Green-up your plate or cup?!

There are many reasons why we need to eat lots and lots of greens.

Let me give you 5 reasons to eat more greens daily:

• excellent source of natural water–great way to keep hydrated and cool, especially during the hot summer days
• best source of fiber, to help you stay regular (I mean to move your bowels), to act as prebiotic (food for the microbes that are happily leaving inside your gut), to make you feel full and satisfied (high volume)
• rich source of  magnesium. Chlorophyll the pigment that gives the green color to vegetables has magnesium in it’s composition very much like hemoglobin has iron, so all those wonderful dark green vegetables are a good source of magnesium. Magnesium it’s a very important mineral, that is involved in many functions in the body from nerve conduction to muscle contraction and carbohydrate digestion, just to mention a few.
• good source of carotenoides (vitamin A precursors). Those are the plant pigments that give the yellow/orange/red color to vegetables, such as carrots, red bell peppers and winter squashes. But guess what?? Kale, spinach and other dark green leafy vegetables contain a substantial amount of carotenoids but the color has been masked by chlorophyll, so you can’t see the red/orange, all you see is the green.
• wonderful source of antioxidants and phytonutrients. Phytonutrients are natural chemicals which help protect plants from germs, fungi, bugs, and other threats. Think of phytonutrients as the pigments that give plants their color (dark green, yellow, orange, red, and purple). We already talked about carotenoids and chlorophyll. Those are examples of phytonutrients. Antioxidants on the other hand are molecules that inhibit the oxidation of other molecules. Antioxidants terminate chain reactions in the oxidation process by removing free radical intermediates, hence inhibit other oxidation reactions. Some example of antioxidants found in greens are vitamin C (broccoli, kale, bell peppers), vitamin E (broccoli, chard, mustard and turnip greens) and beta-carotenes (broccoli, green peppers, kale, turnip and collard greens, spinach)
• this is a bonus reason: greens are CARBOHYDRATES that do not elicit an insulin response, hence no fat storage and no inflammation is promoted in your body when you eat those.

This brings me to today’s twitable:

“Greens are anti-inflammatory and slimming foods”

That’s fantastic, don’t you think?

Now that you know at least 5 reasons why greens are good for you, how do you make them part of your daily food intake? One easy way to add more greens into your diet is to make a “green drink” for breakfast or as a snack later in the day. A green BLAST, that’s how I like to call them.

Here is the secret to making a “delish” green blast:

• Take 2-3 handfuls of spinach, kale, or collard greens, parsley, broccoli etc. or a combination of—whatever you have available, or what you enjoy the most.
• Add ½-1 fruit– e.g. pear, apple,peach, apricot or 1 cup berries, or any fruit you have, it is best to select fruits in season
• Add 1 oz. seeds (hemp, sunflower, pumpkin, sesame) and 1 oz. nuts (walnuts, pine nuts, macadamia, cashew, pecan)
• Add water (spring, filtered or coconut water) to reach desired consistency about 1-2 cups
• You can add ice for a cool drink or even better, use frozen fruits

Click here to download one of my favorite green blast recipe: Arugula Pineapple

Watch this video recipe of a kale-berry-banana-blast. (I did this video back in May 2014, HaHa)

That’s it. It is that easy. Enjoy it, and let me know how it works for you.

Love and greens,

Mihaela xxoo

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