JUICING FOR HEALTH
from Julie Stafford’s and Ann Wigmore’s books
Why not fresh juices for food, as a medicine and an overall tonic for various ailments, but fresh is always best, and organic is better! The fresher the produce the better, one hour after having been picked, fruit and vegetables start to lose their vital nutrients, a very valid reason to grow your own. Such juice is full of vitamins, minerals and trace elements, natural sugars, proteins and live enzymes and is a vital ingredient in the anti-cancer diet.
Fibre free juice provides nutrition in a concentrated form that can be absorbed rapidly into the bloodstream where it goes to work immediately, protecting against disease and creating an environment for healing to occur.
Juices also restore the vital potassium/sodium balance and break down acids and promote an alkaline environment, which is essential for good health. These fresh juices with their nutrients for healthy cells, allow more oxygen intake to produce the energy required for normal cell function and protection from disease.
Bottled juices are mostly pasteurised by being heated to very high temperatures, killing the living enzymes as well as the sensitive vitamin C, these so called natural juices are often boiled down fruit juice that is reconstituted with water, now deficient in enzymes, can only be as good as the water that is used to reconstitute it.
When making your own real fresh juices, always use the outer leaves of vegetables such as lettuce and cabbage or the tops of celery (never rhubarb leaves as they are poisonous), where the blood-purifying Vitamin C is mostly found.
It is best to leave the skin on the fruit such as apples, apricots, peaches and pears and on vegetables such as carrots, parsnips and beetroot, as the most valuable nutrients are found just below the skin surface.
It is the best to drink fresh fruit or vegetable juices on an empty stomach and between meals, or to substitute a meal with juice. Never eat solids any sooner than 30 minutes after having juice.
Many juice experts suggest that juice should be chewed before swallowing, this allows the enzymes in the juices to mix with the enzymes in saliva to begin digestive and assimilation processes.
At least 500ml/16fl.oz or 2 cups of fresh juices should be consumed daily in order to enhance nutrition and precipitate the preventative and restorative qualities of juices.
The Gerson cancer diet, for example recommends drinking 10-12 glasses of fresh juices daily, including carrot, apple and green juice.
Well known Ann Wigmore promoted the following plants as critical to cancer recovery and invariably included in most if not all of them, in her juice recipes.
Alfalfa- the “King of mineral content.”
Beet- its dark red pigment enriches the blood.
Carrot- high in antioxidant vitamin A components.
Dandelion- very good for the liver.
Lambsquarter- “wilderness nutrition.”
Watercress- has sulphur, a virtually unknown nutrient, but vital to the body.
These six herbs, she felt, constituted the “perfect juice” for cancer prevention and treatment.
While battling her own colon cancer, she not only drank two glasses of this mixture daily, but gave herself enemas with some of it too.
(Source: Heinermans’ Encyelopedia of juices, teas and tonics.)
Some carrot juice devotees have noticed that their skin becomes a yellow-orange colour after drinking a lot of juice.
We now know that the change in the skin colour is a sign that the kidneys are working overtime to eliminate the poisonous wastes, and the bladder, unable to cope with the volume of fluid, directs the elimination process to the pores of the skin, which is another perfectly healthy method of ridding the body of toxins.
If this occurs you should continue drinking the juices and help the process of elimination by drinking lots of spring water and herbal teas.
CLEANSING DIETS
A doctor will often examine your tongue to determine your internal state of health. When the tongue has a white or yellowish coating it sometimes indicates that all is not well.
This is a good time to begin an internal cleanse using juices to remove poison and bring about a correct balance in the intestinal flora by establishing an environment for healing.
Should you experience any major discomfort, consult your practitioner.
TURNING BACK THE CLOCK
Chlorophyll, found alternatively in wheatgrass, is a green substance that contains many antioxidants that can stop the activity of free radicals in the body.
Free radicals are like tiny molecular sharks zipping around in our cellular seas, taking chemicals chomps of the atoms that make up our muscle tissue, joints, bones, blood, hair and skin.
We get them from much of the cooked processed food that we eat. Hamburgers for instance, contain more free radicals than any other food, some say of, simply because of the hour they are prepared and cooked.
By continued use of fresh juices containing chlorophyll, the aging process can actually be reversed.
Many people on juices, have found that wrinkles diminish, that the eyes start to sparkle again and that hair that has gone grey can return at least in part to the colour that it once was.