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This is a guest post by Angelina Ignatova and she answers “why eat fruit”.

Maybe you’re just not a fruit person, or you’re wondering why eat fruit when you’re not sure you’re even eating enough vegetables? We’ll address both why eating fruit is important, but also how to eat fruit at the right time to avoid the side effects.

Why eat fruit?

Why do we eat food? It’s a rhetorical question, isn’t it? One can say it’s in order to survive and this would be almost right. Let’s close our eyes to the fact of breatharians’ (prana eaters) existence and move the attention to the delightful world of healthy food.

The most important aspect of a daily diet composition is nutrition – and why eat fruit is precisely because fruit is a big part of this rich palette of choices, called a healthy eating pyramid. Scientists say that if you eat at least five servings of fruit and vegetables a day you may lose weight and also keep the right blood sugar level.

So let’s first understand how our digestion works during the day. When we swallow food, the first stop is our stomach. The gastric juice, containing a small amount of acid, starts to transform the food into the perfect consistency for the next step.

This is a very important part of the process; when a delicious apple or a nut cluster turns into a “smoothie”, because only in this form can all the nutrients be easily absorbed by our intestine.

Imagine that you ate, say, two pieces of toast and some fruit. When the fruit is ready to move to the intestine, the bread (which is more difficult to digest) blocks it and restrains it from moving on.

Gastric juice continues to digest the bread, while the fruit also continues to react with the acid and the mixture “fizzes” even more than it should.

That’s why sometimes when a person eats fruit after a meal they experience bloating, belching and a feeling of heaviness. Fruit is a rich source of fructose, vitamins and fiber. If you eat them properly, they will significantly benefit your body.

Why eat fruit if you’re not eating it at the right times?

Here are some tips to help you take full advantage of fruit:

• Do not eat fruit when your stomach is full! You can do it at any time, but not after a meal.

• After you eat some fruit, wait about 30 minutes before you eat anything else.

• The best time to eat fruit is before the afternoon. They gradually increase the blood sugar level and awake the digestive system after night.

• Why eat fruit when you’ll get a stomach ache? Try not to eat fruit with foods that are hard to digest.

• Bananas and avocados are very heavy, so it’s better not to eat them in the evening. Take a banana or an avocado salad as an afternoon meal when the digestive system is ready for it.

• If possible, prefer fresh fruit to frozen and canned ones because the processed fruit contain lots of sugar and, most likely, artificial preservatives, thus losing most of their nutritional value.

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If you used to eat fruit as a dessert and then suffered from unexplained stomach-ache, try to follow this advice and see what happens. You can also find more healthy eating tips and information on this site – http://www.eatinghealthy.org. Stay fit and nature-friendly and don’t forget to wash all the fruits and veggies before enjoying them!

Angelina is a vegetarian and a yoga addicted writer from Aliso Viejo, CA. Her biggest goal is to make everybody be healthy and live happily. Follow her on Twitter at @_eatinghealthy and get more tips that answer why eat fruit!

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Growing up I always ate a lot of cookies and junk food. That was my de facto standard. But one day my dad showed up with boxes full of seaweed cookies and seaweed bars.

He figured that we could all stand to eat a little healthier, and he planned on selling them at his shop. At first we all wrinkled our noses: “seaweed?! yuck!”

But over time I grew to like these seaweed cookies. They had a different type of flavor, and since my dad was having a harder time than he anticipated selling them, I ended up eating a lot of them.

The Benefits of Eating Seaweed

How to eat seaweed is not something I learned at a young age… unless you count those cookies. I didn’t understand the benefit of eating seaweed back then, but now I’m a huge fan and here’s why:

• A lot of the food grown on the land is lacking in minerals because of aggressive farming practices and lack of remineralization. Seaweed is packed with minerals from the ocean!
• If you’re worried about the toxic chemical accumulation the higher up you go in the food chain, especially in fish… well seaweed is as low in the oceanic food chain as it gets.
• Seaweed is great for balancing out the thyroid gland, which is responsible for producing hormones that keep us healthy and balanced.
• Seaweed is pure energy, and if you need a boost it is really easy to add to your daily routine.
• All in all, seaweed is one of the greatest foods that we often neglect to eat. It is a regular ingredient in Asian cuisine, and can add a great taste to many raw dishes!

How to Eat Seaweed & How to Add Seaweed to Your Diet

I often get asked how people can eat more seaweed, and this article will show you all the different ways you can do it!

1. Add spirulina or blue/green algae to your green smoothies or fruit smoothies. I’ve also added it to my green juices, it makes for a fun mix.

2. Make raw maki or sushi veggie rolls, using nori seaweed sheets as the wrapper.

3. Slice up a nori sheet to top your salads or add to wraps for extra crunch.

4. Use Irish Moss in raw pies and desserts to solidify the fillings, and get some extra seaweed into your diet through your sweet tooth.

5. Soak kelp buds and add these to your salads and wraps. I do this one several times per week, and it adds a different flair to my salads!

6. Add kelp noodles (these are raw!) to your raw soups, raw salads, or make a raw noodle dish with them.

7. Use soaked kelp buds or your favorite type of seaweed to your salad dressings by blending with quality oils and vinegars. You get a great Asian tasting dressing, and you sneak more seaweed in!

8. Dehydrate nori crackers by blending regular cracker batter and spreading it on a nori sheet. Then dehydrate and watch the salty nori turn into a delicious cracker you can’t put down.

9. Make a seaweed salad with any type of soaked seaweed, sliced cucumbers, and a sprinkle of sesame seeds for an Asian feel.

10. Bring nori sheets on camping or cross country trips, they make for a great dry snack or can be combined with fresh veggies for a super simple wrap.

Did you notice? None of these suggestions require you to eat seaweed cookies. But each one will help you remineralize your body, balance your thyroid, and feel incredible.

So go ahead, give seaweed a try. I promise you it gets easier to include in your day to day! The question is not “How to Eat Seaweed” but rather, why not eat more seaweed?

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This is a guest post by Ingela Johansson.

Having a bunch of fasting juice recipes ready when you’re about to go on your raw, healing juice fast can come in handy. Many use fasting as a tool to lose weight, and I don’t blame them. It often works a lot better than the majority of the diets out there.

Fasting not only cleanses your body internally, but it also detoxifies your body and increases your health tremendously.

If you want to get an extra boost out of your enema, it is usually recommended that you do a small enema before you start to clean out the old stuff.

When you’re juicing, you aren’t getting any fiber or solids into your stomach, so you have to get rid of the old somehow, right?

These recipes are the ones I use the most and they are very simple. I like keeping things simple and I am sure our bodies like that, too.

Healthy Recipe #1 – Orange and Carrot Blend

This is probably one of the juices I drink the most. Whenever I get cravings for something sweet I make one of these and it always satisfies my body.

All you have to do is grab as many oranges as you want and when you’ve juiced all of your oranges, add a few carrots. You can vary the amount of carrots you put in depending on what flavor you want.

I typically put in 2-3 medium sized carrots and that gives the orange flavor a nice boost.

Healthy Recipe #2 – Green Orange Mania

This is a recipe I make because I have to get some greens in my diet! Vegetables are very cleansing internally and they are like a retreat for your soul. So you need to get those greens in and this is my way of doing it.

You can take any vegetable, but let’s go with celery and kale. If you were to juice those two and drink it, it would taste pretty bad, and I don’t know, maybe some people like it, but I don’t!

Juice your greens and at the end add a few oranges and it will improve the taste tremendously and it will be a lot easier to drink. And best of all, your body will get the nutrients it needs.

Healthy Recipe #3 – Pineapple and Mango

Are you starting to notice that my fasting juice recipes tend to only contain two or three ingredients? I’m sorry, but that’s the way I have been doing things for a few years, and it works!

I like keeping things simple, but I by no means discourage your from trying your own recipes. Throw in whatever you want in your juicer and see how it tastes. That’s how you learn.

For your pineapple and mango fasting juice recipe all you have to do is peel your pineapple and mango, slice both into small chunks that fit into your juicer and juice away.

I sometimes like to include a carrot right at the end because my juicer can get clogged when I use squishy fruits like pineapples.

[Editor's Note, Nathalie Says: I don't recommend juicing fruit on a regular basis, or drinking lots of juiced fruit but if you do juice fruit keep to this rule: only juice fruit with other fruit, except apples, pears, and lemons/limes which can be juiced with veggies. Try to make the majority of your juice consist of vegetables, especially if you have sugar issues or suspect you've got a sweet tooth.]

Keep It Simple

Like I said, I like to keep my fasting juice recipes simple, because it means I have to use less brainpower to make them, and to clean everything when I’m all done.

There are tons of great juice recipe books out there, and I’m sure you can find more than plenty online as well, so don’t be shy to trying new things.

Best of luck with your juicing!

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Ingela Johansson is in love with natural skin care. If you want more natural anti aging tips, you can visit her blog, where you will find topics ranging from oily skin care tips to home remedies for warts.

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This is a guest post by Ingela Johansson.

Fruit facts are great, not just because of their fascinating nature, but also because learning more about fruits will inevitably lead to a life with more energy, better sleep, and more joy.

Fruits are natures own multivitamins, they usually contain a lot of vitamin C, dietary fiber and different minerals and antioxidants. I’ve heard a lot of people say that fruits are bad and they’ll do this and that to you if you eat too much of them. Usually these statements aren’t backed up by any solid scientific evidence at all. Now, I’m not saying that consuming only fruit is recommended. We still need variety in our diet (hello vegetables!)

With all that said: let’s look at some quick fruit facts.

#1 – Apples

There are 7,500 varieties of apples worldwide, that’s more than you’d think, isn’t it? 2,500 of these are grown in the U.S.

Apples have been proven to support heart health, protect against certain cancers, alleviate asthma, speed up weight loss and lower cholesterol. This is amazing, all these benefits just from eating apples! I personally like the green ones the best, because they taste sour.

#2 – Avocado

Some say that Avocado is a vegetable, but I personally think that it is a fruit.

Avocadoes are higher in fat than most fruits, because of this it can increase your absorption of carotenoids from vegetables. Just add some avocado to your salad! Avocados also promote heart health by lowering cholesterol.

Because avocados are a rich source of healthy fatty acids, it has been shown to offer significant protections against breast and prostate cancer. I personally don’t like eating avocadoes by themselves, so I mix it into things like salads, smoothies and other yummy recipes.

#3 – Bananas

There are many different varieties of bananas, as to how many, it seems that people disagree on that part. Something they do agree on is their health benefits! Bananas are one of the best sources of potassium.

Potassium is a very important mineral that helps your body maintain a normal blood pressure and heart function. A banana therefore may prevent high blood pressure and protect against atherosclerosis.

Bananas are also effective in soothing ulcers because of their antacid effects. I like to use bananas and sparkling water whenever my stomach is feeling off balance, don’t ask me why, that mix just seems to work.

Bananas also help against constipation and I am living testimony to this because whenever I am feeling a bit blocked down there I make a big banana smoothie and things just start flowing ;).

#4 – Blueberries

Mmm, blueberries are delicious. I always sneak back home after summer when my mother has gathered a few buckets of blueberries from our summer cottage. I go in quietly, steal them and sit in the corner and devour them.

Blueberries are supercharged with antioxidants that stop free radicals from damaging your body. Free radicals cause damage to your cells and tissues, which can lead to problems such as glaucoma, varicose veins, hemorrhoids, ulcers, heart disease and even cancer.

Blueberries have also been shown to improve night vision, how cool is that?

Blueberries help protect your brain from oxidative stress and may reduce the effects of ailments such as Alzheimer’s disease or dementia. There are too many benefits of blueberries to list here, but let’s do one more.

No, let’s do two, I’m in a good mood today! Blueberries also keep your intestines healthy and protect your colon against cancer.

#5 – Grapes

Grapes are one of my favorite fruits, but you have to make sure you get organic grapes, because non-organic grapes can be heavily sprayed with all sorts of chemicals, and since you do not peel grapes, you get more of those chemicals in you.

Grapes keep your heart and lungs healthy, and grapes also fight cancer. Red grapes also contain something called resveratrol, which is believed to be one of the reasons the French live so long even though they eat a bad diet.

#6 – Oranges

Oooh, oranges, squeezing your fresh orange juice, have you ever tried it? If not, I think you should, it is better than candy, cakes, pizzas and any other unhealthy (but potentially yummy) food in the world!

Oranges contain a lot of vitamin C, which protects against some cancers, may lower cholesterol and keeps your stomach healthy because of all the fiber it contains.

#7 – Strawberries

Eating strawberries with raw unheated honey is a good snack that I enjoy in the summer time when strawberries are plentiful here in Sweden. In the winter they come from other countries and are pretty expensive, so I don’t really eat them.

Strawberries protect your body from oxygen damage, rheumatoid arthritis, improve your eyes, decrease the risk of developing cancer and much more that hasn’t been discovered yet!

That’s my list. I know I’ve left many fruits out, but these are my favorites and it is good to not get too overwhelmed if you’re relatively new to fruits.

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Remember to buy your fruits organic if you can and wash them gently before you put them in your mouth.

Start eating more fruit today, your body will thank you!

Ingela Johansson is in love with natural skin care. If you want more natural anti aging tips, you can visit her blog, where you will find topics ranging from how to prevent oily skin to finding the best anti wrinkle cream.

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This is a guest post by Katrina Robinson.

It can be difficult finding great vegetarian recipes that are not only chocked full with antioxidants but also taste fabulous. What’s so special about antioxidants, you might ask. Antioxidants such as Vitamin C and Vitamin A help to prevent and slow the oxidative damage that is done to your body. When your body uses oxygen, the body’s cells produce free radicals, which can lead to heart disease, cancer, and diabetes. Antioxidants help to prevent and repair damage that has been or could be done by these free radicals. So you can see why they’re so important! But now the trick is to find recipes that also taste great…well, I’ve found two fantastic recipes that taste fantastic and are filled with antioxidants! These recipes are for those who aren’t all raw. Not all the ingredients are vegan but they’re a great example of how to pack a lot of nutritional value into a recipe. Check them out below!

Baked Apples with Walnuts and Dried Fruit

You’ll need the following for this recipe:

• 6 medium Golden Delicious apples
• 1 cup chopped walnuts
• ½ cup of dried cranberries (raisins work, too)
• ½ cup apricot preserves
• 1 ½ cup apple cider
• ¼ cup unsweetened shredded coconut
• 2 tablespoons maple syrup
• 1 tablespoon butter
• 1 teaspoon lemon zest
• ¼ teaspoon ground cinnamon
• ¼ teaspoon ground nutmeg
• ½ teaspoon vanilla extract

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Lightly coat a shallow baking dish with cooking spray.
2. Core all of your apples, creating a 1-inch-wide hole. Peel the upper third of the apples. Score the flesh about ¼-inch deep around the circumference where the peeled and unpeeled portions meet. Now cut a shallow crater around the top of the hole. This will help to hold the preserves that will go there. Set apples aside.
3. Put walnuts, dried cranberries, and coconut in a food processor and chop. Add lemon zest, maple syrup, nutmeg, and cinnamon and pulse several times to combine the ingredients.
4. Put the apples in the baking dish and press ¼ cup of the filling into each cavity. Spoon a tablespoon of preserves into the crater you created in each apple.
5. Combine the butter and apple cider in a saucepan and keep over low heat until the butter has melted. Now remove it from the stove and stir in the vanilla. Pour the liquid all over the apples.
6. Cover the apples with aluminum foil and bake on your oven’s center rack for thirty minutes. Remove the foil and baste the apples, then continue to bake (uncovered) for twenty to thirty-five more minutes, basting every ten minutes, until the apples are tender.
7. Serve and enjoy!

Vegan Spicy Beet Soup

You’ll need the following for this recipe:

• 6 medium beets (with skin; greens and stems removed)
• 2 cups water
• 1 ½ cup vegan vegetable bouillon broth
• 1 cup red wine
• 1 white onion, coarsely chopped
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 1 tablespoon dark brown sugar
• 2 tablespoons apple cider vinegar
• ½ cup vegan soy sour cream
• 3 tablespoons lemon juice
• 2 cups beet greens and stems, chopped
• 2 medium chipotle chilies in adobo sauce

1. Put the beets, vegetables bouillon broth, and wine into a large soup pot and add water.
2. Bring to a boil and simmer, covered, for forty-five minutes to one hour.
3. Remove beets with a slotted spoon. Reserve the cooking liquid in the soup pot.
4. Once beets have cooled, coarsely chop. Set aside ½ cup of ½-inch diced beets for garnish.
5. Heat olive oil in saucepan over medium heat.
6. Add onion and brown sugar.
7. Saute for two minutes until sugar is dissolved.
8. Add the onion and brown sugar mixture, the chopped beets, lemon juice, apple cider vinegar, soy sour cream, and chilies to the beet liquid in your soup pot.
9. Stir the mixture together and add to a blender in batches, mixing it until it’s smooth.

These are just two vegetarian recipes that are full of antioxidants and are downright tasty, too! Katrina Robinson is a freelance writer who blogs about a wide array of topics, from health to beauty to colon cleansing.

Photo by Gerolf Nikolay

“Anti-bacterial. Kills bacteria in one spray. Removes unseen bacteria, protecting you and your family.”

That’s what all those sterilizing cleaning products promise. But what if bacteria wasn’t something to be feared and squashed at every opportunity? What if your body’s relationship to bacteria was a symbiotic one instead.

Let’s explore this relationship we have with bacteria, and uncover the 7 misunderstood reasons why bacteria are actually good for you.

1. Bacteria and Fungi Lead to Fermentation

Microscopic bacteria and fungi are responsible for the fermentation of foods and drinks. They produce alcohol, lactic acid, and acetic acid that act as preservatives so that foods retain nutrients.

Our ancestors used fermentation, and thus bacteria, to preserve excess bounty for the long winter months. Fermented foods were also very useful during long voyages at sea because they retained nutrition for a long time.

2. Bacteria Make Foods Digestible

I talk a lot about eating foods that are easy to digest, and fermented foods are certainly more digestible.

Essentially, bacteria are acting as little helpers that work to pre-digest foods for us. This is incredible, since we often expend a lot of energy on digestion. So eating more fermented foods will lead to increased energy.

3. Fermentation Creates New Nutrients

How could it be possible that a little fermentation could increase the amount of nutrients in food? Well the interesting phenomenon of microbial cultures proliferating actually creates B vitamins and even antioxidants.

4. Toxic Foods Become Edible

Another surprising benefit to bacteria and fungi fermentation is the removal of certain toxic elements.

Grains contain a compound that blocks the absorption of minerals into the body. However, with a little bit of fermentation these grains are now neutralized and edible.

5. Eating Live Bacteria Is Good For Your Stomach

The term “live” in live foods refers to eating foods that have not been destroyed, and in this case the bacteria is still alive.

Eating fermented living foods gives your stomach the intestinal flora that is necessary for digesting foods and absorbing nutrients.

Watch out for pasteurized foods, since these do not contain any live microorganisms.

6. Healthy Bacteria Compete with Harmful Strains

By eating fermented foods, healthy bacteria like Lactobacillus compete with diarrhea-related bacteria such as Salmonella and E. Coli.

That’s like having your own army to fend off competing invaders, instead of leaving your body to fend for itself.

7. Fermented Foods Help Protect Us from Disease

There are tons of ideas on how to prevent disease, but how many of them use probiotic organisms to do the work for you?

The body is not an isolated test tube, it is an ecosystem with many different factors at play. That’s why supplying it with health-supporting bacteria is a sure way to give your immune system a hand.

Here’s to Fermenting!

In the book Wild Fermentation: The Flavor, Nutrition, and Craft of Live-Culture Foods by Sandor Ellix Katz, there are literally 100 recipes on how to leverage healthy bacteria to make yummy fermented foods.

I highly suggest you pick it up to get an even deeper understanding on how simple and delicious fermented foods can be.

What’s your take on fermentation and bacteria?

Let me know in the comments, and share your favorite fermented foods with me!

When I first went raw, I jumped in with both feet and went 100% raw for 30 days. The first few weeks I found myself eating tons of nuts! I know it’s not uncommon for people transitioning to raw food to overeat nuts, so I decided to share my story and advice about nuts.

Why The Nuts?

Why do most of us immediately reach for the raw nuts and seeds when we switch to a raw diet?

1. We want to feel full.

Since nuts are solid, crunchy, and filling, we have a tendency to use them as a replacement for cooked food. For example, when I first went raw, I would still feel “hungry” after eating a generous salad. I’d eat a handful or two of nuts to get that semi-drowsy feeling I was missing.

2. Nuts are crunchy.

Of course another reason why we might overeat nuts at the beginning is that we miss that crunchy yummy sort of salty feeling. Nuts make a natural replacement for chips, popcorn, crackers, and other snacks. Here’s a quick tip if that’s why you’re reaching for the nuts: try crunching on some celery, or make kale chips!

3. It’s an easy snack food.

You don’t need to wash, cut, or blend anything to eat nuts. If you’re in a hurry or feeling tired, you can just open a jar or reach for a container of nuts and enjoy. There’s nothing wrong with this behavior, but if you’re overeating nuts you will want to prepare adequate snack foods in advance.

Remember that being prepared is half the battle when it comes to eating healthy foods.

Nuts: The Good and The Bad

On the one hand, nuts make us feel full because our body is expending energy trying to digest them. Nuts are harder to digest than fresh fruits and vegetables. In reality we probably wouldn’t be eating tons of nuts in nature, unless they were fresh and in season. How many of us live next to a Brazil nut tree? That’s what I thought.

Nuts have tons of great nutritious qualities, and I don’t think we should shun them entirely. The healthy oils found in nuts are full of Omega-3 fatty acids, which are great for the brain, and for keeping your stress levels under control. Alternative sources of omega-3 fatty acids include chia seeds and flax seeds.

Most people have an easier time digesting seeds than they do digesting nuts. Also, the reason why more people are allergic to nuts than seeds is that nuts tend to go rancid if kept on a shelf for too long a time.

The Nutty Conclusion

So what’s the verdict? No, you won’t go insane if you eat too many nuts. But try to limit yourself to one handful per day, since they are hard to digest. If you feel bloated or gassy after eating nuts, cut down.

Also, you should avoid eating nuts with fresh fruits since that will definitely cause some discomforts and gas!

Other than that, go nuts. :D

Photo by NataschaM

Last week I wrote about the benefits and the power of antioxidants in keeping us young, boosting the immune system, and feeling great.

This week I’m going to talk about a particular type of antioxidant that is harder to find… in fact it is only available in two fruits: the king & queen of fruits. Before we get into the powers of this particular antioxidant, let me introduce you to the king and queen of fruits.

Durian is the king of fruits.

You might want to see my video all about durian, so you can get a better idea of the history of this odd fruit.

Durian is a large spiky fruit, that smells strong. How strong? Each time my boyfriend’s mom visits us when we’ve got durian in the house, she asks if we’ve got a gas leak.

Even though it’s the king of fruits, durian is a bit of a controversial fruit because it’s an acquired taste. It’s also an acquired smell, so much that it’s banned in hotels and subways in many parts of Asia where it originates from.

Photo by Becky Quan

Mangosteen is the queen of fruits.

Although it’s small, mangosteen is definitely the queen of fruits because when eaten with durian it can balance out the “hotness” of durians. This is based on Traditional Chinese Medicine concepts of yin and yang or hot and cold foods.

Since most modern day diets tend to be too “hot” with lots of meat products or acid forming foods, mangosteen is a great fruit for balancing your food intake.

Special Antioxidants: Xanthones

So what’s so special about these two fruits for them to be known as the king and queen of all fruits? Well the taste is definitely part of it, but I think there’s something even more special about these two. They both contain the hard to find antioxidant Xanthone.

Most fruits only have about 2-5 antioxidants per serving, whereas a mangosteen or durian has upwards of 43 Xanthone antioxidants.

Now, this may get a little technical so hang in there with me as I explain exactly what’s so special about xanthones available in mangosteen (and durian).

According to scientific literature from PubMed, obesity-associated inflammation happens when white blood cells enter into adipose tissue (fat) which produces an inflammatory antibody reaction, leading to the development of insulin resistance.

The xanthones, alpha- and gamma-mangostin, are major bioactive compounds found in mangosteen that have antiinflammatory and antioxidant properties.

Another study showed that Mangosteen fruit pericarp is a rich source of xanthones, showing remarkable pharmacological activities. From potent antioxidant, anti-inflammatory and anticancer activities.

Since most of the antioxidants we talked about are actually in the outer layer (the pericarp) of the mangosteen (remember, we’re talking about bright colors here) then you might wonder how you can get those Xanthones into your body.

Well I’ve recently chosen to carry a product that is designed with the modern on-the-go lifestyle in mind.

The busier you are, the more stress you take on, the more you accumulate free radicals. That’s why I think it’s essential for people to start getting more antioxidants from the king and queen of fruits.

So unless you’re already consuming fresh durians and mangosteens, I’d love for you to consider getting in touch with me to see if this new plant-source mineral and mangosteen product is right for you.

Find Out if It’s Right For You

Just email me here, or call me at 1-802-323-1841 and I’d love to discuss this new product with you and get your body the Xanthone antioxidants it needs!

Photo by Rachel

I write a lot about green smoothies and the benefits of drinking green smoothies. I’m also a huge advocate of juicing your greens. But one of the important aspects of drinking your greens is the rotation of plants.

Let me explain.

When you consume the exact same variety of green leafy vegetables, your body is always getting the same nutrients. Each variety of plant will give you different nutrients, minerals, and antioxidants.

But it goes even further than that. You see, each plant has a self-defense mechanism to keep animals from completely devastating their favorite plant. For example, if monkeys loved spinach and decided to eat all the spinach around then the plant could not procreate and it would die out.

Nature’s system is so smart because it knows that it’s important to keep greens around (hello! most nutritious food pound for pound!). So green leafy plants actually have a minute amount of alkaloids, which act like a poison if ingested regularly.

That’s where rotating your greens comes in! If you switch between different types of green plans, your body’s immune system is actually getting a boost because it is working on different alkaloids all the time.

So my recommendation, backed up by Victoria Boutenko is to switch between at least 10-12 types of greens. You can have say two or three days on one green like spinach, and then two or three days on kale, then two or three days on gai lan, you get the picture.

This actually ties in well with the Traditional Chinese Medicine system of hot and cold foods. Some people do well on certain types of greens, while others are better off with different types.

I think it’s super important to swap greens regularly! Oh, and the reason we don’t need to focus on swapping fruit as much as greens is that fruit were designed to be eaten and spread by animals. Greens would rather grow, and have their seeds blow in the wind or be pollinated by insects.

Greens are the most powerful healing foods out there, so it’s great to make them a staple part of your diet!

List of Greens to Get You Started

Your best bet is to go to a farmer’s market and look a the vast array of colorful greens. Pick some up, smell it, ask the farmer what it tastes like, and give it a try! If you’ve got the space and inclination, I’d highly recommend you start a garden. Plant a few of these vegetables and see which ones you like!

• Spinach
• Swiss Chard
• Kale
• Bok Choy
• Gai Lan
• Dandelion Greens
• Mustard Greens
• Carrot Tops
• Yu Choy
• Sunflower sprouts (sprouts in general)
• Romaine lettuce
• Buttercrunch lettuce
• Boston lettuce
• Arugula (Rocket)
• Collard greens
• Cabbage
• Watercress
• Purslane
• Sorrel
• Tatsoi
• Turnip Greens
• Radish Greens
• Beet Greens
• Basil leaves
• Coriander / Cilantro
• Parsley
• Mint leaves

What other greens do you enjoy?

There are literally hundreds of different green edible plants out there. Which ones are your favorites and what have you tried that you didn’t quite like?

Summer is here, and that means hot days and refreshing watermelon slices.

Photo by Luke Robinson

Unfortunately, one of the reasons people don’t enjoy fruit as much as they could is they haven’t learned how to pick the freshest, ripest fruit.

With most fruit you can smell it, touch it and check for firmness… but with watermelon there’s another trick – tapping it like a drum. Basically what you’re doing is checking to see the water content of the melon: the higher the better.

So if the sound you get from lightly tapping a watermelon is deep, then you know it’s a good one. If you don’t hear much then move on to the next one.

Another good thing to check is how heavy the watermelon is. A heavier melon will have more water and that’s what you’re looking for!

My Watermelon Gum Story

A few months after I went raw, I remember having a conversation with a colleague about watermelon.

His stance was that watermelon had “no substance” and that you could just as easily chew a piece of watermelon gum and drink a glass of water, and get the same benefits as eating watermelon.

I didn’t say anything because it wasn’t the time or place, but my mind was screaming at the fallacy of this proposition.

There’s no way that chewing gum and drinking a glass of water has the same affect as eating watermelon.

I just know that intuitively, but let’s look at some hard data.

Photo by Sydney Marie

Watermelon has fiber and tons of nutrients that we just don’t appreciate at first glance.

Watermelon Nutritional Information

Here are just a few of the things that watermelon has going for it…

• Good source of Vitamins C and A
• Helps reduce inflammation
• High in antioxidants that fight free radicals
• Contains more lycopene than most fruits and veggies, including tomatoes
• Provides the body with potassium and magnesium
• Very cleansing, alkalinizing, and mineralizing food

Many fruits have a lot of nutrition in the skin or rind, and it’s no different for watermelon… so don’t feel weird eating the white stuff, or juicing the rinds in your morning juice.

Enjoy the seasonal fruit!

Here’s to fresh, tasty, and juicy watermelon! Enjoy the seasonal fruit when it’s here, yum yum!