Why Go Green? The Health Benefits of Green Drinks

    

Green drinks are all the rage these days, but are they really everything they’re cracked up to be? We contend yes. When all is said and done, green juice might be seem like another addition to the new-age pantry, but it is so much more than that.


In addition to a hefty portion of the fiber in every glass, helping to regulate your digestion, the green matter is also very low on the glycemic index. That means it helps regulate your blood sugar and keeps you from crashing after drinking it, unlike other drinks and juices.


All around, green drinks are a win, and that’s before you even take into account the raft of vitamins and nutrients they contain …

What’s in Green?

They say you should eat the rainbow, but do you know why that is? The short answer is because each color group carries a different range of vitamins and minerals. Green fruits and veggies, for instance, are high in vitamins A, C, and K, magnesium, potassium, folate, phytochemicals, iron, and calcium.


Together, these ingredients can perform a huge range of services for your body, including:


  • Reducing your risk of diabetes

  • Reducing the risk of skin cancer and breast cancer

  • Lowering your risk of mortality

  • Increasing bone strength

  • Decreasing the risk of deficiency-related diseases in children, such as blindness from inadequate vitamin A

  • Fighting inflammation

  • Helping blood to clot

  • Protecting cells from damaging free radicals through high antioxidant loads

  • Preventing birth defects

  • Slowing aging

  • Promoting healthy body weight


You can have all of these benefits and more just by drinking one green drink a day.

  

How Can You Get More Green Drinks in Your Life?

The go-to response to the question of how you can up your servings of green drinks is typically a juicer. But most people who make the leap into juicing leap right back out of it in a few weeks or months. Because the ratio of produce to juice is so limited, they burn through their wallets at the grocery store and have to deal with a frightening mound of pulp once at home.


There’s a better way. While occasionally you can purchase beverages at the store, it’s much healthier to opt for smoothies when you want green drinks. Juice removes all that wonderful fiber and leaves many of the nutrients behind, while smoothies incorporate all of it.

  

  

Hello, Smoothies


When making green smoothies, keep in mind that it’s easier to get a range of benefits if you vary your produce. Try choosing a few of the following fruits and veggies for each drink: spinach, kale, chard, baby greens, collard greens, arugula, kiwi, cucumber, lime, apples, celery, cilantro, avocado, green mango, purslane, or parsley.


Be sure before you blend up your next batch of greenie goodness, however, that you remove the ribs of large leafy vegetables such as kale or Swiss chard. These will make your drinks too pulpy. No one wants that.


Obviously, you can add other ingredients to spice things up as well. Common choices include yogurt which is rich in probiotics and is good for digestion, berries, nut butter, milk or alternative milk, coconut water, bananas, or anything else you desire. 


So what do you think? Are you inspired to jump on the green juice craze today?