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Our Newsletter JUICING FOR HEALTH
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November 28, 2010 on 7:01 pm
I added a couple of carrots and a couple of apples as well. I added a small piece of ginger and then topped it off with freshly grated nutmeg. Yumm. I’ve been working on some nice recipes to add to my e-Book which will be coming out in the next couple of days. I think this one is a contender. I’ll let you know about the e-Book as soon as it is completed. I had a lot of fun creating it and even more fun coming up with some delicious recipes that I think you all will enjoy.
November 28, 2010 on 12:48 am
Parents have a difficult job. Fear is everywhere, and if we responded to all the adverts around us, making us afraid of the air we breathe and the water we drink, we’d live a sad, drab life. Most of us struggle to find the right food for our children. They need liquid, they need vitamins, they need fiber and they need protein. Sadly many of the popular drinks contain only carbohydrates, and rather too much of that, they are also expensive. I found that my kids would drink cans, but they had learned so much about pollution at school that when I suggested water as a substitute they thought I was mad. The problem with cola/soda is that it’s sweet and kids get used to that. It can also contain caffeine which has more effect on small bodies than it does on adults. In fact when you get right down to it, you wonder why we let them drink it all. There are many alternatives. Sparkling water is one, smoothies are another. Most of us think of smoothies as creamy drinks, and this is great initially when you are persuading your kids to try them out. Imagine if you could persuade your children to drink something which supplied them with the water they needed AND lots of minerals and vitamins, without the caffeine and excessive sweetness? Guess what? That ideal drink’s a smoothie, so you’ll need a blender. I like the Blendtec Blender HP3A. Take a look at any smoothie recipe and one thing that will jump right out at you is the sugar content. Although smoothies are made with real fruit, modern tastes seem to prefer food which is far sweeter. The good things about this is that the sweet tooth is learned, so it can be unlearned. Ask anyone from outside the USA and they’ll tell you that everything here tastes sweet to them, often too sweet, in comparison to the food in other countries. Here are three smoothie recipes to help with the process. 1. The original ice cream drink. It’s important to use strawberries and bananas here because they are nice familiar fruits – don’t try to introduce anything weird or wonderful. If you can’t get strawberries because of the time of year, frozen ones taste great. Strawberry and Banana Ice Cream Drink 1 large banana 2 scoops of vanilla ice cream 3-4 fresh strawberries Blend them all to make a refreshing drink that’s great for the summer. 2. Staying with nice, familiar strawberries, blend them with fruit juice and start to introduce some other fruit. Pineapple and Strawberry Smoothie 8 large strawberries 1/2 banana 3 pineapple slices 1 cup of apple juice (no added sweetener) If this isn’t sweet enough, try adding just a little honey. Blend it all together until smooth and then add 1 cup of crushed ice as the final touch. 3. This last recipe introduces melon. I love the taste of melon, especially water melon, but I’ve never been able to persuade my kids to eat it. This recipe had the opposite effect. They liked the drink and so were curious about the fruit. The happy result is a house full of melon eaters. Strawberry Fair 2 cups fresh strawberries hulled and chopped 1 cup apple juice 1/2 melon peeled and chopped into chunks. As always, add honey if required. I like to add ice cubes once the fruit is all smushed (technical term) together, the kids seem to enjoy the destruction involved! Weaning your kids off cola is no easy job, but it’s very worthwhile, especially if you can do it by introducing smoothies. You might just succeed in teaching them that not everything that’s good for you tastes bad. 
November 15, 2010 on 12:06 am
Children seem remarkably resilient and can survive on an amazingly junk food diet, but processed food contains less vitamins and minerals and these are necessary not just for health and growth, but as a foundation for health in later life. The easiest way to access vitamins and minerals directly is through fruit and vegetables, but children often reject these, finding green vegetables unpalatable, and preferring sweetened desserts to raw fruit. It’s amazing how kids can be convinced that foods will only taste good if covered in breadcrumbs, wrapped in a bun, smothered with sugar or at the very least sealed in a packet. Children need to consume the right foods and perhaps more importantly, get into the right habits, so as parents how can we persuade them? Good nutrition is a complex issue, not least because there is so much variation between one person and another. Tests have shown that two apparently identical individuals living similar lifestyles can have very different amounts of vitamins and minerals in their blood. We all know that vitamins are essential, but did you know that minerals, in tiny quantities are also vital to the operation of our bodies, and that no matter how many drugs we consume, without minerals we cannot function properly? The minerals we need in large quantities are: But there are even more which are vital to the body in extremely tiny amounts. They act as catalysts in many of the chemical reactions in our bodies, and without them we would die very quickly. Zinc is an example. Nutritionists believe we need around 8-11 mg per day to stay healthy, a tiny amount by any standards, but vital as zinc is essential in the operation of over 100 enzymes. Zinc is used by the metabolism, and the immune system. It is also important for proper growth, and a serious deficiency can result in growth problems.
Here’s a recipe. Take one cup of Greek yogurt Blend them all together with your Vita Mix Blender and taste. If it’s too tart, add just enough honey. If you’re just starting with smoothies make them with ice cream in place of the yogurt and milk and present it to your children as a treat. If you have to over sweeten to begin with, don’t worry. You can reduce the sweetening slowly over time. Who should have healthy smoothies? The simple answer is everyone. Using zinc again as an example, recent surveys have shown that 35-45% of adults over 60 have diets which are deficient in zinc, resulting in loss of taste and smell as well as lethargy and loss of appetite. Whatever your age, vitamins and minerals are essential to your health, so get out your blender or juicer and start experimenting. It may be healthy, but it’s also fun. 
September 30, 2010 on 11:40 pm
I picked up a couple of pineapples they had on sale at the market today. I also had some fresh organic produce that I got from the Farmer’s Market we have down the street. I wanted to try a new recipe using a few more ingredients. I had just worked out at the gym; I was not real hungry, but wanted a pic-me-up. This is what I came up with and it was so tasty and refreshing I thought I would share it here. 2 – 3 carrots or a couple of handfuls of the already peeled organic ones Of course wash all your produce well. You can use a vegetable brush if you want. Add fruits and veggies to your vegetable juicer, alternating the softer ones with the harder ones. Drink and enjoy. Related articles
September 24, 2010 on 3:41 pm
One of the reasons we find it challenging to change our diet is that it is exactly that, CHANGE, and most of us really don’t like to do things differently. One way to make life easier (as well as healthier) for your children is to get them started off the right way, to make fresh fruit, and other raw foods generally a habit right from the start, and this really begins with juices made with a fruit and vegetable juicer. When a baby is born it needs milk and nothing else for around six months. Many women give their babies water in addition to milk, and in recent times there has been a trend towards fruit juice. If you want to give your child fruit juice at an early age, two things are very important. The first is that the juice should be extremely watered down (with filtered water) as natural fruit juices are far too strong for a baby’s stomach. The second is that, if the juice was purchased, you must check the label. When you do, you may well be shocked at the small amount of nutrition in the juice. Avoid anything with extra sweetener. Yes, your baby will probably enjoy the sweetness, but the development of a sweet tooth is something you really want to avoid. If you baby doesn’t like watered down natural juice, don’t give them juice at all. Small babies really don’t need it. As your child grows, introduce them to a juice mixture, and not from the sweetened variety, but made with good quality fruit juicer, such as an Omega 4000 juicer or the Acme 6001 juicer. You can create a wide variety of mixtures with a fruit and vegetable juicer. (Some tasty recipes below). The addition of some sparkling water makes a very refreshing drink and you can reduce the proportion of sparkling water as the child grows, or not. Many adults enjoy the combination. In doing this you have three objectives:
Research shows that children who are accustomed to fresh fruits juices find many shop bought juices, desserts and snacks too sweet. This one difference in diet can go a long way to prevent obesity and diabetes in later life. In April 2010 new research showed that children and teens who drink 100% freshly made fruit juice have higher intakes of key nutrients compared to non – consumers. The researchers reported that a higher proportion of non fruit juice consumers 2 – 18 years of age failed to meet the recommended levels for several key nutrients, including vitamins A, C and folate compared to those who drank fruit juice. Lead researcher Dr Carol O’Neil said ’100% fruit juice plays an important role in the diets of children and teens supplying important nutrients during a key period of growth and should be encouraged as part of an overall balanced diet’. If diluted fruit juice is on the table for both you and your child from day one, it’s likely to be some time before resistance sets in, but at some point there will be some resistance, and there are a number of ways to deal with it. If your child is one who always wants to do the opposite to what you tell them to (and many go through that phase) make yourself freshly made juices but keep it to something simple like apple and carrot so that it has a nice sweet taste. Always make time to sit down together and drink it leisurely and when you are asked what it is say, ‘ This is a very special drink, I’m sure you wouldn’t like it’, keep this up until one day you make an excuse to leave your drink on the table near the child, 10 – 1 they will have had a sip while you’ve been gone. Eventually if they liked it they will ask if they can have one too and then you both can have fun. Another thing you can do is buy yourself a special cup, mug or glass exclusively for your juice, choose one that is in the colors or a pattern that you know your child will like and that you could buy another in the same set. Don’t drink anything else out of it and when you are eventually asked ‘Can I have one like that’ you say, ‘ This is a very special mug/glass and only for drinking this special drink out of but if you ever have one of these drinks I’ll buy a special one for you too’. See what happens. It’s sad but true that it’s a bad idea to tell any child that they ‘have’ to drink the juice or that it’s good for them. There seems to be no faster way to put them off!
*Some fruits do much better in a fruit and vegetable juicer than others. Apples, watermelon, pears and citrus fruits do well, while bananas, strawberries, blueberries, stone fruit (peaches, nectarines) tomatoes etc. do better in a blender. Here are a few recipes to enjoy with your child. YOU ARE A PEACH 2 Peaches 1 Pear 1 Apple Take the stones from the peaches. And juice all ingredients together in your juicer. YUMMY APPLE JUICE 2 Sweet Apples 4 Large Carrots 1 Red Bell Pepper Remove seeds from pepper if your juicer can’t cope with them. Cut in half. Juice the apples and carrots followed by the pepper. RASPBERRY NECTARINE 1 Orange 1/2 cup Raspberries 1 Nectarine Peel the orange and cut into quarters, pit the nectarine and juice all together. SPARKLY FRUIT JUICE 1/2 Mango 1 Orange 1 Kiwi Sparkling mineral water Peel the mango, orange and kiwi, juice them. Pour into glass and top up with sparkling mineral water. Puberty is a difficult time when children need good nutrition to help them grow and to even out those hormonal changes. By getting your child into a fruit and veggie ‘habit’ at an early age, you provide a good foundation for every aspect of their lives and increase the probability that they’ll continue eating a healthy diet into adulthood. Together you can look forward to introducing fresh juices made in your juicer to your grandchildren.  |
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