A TV advert convinced me to try juicing, and for the next six months I started my day with freshly made juice.

So, what are the ins and outs of smoothies and juices?

Ingredients

A green smoothie is a blend of fruits and green leaves whizzed up in a blender.

My typical green smoothie includes: mango/pineapple/apple + banana/avocado + spinach/kale/lettuce + lemon slice + celery stick. Yum!

Because of the fibre content a smoothie is quite satisfying – more like a meal.

A green juice is extracted from a mix of fruits and green leaves, with the addition of vegetables.

My typical green juice includes: cucumber + carrots/courgette + celery + mango/pineapple/apple + spinach/kale/lettuce. Yum!

For me, the main advantage of juice is the sheer vitality and lightness I feel after drinking one!  I’ve also noticed that a juice including bitter greens such as kale or dandelion leaves, doesn’t taste as bitter as the equivalent smoothie.

Equipment

To make a smoothie you need a powerful blender, though a stick blender is adequate for occasional use, eg when travelling.

There’s a wide range of electric juicers on the market; do make sure you get one that will juice greens if you want to include them in your juices. The more expensive juicers are more efficient in extracting juice. Modestly priced hand juicers are also available, however it’s worth investing in an electric one if you plan to make juices often, as they speed up the process dramatically.

If space is an issue, a blender will make a smaller footprint on your work surface than a juicer (unless you get one of the new ‘vertical’ juicers). We had to put our food processor away to make room for the juicer!

A mid range juicer is likely to be at least twice the price of a mid range blender, so if already have a blender, it may make sense to start with smoothies, as we did.

Time

Smoothies win hands-down for preparation time. It only takes a couple of minutes to load and run the blender, pour the smoothie into a glass, and rinse the blender. A smoothie is always my choice on mornings when I’m in a hurry.

It takes me about 7 minutes to cut up the fruit and veg, keep loading the juicer, and then dismantle and wash the parts. On the other hand, when I do have time, the whole juicing process is now so automatic, it’s become a morning meditation!

Nutrition

With a smoothie, your body receives the whole of the fruit and greens. When the cell walls of greens are broken down by the blender, amino acids – which are the building blocks of protein that are needed for growth and repair – are released.

With a juice you get a more nutrient-dense drink, with a higher concentration of vitamins and minerals, which is helpful for cleansing and healing.

Blood sugar

The ‘whole’ food in a smoothie is more balanced since there is less concentration of the natural fruit sugars that you get with juicing. Sugar is released over a longer period, and blood sugar remains more stable.

However, depending what  you will be doing next, the quick energy boost from the more concentrated sugars in fresh juice may be what you’re looking for!

Digestion

A big advantage of juices is the ease with which the body can assimilate the liquid and all the vitamins and minerals it contains. This can be helpful when you’re ill, convalescing of have a compromised digestion which would struggle with the fibre in a smoothie.

On the other hand, fibre has a regulating and cleansing effect on the digestive tract which many people find beneficial.

Cost

If you use the same ingredients to make a juice and a smoothie, you’ll get around twice the quantity of smoothie, because the smoothie is bulked up by the fibre that is discarded from juice. This makes juicing appear more expensive.

On the other hand, since juices use more vegetables such as carrots, beet and celery, which are generally cheaper to buy than fruit, the difference in cost my not be as much as it seems when you look at the pulp coming out of the juicer!

My conclusion

Having spent extensive periods of smoothie only, followed by juice only, I now oscillate between the two as the mood, hunger level, available ingredients and my time takes me. If my digestion were upset, or I were recovering from illness I would take juices for a while. Best of all, check each day what your body would like!

The Delicious Nugget: Green smoothies and juices are both good for you – smoothies give all-round nutrition includthe building blocks of proteis from greens, while juices yield a higher concentration of micro-nutrients and fruit sugar and  are more easily assimilated and good for cleansing the body. If you have the equipment for both, check ‘Which does your body want today?’

Read on to find out how I now enjoy just one piece of chocolate!

I’ve had a few goes at ‘conscious’ or ‘mindful’ eating, which haven’t been too successful. Here’s the simple approach that works for me.

It can be fun to share this experience with friends. Taking your time is of the essence here, so make sure you have a few minutes of unhurried time when you won’t be distracted.

If you’re not a chocolate fan, try this with another food that you would like to eat less of – maybe a savoury, salty food.

1.      Savour with all your senses

Touch the chocolate, feel it, look at it, smell it – take your time to really connect to it with all your senses.

For me, taking the time to really absorb the smell of the chocolate is satisfying. It doesn’t stimulate my appetite in the same way as a cursory sniff, so sometimes this is enough and I no longer want to eat it!

What do you notice?

2.      Roll it around in your mouth

Now put the chocolate in your mouth, and without biting, roll it around with your tongue. Again, take your time with this.

For me, I notice the smoothness and the start of a creamy taste.

What do you notice?

3.      Chew and swallow

Now bite the chocolate, and chew it slowly until you’re ready to swallow.

For me, if it’s a good quality chocolate I enjoy the melting creaminess and flavour. With cheap chocolate I notice an artificial taste and too much sugar that I don’t like – no more of that, thank you!

What do you notice?

4.      Check if you want more

Finally, check to see whether you want more.

For me, I now find I’m satisfied with one chocolate, or one piece of a chocolate bar  - there’s simply no urge to eat more!

What does your check tell you?

You may find, like me, that one chocolate was enough. If you want more, eat the next chocolate in the same conscious way, and then check again. You’ll probably find you are satisfied well short of your usual ‘appetite’.

If you still want to eat the whole box, it’s probably time to see if you’re eating to dull uncomfortable emotions rather than satisfy your body’s needs. Watch out for another article on that!

The Delicious Nugget: Consciously eating chocolate, by slowly savouring it with all your senses, makes it more satisfying so you won’t want to eat so much of it. You may not want to eat it at all!

As the festive season approaches you’ll probably be bombarded with more food than at any other time of the year.

This year I’ve become much more aware of my eating; so here’s the most powerful tip I use to eat well and feel good afterwards!

If you think you’re inevitably going to overeat and you project all the associated feelings such as feeling over-full, a temporary high and then a lethargic slump and maybe some guilt, that’s what will most likely materialise for you. It’s the Law of Attraction at work – what you think about and feel manifests as your reality.

The trick here is to change your thinking and feelings in advance! You replace the old thinking and feelings with the positive thoughts and feelings you will have as you eat what your body needs and you feel great afterwards. For me this is a feeling of relief that I’ve eaten what my body needs, and the alertness and aliveness that comes from eating well.

To take this beyond positive thinking – which is hard work and often fizzles out, it’s best to experience the feeling of good eating when you’re in your sub-conscious mind. This enables you to access the extraordinary power of your subconscious that controls most of your activities. For example, once you learned to walk your sub-conscious mind took over, so you no longer need to consciously think how to walk.

How good would it be to reprogramme your sub-conscious mind so you automatically eat well too?

There are many ways to access your sub-conscious mind – where your brain is in the theta state – eg meditation, The One Command, Sedona Releasing, EFT etc. My Delicious Moment of Now, or simply asking yourself Am I Still Breathing? will help you quickly access your sub-conscious.

Taking a little time each day to feel the good feelings of eating well will automatically reprogram your sub-conscious to guide you to appropriate action so you actually eat well in practice. You don’t need to be concerned with how this works – simply raise your vibration to the good feelings of eating well while in your sub-conscious mind, and you will attract the reality of eating well.

Of course like learning to ride a bike you need a little discipline at first, until it becomes automatic and your sub-conscious takes over!

Any time you catch yourself feeling doubts or going back to your old feelings, take a minute or so to get into that meditative state, and feel the good feelings of eating well again. It won’t be long until your sub-conscious is running them for you, and as you experience the bliss of good eating, so you expect to eat well, and you’ve set up a virtuous circle!

Once your subconscious is reprogrammed the actions you need to take to eat well will come easily to you. You’ll find it easy to:

• wait until you are hungry before you eat – perhaps by eating less between meals.
• eat what your body needs – this may vary from day to day, and you may find some surprises. What Does Your Body Really Want To Eat?
• recognise when you’ve eaten enough – rediscover your signal for ‘enough’!

Happy eating!

The Delicious Nugget: Just as you trained your sub-conscious to automate your walking, with a little effort you can train it to guide you to easily eat well.

Have you ever struggled with the discipline of rinsing your sprouts twice a day?

Sprouted seeds, pulses, grains and nuts are highly nutritious: they are living foods with all their vital force present, and as embryonic plants they are loaded with the enzymes our bodies need to carry out a myriad of processes. They also help alkalise our bodies, and are rich in minerals.

Cooked and processed foods are enzyme-poor, so many of us end up short of enzymes, and our bodies may even draw enzymes from other organs to help us digest the food we eat.

What better than to eat live, nutritious foods in the form of sprouts? As well as being nutritious, they are very tasty – with flavours ranging from the peppery radish to the nutty chick pea. I’ve also been surprised how filling they are.How to sprout the easy way

1. Buy yourself an ‘Easy Sprout Sprouter’ at a very reasonable price from Amazon UK, or USA.
2. Select something to sprout – my favourite is a mix of different types of lentil – green, puy and brown. [Sprouts that get mucilaginous, and therefore do need to be rinsed frequently are not suitable for this method.]
3. Fill the inner sprouter beaker to about one third full with eg lentils, and place inside the outer beaker.
4. Add water to almost fill the sprouter (I use filtered water, as the sprouts will absorb the water). Put the vented lid on, and leave to soak overnight.
5. Empty the excess water, take out the inner beaker with the sprouts and rinse very thoroughly under the tap. Drain the excess water by shaking the beaker containing the lentils..
6. Replace the vented lid, and leave the sprouts to grow until the shoots are about the same length as the lentils. This takes 2-4 days depending on the temperature. I keep my sprouter on a sunny window ledge.
7. Once the sprouts are ready, store in an airtight container in the fridge. You can use the sprouter itself with its sold lid, or another container.

Your sprouts will easily keep for a week in the fridge.

Easy, eh?

Eating your sprouts!

Now for the good part! Because your sprouts are still alive, they have not lost any of the nutrients as happens with so many transported fresh foods.

Sprouts are good in salads, sprinkled on soups, as an addition to wraps, or even as part of your juice. You can also use them as the base for making pates and dips, like hummus.

It’s good to eat a variety of different types of sprout, to benefit from a range of nutrition.

The Delicious Nugget: Sprouts are highly nutritious, live foods, that you can easily grow with a minimum of effort.

Your body is unique, so why not tune into her specific needs, rather than follow the rules someone else has developed for their very different body?

In the self-development arena there’s sometimes a notion that we need to get beyond the shackles of the body into the ‘higher’ world of the spirit. On the contrary, our bodies are highly aware – perhaps more than we are, and you can easily tune into your body’s awareness.

The Leaning Test

There are many ways to check what your body wants to eat, such muscle testing and dowsing with a pendulum, both of which take a bit of practice.

Here’s the easiest way to check if your body wants to eat a particular food. from Access Consciousness.

1. Stand with your feet together, heels and ankles touching.
2. Have an open mind about what your body wants!
3. Hold the food or drink you’re considering in front of your solar plexus (ie a little higher than your navel).
4. Check which way your body leans:
   • towards the food means your body wants the food
   • away from the food means your body doesn’t want the food.

After a few practices, you’ll find this a quick and easy way to check what your body wants to eat.

If you’re unable to hold the food, as in a shop or restaurant, simply look at the food, or the item on the menu, and your body will respond to its vibration.

Now to explode another eating myth – what your body wants to eat today, it may not want to eat tomorrow! Your body has no hard and fast rules like never eating chocolate; one day it may need chocolate, another it may not!

Prepare to be surprised at what your body wants to eat and drink, and how this changes from day to day!

As always, please check with your medical practitioner if you are concerned about the food your body can tolerate.

The Delicious Nugget: Your body knows best what it wants to eat at any given time, use the leaning technique to tune into your body’s awareness of what it needs at any given time.

As a change from a slice of lemon in your water, try a slice of cucumber.

One slice in a glass of water, or four slices in a jug. To comment click:

Ginger has a multitude of healing properties

Cut thin slices of fresh ginger root. Add boiling water and a slice of lemon. Allow to infuse until it reaches the strength you like. Sip and savour!

I first tasted this tea with an Italian fig biscuit in the tranquility of the Botanic Gardens in Cambridge! To comment, click

They are less likely to be contaminated with pesticides. And, freshly picked, you get the full benefit of all their nutrition. Here are the wild plums I picked from the woods near our house. I’ll soon be on the lookout for blackberries, elderberries and rose hips.

What wild fruits could you enjoy?

I was wary of adding beet stalks and leaves to my smoothies, thinking they would make it bitter. Not so, it came out a beautiful pink colour and delicious!

Blend: 1 peeled orange, 1 inch slice fresh pineapple, 1 banana, 1 apple, handful of beet tops (stalks and leaves). Add some water if you prefer a drinkable smoothie. Vary the ingredients to match what you have available.

Enjoy! 

First, develop a vision of a healthy you. As your body becomes more alkaline you’re very likely to experience improvements in your health, which vary from person to person, and commonly include: weight release, clearer skin, easier joints, feeling lighter and brighter, mental clarity and easing of various health symptoms. How do you see yourself, once your body is more healthy?

Of the various possible approaches to alkalise your body, the one you’re likely to have most control over is the food you eat. The aim is to eat less of the acid-forming foods such as meat, dairy and wheat, and more of the alkalising foods such as fruit and vegetables.

As a general guide, to maintain good health, your aim is to move towards making sure over half the food you eat is alkalising – say 60%. This should result in your body becoming slightly alkaline with a pH slightly above the neutral value of 7. My article How Acid Is Your Body? explains how to measure your pH.

To restore your health you may need to temporarily increase your consumption of alkalising foods to around 80%.

So, what to eat?

Generally, eat less:

• Dairy: milk, cheese
• Eggs
• Meat
• Poultry
• Wheat: bread, cakes, pasta
• Sugar and sweeteners
• Fizzy drinks

This is quite a challenge to the average western diet with its focus on dairy, meat and wheat. A meal of burger, chips (fries), tomato sauce, side salad, ice cream and coke/coffee/milk shake would be very acid-forming!

Generally, eat more:

• Vegetables
• Fruit
• Green leafy vegetables such as spinach, lettuce, kale
• Peas, beans, lentils
• Seeds and nuts.

The difference between ‘alkaline’ and ‘alkalising’

Generally speaking, foods which are alkaline have an alkalising effect on the body when eaten. Similarly, most acid foods have an acidifying effect on the body. However, there are exceptions, notably lemon juice and cider vinegar, which while being acid have an alkalising effect on the body. So, the most helpful charts are those which give the alkalising/acidifying values of a food rather than its actual pH.

To find out more about individual foods

You can Google up various food charts, including charts giving the pH value of individual foods, and charts giving lists of foods that are high/moderately/low alkalising, and high/moderate/low acidifying. There’s a helpful set of charts here.

7 tips to alkalise your body

1. Develop your vision for a healthy alkaline body

Mine is ‘Fully alive in body, mind and spirit’; bringing this to mind usually neutralises the temptation of acidifying foods such as crisps and biscuits which my family eat. Some people like to develop an image of their vision, as in a vision board.

2. Have a green smoothie for breakfast

Green smoothies are delicious and highly alkalising, See my Green Smoothie Challenge for more information. You may be surprised to find out they contain protein!

3. Introduce salad ingredients to lunch and dinner.

Our family meals always include a salad, which forms the main part of my meal, while the rest of the family eat it as a side dish. This has proved to be a win-win, and I’m having to make increasingly larger salads! For lunch you might choose a salad, rather than a beef sandwich.

4. Familiarise yourself with the alkalising foods, and introduce them to your eating.

You may want to print off one of the charts from this link. For example, highly alkalising foods include: water melon, lemon and seaweeds, while moderately alkalising foods include bananas and potatoes. Experiment to find alkalising foods you really like, then you’ll want to eat more of them!

5. Replace highly acidifying foods with less acidifying ones.

Again the charts will help you. Examples of highly acidifying foods are artificial sweeteners, fizzy drinks, beef and white pasta, which you might replace respectively with: honey, fruit juice, nuts and wholegrain pasta.

6. Aim to have some overall alkalising meals

You could aim to have a couple of overall alkalising lunches a week, later moving on to one a day. Again, experiment to find meals you really like.

7. Get support

Find a friend who is interested in moving to a more healthy, alkaline body, so you have a source of support and inspiration, and someone to hold you accountable for the choices you make.

Please consult your healthcare practitioner before making any substantial changes to your diet.

The Delicious Nugget: An effective way to achieve a healthy alkaline body is to eat more alkalising foods, and less acidifying foods.