sometimes have chunks of peaches or bananas frozen too. I find if I have a little liquid to get the blender working well, some berries and something sweeter and creamier like bananas, peaches, or mangoes, it's a great tasting smoothie. Next I throw in the greens. My favorite greens for smoothies are kale and spinach. When I use kale, I make sure I tear off the leaves and not put in the stalks. Maybe a Vita-Mix or Blend-tec could handle the stalks, but my blender would probably get jammed. I do use the whole stem for juicing though (see next tip). An internet friend of mine, Robyn Openshaw-Pay has a website called greensmoothiegirl.com where she talks all about the benefits of green smoothies. She has other interesting information on nutrition there as well (debunking nutrition myths in her newsletter) and plenty of ideas on how to get your family eating healthy foods.
2. Start juicing! I wrote a post about juicing back in February. Check it out for the finer details -- (I haven't the slightest idea what I wrote about it now :)). I'll just add now that it's a great way to get some amazing phytonutrients absorbed into your body quickly. The freshness of it will make you smile. If it doesn't, keep trying. I used to poo-poo juicing any vegetables (I'm sure the thought of juicing greens would have sent me running to the cookie aisle in the nearby grocery store), but now I just love it. It didn't take me long to become converted to green juice. I think I probably mentioned this in my previous post on juicing, but when you juice greens, very little comes out at first. It's important to juice some more watery produce afterwards (like apples or cucumbers) to get more greens out. My favorite greens to juice are chard and collard greens.
3. Buy some Superfood product. If it's been processed or pasteurized, it's not going to be as healthy as making it yourself, but if you don't have the time or can't expend the effort right now, start off with Odwalla Superfood. It tastes wonderful and can really give you a boost. You don't have to drink a full glass to get the benefits -- just a bit. I don't know if your grandmother was like mine and had those tiny little glasses for juice in the morning. We were never allowed seconds (or heaven forbid, a big cup). A tiny bit was just enough to get us going for the day. The same is true for drinking Superfood. I've also bought the Naked Juice Superfood before when traveling. It's tasty and enlivening too. It's more of a juice than the thicker smoothie version by Odwalla. But it's still natural and great.
4. Okay, I'll add making salads. Eventually I'll get good at this and will write a whole post about it. I promise. (Oh dear, what have I said?) But yes, salads are a great source of getting your greens too. Just be careful not to add artificial foods like white flour croutons or sugar-laden Craisins. Yes, sad to know those Craisins aren't the bounty we'd all hoped for. (I used to eat them by the cupful and build my salads around them!) Also beware of the dressings you use. You can make your own dressings or buy some that are natural (and just use a bit). You're thinking now, "No wonder she doesn't like salads much!" :) No, I do, once I start eating them. I'm just stubborn and will break through this just like I have so many other things I've resisted with eating better.
5. Make soups and sauces. Dr. Furhman lists the most nutrient dense foods in his books as not just the dark leafy greens (those are the very highest though), but also peppers, cabbage, and broccoli. I've found a handy tool for making soups and sauces is the hand blender (like the ones by Braun that used to be so popular). I start with a marinara sauce, add in spinach, then blend away and my kids don't even know it's there. I do this with other vegetables too just to make the recipe thicker. Kale is also good cooked. (I still prefer it in my smoothies though -- that's the best way to get the maximum nutrients from it!)
6. Dehydrate. I don't know if you have a dehydrator or not. But if you do, you can make savory crackers with greens like parsley, basil, and kale. I've made some that are sooooo tasty. It's just a bonus to know I'm eating some greens while chomping down on a crunchy snack!
7. Make a wrap w/greens. You know how wraps became the chic way to have a sandwich a few years ago using flour tortillas. Well, you can make wraps with long lettuce leaves like romaine instead of using bread. There are plenty of raw recipes that are tasty and filling. It's been awhile since I've made any. So that will be another goal for me -- to start making them again so I can share recipes and tell you which are my favorites. You may be able to search "wrap" at goneraw.com. They have a ton of great recipes. Here's one I just found there just now -- Salad Wrap Recipe. Remember, you don't have to be a raw foodist to enjoy raw food in your current diet!

Okay, I think that's about it. (I was tempted to say "that's a wrap!" but I held my tongue, or my fingers??? Well, almost anyway).

While I've learned to appreciate and enjoy my greens more in the past few years, I still don't eat as many as my body needs.

So I'm going to set a 30 day goal once I get back from traveling this weekend to eat my greens 3x a day. (I apologize to those of you who have already read my reneeonrawfood blog post today and see me repeating myself). I'll let you know how I do. And I'll be sure to share recipes as I discover new ways to enjoy my greens!