Cleanse!

green juice (kale, romaine, celery, apple, ginger, lemon), pineapple-mint juice, spicy lemonade (lemon, maple syrup, cayenne pepper, water), and citrus-beet juice (beets, blood orange, tangerine, and grapefruit)
Today was the first day of my three day cleanse. There are many ways to vary a juice cleanse (the companies in my previous post all offer different cleansing levels, with different juice combinations), but generally speaking, the more green juice and the less fruit juice you drink, the better cleansed your system will be. The regimen I am following this week is as follows: green juice, pineapple-mint juice, green juice, spicy lemonade (based on the famous Master Cleanse recipe), beet-citrus juice, coconut water (not pictured).

Of course there is a lot more to cleansing than simply flushing out your digestive system, which is what drinking all that fluid does. The three tenets of cleansing are: hydrate, eliminate, exfoliate (a cleanse is meant to clean out your colon, liver, and kidneys, but many of the toxins will be eliminated through your skin, which is the body's largest organ. Therefore it's important to sweat a lot- to speed up the detox- steam- to open up your pores, and exfoliate during a cleanse to keep the toxins from reabsorbing into your body). Thus, along with all this juice (112 oz), I will also be drinking large quantities of water and herbal teas, working out extra hard, taking very hot, steamy showers and baths, dry brushing my skin, and taking some superfood supplements along with it all.

Curious about juice cleansing? This post is full of great resources.

Celery, Romaine, Apple

Pomegranate Tangerine

Beet, Grapefruit, Tangerine

Cucumber, Kale, Celery, Apple, Lime

Grapefruit-Carrot-Orange Juice

Pre-Cleanse

I have a confession: I am a closet juicer. I purchased my very own juicer recently and am completely in love with it. It's generally not a great idea to drink too much juice, especially fruit juices or starchy vegetable juices (like carrot or beet) because of the high sugar content, but I have been starting every day with a glass of leafy green juice (I like a combination of kale, celery, romaine lettuce, green apple, ginger, and lemon), and it makes me feel great. The wonderful thing about drinking your vegetables is that it gives your digestive system a break- you get to absorb all the nutrients in the food without having to process any of the roughage.

Although I normally only drink one glass of juice a day, I try to do a juice cleanse for a few days every season. In the past I've ordered juices from Blue Print Cleanse (some other great bottled options are Can Can Cleanse, Juice to You, Juicey Lucy's and Living Greens here in SF, Organic Avenue in NY, or Ritual Cleanse in LA), but the shipping time really depletes the enzymes in the juices that are so nutritionally important, and the cost is a bit prohibitive for regular cleansing, which is why I saved up for my own Super Angel 5500 juicer.

It's important to wean yourself off of most foods before you start juicing, to avoid shocking your body, so I like to spend the week before a cleanse doing just that. On Monday I stopped eating meat, Thursday I stopped eating (most*) refined sugars and white flours and had my last bit of dairy, and tomorrow (Saturday) I will start eating only raw vegetables and fruits so that on Monday my body is adjusted and ready to cleanse! In the past I've made some scheduling mistakes and started cleansing without a much prep time, and the resulting detox was pretty gross. I'm starting my three day cleanse on Monday, so in the interest of this blog being a record of what I eat, I thought I'd share some of the raw foods I'm eating this weekend, and the juices I'll be drinking next week.

Some of the easiest and best things to eat in preparation for a cleanse are raw greens, like arugula. I dress mine in a little bit of mustard and lemon juice, and I like to have some avocado with it for substance. Because I haven't gone completely raw yet, and I do love my fiber, tonight I also had half a roasted sweet potato with some salt and pepper.

*I must admit I was not super strict about this one- today I had some bhatura with lunch- but I won't be having any more grains (even whole ones) for the rest of the week.