Why Juice?

Fridays are my day off so I try to get everything in on that day. Laundry, gym, sleeping in, ...
So today after my boot camp and yoga classes at the gym I headed over to Lins Marketplace to buy some produce for our February juice cleanse.  I got a case of gala apples for $39.00! That's .99c/lb!

I found some other great deals too and always go for what's on sale.  I will just have to grow my own herbs since I refuse to spend a couple dollars on 3 sprigs. Maybe that's a bit of an exaggeration but you get the idea.
I always get my carrots there too. I have yet to find a better deal than 25lbs for $14.99! Someone always asks me "what are you going to do with that many carrots?" When I reply with "I'm going to juice them" most people respond with words of encouragement, but I occasionally get the deer in the headlights look.

So, why juice? 
Fresh juice gives our bodies the maximum benefits from our fruits and vegetables. This way we get all the essential fatty acids, carbohydrates, minerals, proteins, and vitamins, etc. from our produce. These nutrients are locked in the fiber of our produce which is expelled from the body. When we juice our produce, the nutrients are released, entering our bloodstream very quickly, and we are able to drink their highly concentrated nutrients. 
Plus we get in the recommended amount of our daily servings of our fruits and veggies! Bonus! 

As with any cleanse at first you may feel tired, or have less energy. Everyone's bodies are different. Whatever you experience remember this is normal! This is your body working hard to get rid of all the toxins! You are on your way to a stronger body and mind free of disease! Soon you will feel so much more energized!

Start with one fresh juice a day and I guarantee you will feel the benefits! 

Juicing is great for all ages, however, we do not recommend anyone under the age of 16 going on a juice fast. Seek medical attention if you experience severe symptoms or are on any medications. Never go off medications cold turkey! For additional information watch the documentary Fat, Sick and Nearly Dead. 

How to heal and prevent haital Hernia and Acid Reflux

As you guys might know already I have started to eat healthy and change my diet because I have a Hiatal hernia, It is caused from severe acid reflux or vomiting. During my 3 pregnancies I was always sick, throwing up and had constant severe heartburn. and medications wouldn't help. Because I had these problems it created a severe hernia. I would get crazy chest pains. that hurt so bad I couldn't move or breathe. Anyways like in the picture the hernia is that bulge in the esophagus. and It hurts!!! 

I have decided to change my diet and heal this thing with food and a juice cleanse. which is starting in a week! aahh! I have mixed feelings about the cleanse:)  

I decided to give you guys some pointers on healing and helping with this pain.  

First off I want to start with foods that heal and help with acid reflux. To cure a hiatal hernia you need to get rid of the acid reflux.

Antioxidant-rich fruits, such as blueberries, black berries and cherries may ease your symptoms. Foods that contain vitamin B-6 will help as well. such as almonds, spinach, kale, and beans.

some home remedies you can do at home if  your having heartburn:
Ginger root- in any form has been known to help ease heartburn


Baking Soda- Yes I know. It sounds GROSS! But it actually works. I have done this so many times and it helps. You just mix a tsp of baking soda with 8 oz of water and drink it as fast as you can. It is known as an acid neutralizer.

Apple cider vinegar- This one is gross too. but its soooo good for you. It has so many health benefits. It has to be the apple cider vinegar not distilled. and organic. You can take about 1 tbls in water or plain and it is an acid neutralizer as well.

Now I feel like a lot of these foods are a no brainer. But some of them I was surprised. Like chocolate! who wants to give up chocolate! I sure don't. And coffee??! anyways.... To get rid of acid reflux and heal the hernia. You have to avoid certain foods such as, Chocolate, Dairy, fried foods, coffee, citrus(with the exception of lemons, those are pH balancing which help neutralize your system), butter and oil, spicy food. garlic and onions, carbonated beverages. Ya there's not much left except fruits and veggies! :) which are the best thing for our bodies! Fruits and veggies heal our bodies and are the best way to get all the nutrients and vitamins we need! Its is a hard adjustment to get into, eating mainly fruits and veggies. Especially when your craving those french fries! But it is so worth it to heal your body the natural way! your body will thank you! Mine is already starting too! my acid reflux has been going down significantly. The pain the hernia causes is slowly fading. and I'm loosing weight! which we would all love right!

I hope that helps!  Let me know if you have any thing you would like to add or if you have any questions on the matter!

                                                                 ---- Kristel

Remove Gallbladder Stones Easily and Naturally

Gallbladder issues run rampant in our family. We have Aunts, Uncles, and Cousins who have all struggled. Our Dad suffered much of his life and us sisters were no exception when we grew into adulthood.

We were told by doctors that there is nothing you can do except get your gallbladder removed if it gets bad enough. They advised us all to avoid greasy and fried foods as much as possible and hope that we didn't fall victim to a gallbladder infection.

Then my dear departed Mother began her training at The School of Natural Medicine and everything changed. We became vegetarian, removed all dairy products from our home (more on that in a future post), and my Mom began to learn how to not only deal with debilitating symptoms of disease with plants and diet, but literally CURE these chronic illnesses we had all been suffering!

One of the things she learned was this gallbladder cleanse. And we all swear by it! So much so that countless friends and family members have also been cured of their gallbladder attacks using this simple and easy method.

There are many ways to cleanse yourself of gallbladder stones- and even some great ways to deal with the symptoms- (we've got more posts coming about that soon!) but until then- I highly recommend you start by trying this simple cleanse first.

WHAT YOU NEED:        
Extra Virgin Olive Oil
1 Lemon 
Shot glass - or small cup
(both organic if possible)




SO HOW DO I DO IT?
Simply squeeze the juice of one lemon into a 1/4 cup of olive oil, stir like crazy because it separates fast and chug immediately before bed. Eat nothing after. Let that be the last thing you do before your head hits your pillows.


WHAT HAPPENS NEXT?
 In the morning you should pass stones in your stool and feel much better.

HOW CAN I TELL I PASSED STONES?
Gallbladder stones float and are a rainbow colored. If you see anything floating in your toilet that isn't the color of your stool, you've passed stones!

WHAT IF I DON'T PASS ANY STONES?
That's ok! Try again the next night. The first time I did it I didn't pass any stones. I was told by my physician during my last pregnancy that they discovered so many gallstones in my gallbladder during my ultrasound that they were labeling me high risk! So I tried again the second night and the next morning I passed stones! This same thing happened to my baby sister. She did it 3 nights in a row- only passing stones the 2nd and 3rd days- some as big as dimes!

WHAT DO I DO AFTER I PASS MY STONES?
Avoid greasy fattening foods!! And get on a plant based or heavy plant based diet so your gallbladder can begin rebuilding itself. If you continue to eat the way you were before, gallstones will build up again and you'll have to do another cleanse. I can't stress enough the importance of eliminating ALL greasy and fried fattening foods and eating a diet high in whole foods and produce!

So this begs the question- Have any of you tried this (or other) gallbladder cleanses?? If so, what did you do and how did it go?

diy raw cough drops and cooked cough drops recipe

My youngest is sick with a cough and since she is only 18m old. she wont take much. She is the pickiest eater and wont take any medicine unless its in a bottle disguised as juice. So I had to think outside the box...candy!! yes she will always eat candy. So I made two different kinds of "candy" for her. The one on the right is raw! no cooking! and the other is made up of just honey and cinnamon. cooked. 

These are so simple to make, I made two for variety for her. Since I cant give her to many of the coconut oil ones because she will get diarrhea. So I made the other ones as well, and she will eat them or I pop then in a sippy or bottle for her. 

Its a super easy way for her to get her medicine and soothe her cough.
These are great for adults too!

Recipe for the RAW! honey coconut oil--

- 1/4 cup raw honey
- 1/4 cup organic coconut oil
- squeezed lemon
- any desired herbs or medicine you prefer.
 - I used a tincture of Uva Ursi (kills bad bacteria) and another tincture from herbs 4kids called echinasea and astrologus (immune boosting herbs)
  **I put about 2 dropper full of each tincture

blend together with a hand blender until whipped get a small spoonful of cough drop and place them on parchment paper or in an ice cube tray and plop them in the freezer for 20 min.


Recipe for the cooked honey cough drops--

- 1 cup of honey
- squeezed lemon
- dash of cinnamon
- any desired herbs or medicine.
 I used a tincture of Uva Ursi (kills bad bacteria) and another tincture from herbs 4kids called echinasea and astrologus (immune boosting herbs)
-tbls of coconut oil

place all ingredients in a pot and bring to a boil. then reduce heat to a simmer for about 3 min.

get a spoon full of cough drops and place on parchment paper. repeat till mixture is gone. Place in freezer for 10 min.
I keep mine in the freezer or else it will turn back to a honey consistency. Since I don't want it to be like a hard candy for my 18 m old. it just melt in her mouth pretty quickly

Hope you guys enjoy it!
                                           -Kristel

Zucchini Pasta

* I have just started on my journey to health and healing, and I am taking it slow! I dont know about you guys but if I just jump into eating crazy healthy, then I cave and then I think, "well I've already had one piece of cake, might as well have one.. NO! two more. then by the next day im like.... well I suck, I'll try doing it another time. So I am starting off with eating one healthy meal a day, and todays was zucchini pasta with creamy avocado dressing. Knowing my family would never eat the avocado dressing I made them the traditional speghetti sauce, with chicken on the top.

I really liked the avocado dressing but it does taste healthy lol.. I cant have tomato sauce. But my hubby and kids really liked it. it was made from scratch!

ok enough blabering here is the recipe:
**feeds a family of 4

4 Zucchini's (I used the veggit machine to make them into noodles) cook on skillet for a few minutes with a dash of olive oil.
Avocado dressing:
                             1 avocado
                             1 tsp of crushed garlic
                              1/3 cup of almond milk ( add enough to make it creamy )
                              pinch of salt, or to desired taste
                              squeezed lemon
                             chopped up fresh oregeno (about 1 tbls)
                             chopped up fresh parsely (about 1 tbls)
                             pinch of onion pwd and garlic pwd
add all ingredients into a food processor or blender. and blend until creamy. and add to zucchini pasta and enjoy! it might be good with some sprinkled parmesean cheese on it. but im trying to avoid dairy

Tomoto sauce
                      2 Tomatoes
                      Italian seasoning packet
                      dash of water
                      dash of salt
*optional- grilled chicken.we added some grilled chicken to the top of ours just cuz the hubs wanted some meat on it.

I hope you guys enjoy! it was a delicious meal and my kids loved the zucchini spegehetti!
its a good start to my juice cleanse that stacie is making me do in february! I have to start eating healthy now so its not much of shock to my body!

                                                                 -Kristel

Centrifugal vs. Masticating Juicers

My husband surprised me with a new Hurom juicer to start my 30 days of juicing, aka"30 before 30 juice cleanse"  Given that I'm starting my juice cleanse around my birthday instead of before my birthday, I'm calling it my  "30 turning 30 juice cleanse". 30 days of strictly juicing goodness to cleanse out my unhealthy 20's :)

 I even talked my sisters into doing it with me!  It's going to be so ah-ma-zing!

So what's so special about this juicer??

Juicers typically fall into 2 categories:

Centrifugal and Masticating

Centrifugal juicers are more commonplace and generally less expensive. They typically have an upright design where food is pushed into a spinning blade on its floor. The teeth shred the food into a pulp, and the centrifugal motion pulls the juice out of the pulp and through the mesh filter, where it is funneled out of the juicer via a spigot. So basically- it shreds the produce to pulp and then through centrifugal motion pulls the juice out. 

Masticating juicers squeeze and press the produce instead of shredding it, allowing for more juice to be dispensed and allowing you to juice things that centrifugal juicers typically can't handle such as leafy greens, wheatgrass, and parsley. Masticating juice lasts longer than centrifugal juice- which begins losing nutrients within after the first 20 minutes . They are also powerful enought to juice nuts! That's nuts! (lame pun intended). Masticating juicers are more expensive- however, given that you get more juice from your produce and have a wider variety of things to juice- they are (in my opinion) the better buy. 

I've always used a centrifugal juicer for my juicing needs. (I used the Jack LaLanne Juicer)
Until now.
My new Hurom Juicer is so powerful I can finally squeeze wheatgrass juice at home! And it's more quiet than my Jack LaLanne juicer- which sounds like a jet plane taking off.

So when my family saw this new quiet juicer (besides the "bones crushing" sound my boys said it makes) everyone had to test it out with me. It turned our family game of UNO into a family night of juicing instead!

So that begs the question- what juicer do you use/recommend? 

Juicing Equivalents

Natural Strep Throat Cure

This food based strep throat cure has been used in our family for over 15 years and we all swear by it! Granted, we don't tend to get strep throat anymore now that we don't drink dairy- but we've had a couple cases pop up in the last decade within our family and this is the recipe we give all our family and friends when they are looking for a natural cure.

I'm not going to lie- it hurts going down (thanks to the Cayenne!). Like, really really burns. BUT you have to ask yourself- would you rather have strep for a week+ (sore throat and all) OR would you rather suffer the temporary burn and kick that nasty strep to the curb in as quick as a day or two?

RECIPE

You will need: 

Garlic
Raw Unfiltered dark honey
Cayenne (any heat unit)

INSTRUCTIONS:
*Simply chop 3 cloves of garlic into tiny bits small enough to fit on a tablespoon and small enough for you to swallow whole.
*Then fill that spoon full of dark raw unfiltered honey.
*Finally, sprinkle cayenne pepper on top. Now plug your nose and swallow that entire spoonful! Repeat every few hours making sure you get in at least 4-6 doses by the end of the day.

The garlic will kill the infection so fast those tiny bad bugs won't know what hit them (Garlic is antibacterial AND antiVIRAL!). The Cayenne forces a ton of white blood cells to the surface essentially forcing your little tiny white blood cell soldiers straight to the source to kick some serious "bad guy" butt! The honey soothes the throat and helps the garlic and cayenne to stick to the back of your throat.

ADAPTATION FOR KIDS:

Obviously this recipe is not for young children- but there's a quick fix for that: Simply omit the cayenne and use garlic oil instead of chopped raw garlic. The garlic oil (about a tincture lid full) combined with the honey will create a sweet syrup your kids can safely and easily swallow.

***Know of any other natural strep throat cures? Sound off in the comments!***

Fed Up Documentary Review

I'm a bit of a documentary freak. Especially when it comes to social causes.

I don't typically watch documentaries on nutrition as I feel like they are redundant (for my personal growth- I like to learn NEW things)

HOWEVER... for whatever reason this documentary spoke to me and I decided to give it a go.

First off- this documentary was incredibly well researched and put together. Katie Couric narrates the entire movie and you can't help but feel her passion and frustration as she guides you through one of the biggest political cover up stories ever told.

But rather than give away the entire premise- (because you should definitely watch it yourself) I'll just give you a quick synapsis as well as my thoughts on what was taught:

Fed Up follows the lives of several young kids with diabetic, prediabetic, and obesity issues. It discusses exactly how the food industry (big chain fast food, grocery stores, and big name food labels) continuously sabotage our Western views on diet and nutrition in the name of politics, money, and power. 

Several leading experts discuss the age old adage of "calories in- calories out- aka diet and exercise.  They agree that not only is this idea misleading but also completely false doctrine. 

Basically, you can count calories all day long and exercise your heart out but it won't necessarily lead to weight loss and it especially doesn't mean you are healthy. They discuss being "Fat on the Inside"- which  means that you appear skinny on the outside but your insides (heart and other organs) are laden with fatty deposits and function on levels comparable to obese patients. 

 But the primary message being sent throughout the entire documentary is the misconceptions about sugar. If nothing else this message should shake you to your core!

In the end all the nutritional and medical experts agree that the only way to true optimum health is a diet rich in fruits, vegetables, nuts, and seeds.

I was thoroughly engaged the entire movie.  My two young daughters age 9 and 10 even got sucked into the movie! The fact that the movie follows young children with real life struggles their age makes it not only kid friendly- but also engaging for the younger audience. 

I even learned something new via the politics of nutrition - which completely appalled me- but not surprisingly  so as I have very little faith in politics to begin with. 

Bottom line: WATCH THIS MOVIE WITH YOUR KIDS! 

Cran Razzle Nice Cream

We've been playing with "Nice"cream (non dairy ice cream) flavors lately and absolutely fell in love with this one:

CRAN RAZZLE NICECREAM

1 C. cranberries

2 frozen bananas

1 C. sliced up peaches

1/4 C. raspberries

1 handful of spinach

1 C. water

*measurements are approximate

Blend and serve. 
Simple post for a simple recipe.

Enjoy!

COLD AND FLU JUICE

I've had a dry unproductive cough for almost a month straight. It started as a cold but then quickly traveled down to my lungs and decided to simply camp out there. I felt like I had a tickle in my lungs/throat that just wouldn't go away!

So I got this recipe from my dear friend who swore by it and decided to make enough for me to drink for a couple days.

By the next day I was coughing up stuff (gross, but yay!!) and the cough turned productive! (Coughing is one of the many ways your body tries to rid itself of impurities, viruses, and excess mucous. So a productive cough, although uncomfortable, should not be suppressed but rather encouraged!)  By day 3 I was over it. I didn't take any supplements, didn't do a cleanse, didn't change or omit anything from my diet... all I did was drink a quart or two of this juice for 3 days. Incredible to say the least.

It's got a semi strong aftertaste- but is still very sweet at delicious! I didn't have to plug my nose or chug it down with a chaser which was a bonus. Just simply sipped on it all day:)

RECIPE:
1 pineapple
2 lbs carrots
4 apples
3 cloves garlic
1- 2" inches of ginger (eyeball it)

Juice in your preferred blender. (I use the Jack LaLanne Blender)


THE SCIENCE BEHIND IT (from what I gather- I'm no doctor)

*Pineapple & Carrots are high in Vitamin C and help alkalize your body.
*Apples are cleansing and also help with your PH levels
*Garlic is antiviral/antibacterial. 3 cloves (not bulbs!) just cloves, of garlic is = to one dose of penicillin without the nasty side effects! 
*Ginger is an expectorant and great for the respiratory tract. It's also great for the tummy and aids in digestion.

If you know of any other cough/cold juicing recipes let us know in the comments!

- Steph