Choosing to Juice

Some may recall my post several months ago about the juice cleanse/reboot Daniel and I were doing based on the documentary, "Fat, Sick, and Nearly Dead" by Joe Cross {here}. WELL, we've decided to take some of what we learned through our ten day juice and apply it to our life day-to-day. What does that look like? For starters Daniel and I both knew that we didn't want to do another ten days of juice only SO we decided to continue to juice, but in addition we would start incorporating a normal sized, healthier dinner at the end of the day with a small non-juiced snack in the afternoon. Our hope is to continue to increase our fruit and vegetable intake and decrease our intake of carbs and processed foods. So far, so good.

The lovely machine that makes all of this juicing possible.

Previously, during our ten day reboot, a typical day's menu looked something like this:

Breakfast: two glasses of warm water & {orang} juice
Mid-Morning: coconut milk
Lunch: {green} juice
Snack: {green or red} juice
Dinner: {green} juice
Dessert (optional): {purple} juice
  *lot of water throughout the day

Now, our menu looks something like this:

Breakfast: two glasses of warm water & {orange} juice
Mid-Morning: black coffee with Splenda
Lunch: {green} juice
Snack: fruit, trail mix and/or nuts
Dinner: grilled chicken with a green leafy salad {we try to change up the type of chicken and salad for a little variety}
Snack (optional): fruit, nuts, yogurt, granola etc.
  *lot of water throughout the day

If you're curious, all of the recipes can be found by clicking here. All of the information, including the full length documentary can be found on Joe's website. Here are our two personal favorites - a typical breakfast and lunch any given day:

 

 

Carrot Apple Lemon {Orange}
4 carrots
2 green Apples
1 lemon

 

 

Green Lemonade {Green}
6-8 kale leaves
1 cucumber

3 handfuls of spinach

1 green apple

2 celery stalks

1 lemon

Pictured above is a salad from dinner a few nights ago - grilled Cajun chicken, mixed leafy greens, dried cranberries, fresh sliced Avocado, and crunchy tortilla strips.  Another one of our summer favorites has been spinach, fresh strawberries, blueberries, and mandarin oranges, with pecans and a lemon poppyseed dressing. {Recipe credit my awesome sister-in-law Janelle.}

 

Some quick observations about juicing:   1. Eating healthy is expensive {On the flip-side, we are saving a good bit of money from not eating out as frequently and not having daily trips to Starbucks/Dunkin Donuts}   2. We have to make more trips to the grocery store in a given week in an effort to keep all of the produce as fresh as possible   3. You NEED to drink a LOT of water.   4. Both Daniel and I have lost several lbs.   5. It's not as hard as you think   AND   6. I miss baking - my Kitchen Aid has been temporally replaced by my juicer.