Juice fasting: Day 4

Felt much better today!! My "hangover" yesterday was definitely from the caffeine. I'm glad because that means I can keep on trucking! Breakdown:

Breakfast

Quart of warm water with 2 teaspoons of salt to cleanse.

Also juiced apple, lemon, and ginger. 

Added almond meal to the pulp and made cookies! Dehydrated strawberries too, mmmm

Lunch

Hot water with lemon.

Juiced kiwi, strawberries, orange, apple (DELICIOUS!)

Also made fruit splats / leather

     

Dinner

Tried to juice red cabbage but no juice was really coming out. So I am making sauerkraut with it instead which is just fine! I made some last week and devoured it :)

So I just juiced carrots, parsley, apple, lemon, and added some cayenne. Also had coconut water from one young Thai coconut.

Late night

Homemade tea concoction of lemon slices, sliced up a BIG hunk of ginger, added a few goji berries, some turmeric, a couple dried shiitake mushrooms, and a large piece of kombu in a slow cooker. This big batch should last me a couple days.

Exercise

Walked around Piedmont for an hour

Lesson of the day: I came to find that turmeric doesn't really dissolve, even when heated. Sad day. But yay for the process of learning!!

Juice fasting: Day 3

I woke up this morning feeling worse than my worst hangover :( I felt similar to how I've felt when I've almost passed out donating blood and I think it was due to me drinking jasmine tea (caffeinated) last night. Right after I ordered it I thought to myself, "Hmm I probably should have gotten hot water and lemon instead." I definitely felt the consequences today :(

So, I shakily cut up a pineapple, juiced it, drank it, and laid back down for an hour. Felt a little better after that but I was still shaky. I figured I needed some protein since the sugar didn't do as much as I'd hoped so I went to Sevananda for wheatgrass. Had a 2 oz shot and bought a cute little tray of wheatgrass so I could juice some on my own. I was planning on helping coach softball this afternoon, but on my way to Chastain I felt extremely nauseated. I turned around, went home, and immediately vomited :( Luckily, I felt better afterwards. Not wanting to waste the day recovering inside, I went to Piedmont and napped for a couple hours in the sun. That definitely helped. So here's the daily breakdown:

Breakfast

Whole pineapple

Lunch

Wheat grass shot and some coconut water. Didn't stay in me for long :\

Dinner

Juiced kale, tomato, parsley, carrot, apple, lemon, and added a little cayenne pepper

Exercise

Just walked a bit around Piedmont

Anyway, hopefully this post will help spare someone else from making the horrible mistake I made. On the off-chance that I feel miserable again tomorrow, I will discontinue the fast. However, I honestly believe my reaction was only from the tea and I plan on maintaining my 10-day juice fast.

Lesson of the day: NEVER have caffeine while juice fasting!! 

Juice fasting: Day 2

Day 2 breakdown:

Breakfast

Coconut water from one young Thai coconut

Tea

Lunch

Fennel, kale, beets, cayenne pepper. Used the pulp for fennel crackers and kale/beet bread!

Dinner

Gazpacho juice! Tomatoes, cucumbers, garlic, onion, parsley, lime juice, and cayenne. Was in a rush so I forgot to take a picture of all the pretty ingredients. I stuck the pulp in a container with some water, put it in the freezer, and BAM!! Lovely, refreshing soup to last about 2 meals right there :)

Late night

Tea

Exercise

Just walked today, too cold for me to venture out on my bike like last night. Plan on exercising more mañana!

So last night and tonight I went to restaurants and just had tea. I thought tonight would be a lot more difficult than last night because I went to Chinese Buddha (a favorite) and didn't eat anything. Everything smelled so good! But I was proud of my level of self control and how easy it was for me to just sit and sip my tea. I'm amazed at how little my body really needs. I keep thinking to myself, "Man, this isn't even a full glass!" But in fact I end up sipping the juice super slowly without even intentionally trying to make it last. I've found that fresh juice is extremely satisfying, especially when you spend the time and effort to get it!

8 more days of this? Bring it on!! We can do anything we set our minds to :) I hope that my endeavors inspire you to be healthier and just mindful of your every day choices. As my tea profoundly stated this morning: Your choices will change the world!

Juice fasting: Day 1

As I anticipated, my first day really wasn't that bad! However, I was pretty mentally prepared for it so I definitely think that helps. I noticed a few times during the day I had mini headache pangs but nothing serious or lasting. Here's a little break down of the day:

Breakfast

Apples, orange, and strawberries. I mixed the pulp with almond meal and made cookies I can enjoy in a week or so when I stop juice fasting :)

Lunch

Drank the rest of my concoction from last night. I poured it into my container of coconut water so that helped stretch it.

Afternoon Booster

I juiced carrots, tomato, kale, cilantro, parsley, and garlic. Very flavorful, reminded me of a bloody mary, just a way healthier version hah. I almost added onion but decided against it as the garlic provides enough of a breath wrecker :-P I mixed the pulp with flax seeds and chia seeds like last night. The crackers shown below are from last night's pulp. Flax crackers all pretty much look the same so I won't be posting pics of them each time. 

Dinner

Coconut water from one young Thai coconut.

Exercise

I biked a couple miles to my brother's step aerobics class and back. I wasn't sure how I would do and if I would be able to get through the entire class but it went great! Stopped more often than usual for water breaks but I had plenty of energy.

I plan on drinking some tea tonight while doing a bit of work. I'm pleasantly surprised with how much energy I have and how satiated I feel from just juice. It's great because while I'm juice fasting I'm also stocking up on crackers and goodies from all the pulp!! I'm very happy with my first day and am looking forward to continuing this for, dare I attempt, 10 days? I want to at least do 7, but we'll see how things go! I think I can do it :)

My juicer has arrived!

My juicer arrived in the mail today! I'm pretty excited because I've been wanting do a week-long juice fast (where I consume nothing but fresh juice). I got a Healthy Juicer - Manual Hand Powered Wheatgrass Juicer. Only done one round of juicing so far, but I LOVE IT!!


 

I started out with a bunch of celery and was happy to see that it did just fine. So of course, I looked around for other things to juice. I added apple, orange, ginger, garlic, onion, and some pickled beets! It was surprisingly flavorful, but I think it was mostly due to the pickled beets.

        
I had all this pulp left over and being the non-waster that I am, decided to mix it in with some soaked flax seeds and chia seeds to make pulp crackers that are dehydrating at this very moment! I'll take pictures when they're done, but I won't be sharing how they taste yet because I'm juice fasting for a week! No worries, I will return to them soon enough :)

Anyway, thanks for reading my very first blog about rawkin n rollin! I will warn you that the next week will probably be fairly boring like this one because there are only so many things one can juice...

Or are there?!