Wednesday, March 31, 2010

Go Green – Green Smoothies that is! Fight your RA with nutrition!

Hey everyone! how is the RA been treating you? Crappy? HAHA – Well how about you up your intake of veggies and fruit by making one of these bad boy green monster smoothies? I have a green smoothie or green juice almost daily for breakfast. It is easy on the digestion and loaded with super-rich nutrient foods that can help power up our bods to combat RA and the associated symptoms like fatigue, yukky skin, hair loss, etc. I am a firm believer that a healthy diet based mainly on plant-rich foods can really help with auto immune disorders. Has my RA improved on the Raw/Vegan diet? NO…but remember I had a major surgery 6 months ago which I think put me in a major flare. That in conjunction with detox symptoms from switching from a crappy Standard American Diet to a High Raw/Vegan diet has made my RA not so good.  But hey, I am not a quitter! I have improved other areas of my health dramatically by going Raw. My LDL cholesterol dropped a whopping 30 points since I started this diet, and we all know how important it is to remain heart healthy when you have RA. I am keeping thin on this diet which really helps my knees. My skin has finally cleared up and alot of my brown splotchy areas on my face (which I know was from RA) have disappeared. My nails grow like crazy and I have also cured myself of lifelong constipation. I know, I know, a yukky subject, but I lived on senekot for years. I was the queen of constipation! Not anymore. I am 100%, totally cured of that crappy ailment (no pun intended!)

Ok, so anyhoo, here is the green monster thang that I drink alot of!  Drinking smoothies and fresh juice is a great way to get tons of veggies and fruit into your diet!

My Green Monster Beast! with a Rubik's Cube in the background..I am such a nerd!

Judy's Spinach Mango Green Monster Beast

  • 2 big handfuls of Organic Spinach (I buy mine in the package at the regular grocery store)
  • 1 cup of frozen Mango (Trader Joe's)
  • 1/2 cup frozen Papaya (Trader Joe's)
  • 1 banana (I freeze mine in chunks then just toss them in my smoothie)
  • 1 TBSP Coconut butter (I LOVE THIS STUFF and it is soooo good for you)
  • 2 cups of high quality H20 - (just like waterboy)

That is it! Blend it all up for about 30-60 seconds and you have a super-nutritious green monster beast to feast on anytime of the day!

You can replace the coconut butter with almond butter, or whatever floats your boat. Sometimes I toss some raw pumpkin seeds (pepitas) in there to increase my iron intake, maybe hemp seeds for protein. You get the picture. A basic green smoothie recipe that you can tweak to your heart's desire and feel good about drinking! Be warned though, go put on a jacket as these dang things make you cold. Well, I am always FROZEN cuz of RA, so cold drinks make me cold…lol go figure.

We can take control of what goes in our bodies! That is the one area that we are totally 100% in charge of! We may have to take crappy meds and live with RA until they find a cure (*cough*) but I WILL control what goes into my body. I hope one day that my RA will turn the corner and I will be able to get off conventional meds due to my healthy diet – if not, well back to cheetos! haha

Hope everyone has a great Wednesday!

9 comments:

Laurie Grassi said...

OK, I have to admit, my first thought when I read that it was green was, "Yes, but does it taste good??"

But I have to say, your recipe sounds really good! I'm going to try it this weekend. I don't have papaya and likely won't get (I had some dried papaya years ago and it – or something – made me really ill and ever since then the thought of it makes me feel sick), but I have all the other stuff, so I'm game!

Looking forward to it – thanks for passing it on!

Have a great end of week and Easter weekend!

:) Laurie

Pony said...

Ooooh, I love big green monsters!! I make a huge blender-full every morning for my sweetie and I :) I usually put in:

- spinach/arugula/romaine/parsley/
whatever greenery I can find
- frozen mango
- frozen mixed berries
- a banana
- hemp seeds
- goji berries
- homemade yogurt if I got it
- maca powder
- spices (cinnamon, cayenne, etc.)
- coconut oil/butter
- water

Laurie, you should definitely give it a try! They are soooo yummy, and taste sweet because of the fruit. I just feel good when I drink these.

Judy, do you make your own coconut butter? I posted about this a little while ago. Sooo good!

Pony

Leslie said...

I'm eating healthier day by day...not quite ready for the green monster but your ingredients sure do sound good...I will mark this for future reference...thanks :)

Leslie said...

I'm eating healthier day by day...not quite ready for the green monster but your ingredients sure do sound good...I will mark this for future reference...thanks :)

RA is Wild said...

Pony - no, I use Artisana...do you make your own? I would love to know how! I cannot open the coconuts though, I save those for the men in the house. We get crappy coconuts where I live, so I kind of gave up on them.

Laurie, I can only find frozen papaya at Trader Joe's - but you can omit. Trust me you will like this recipe. Spinach is a really great "first" green to juice or use in smoothies as it is kind of creamy and does not have the grassy taste like others. The fruit completely covers up the green taste.

Pony said...

Well, I haven't tried it with fresh coconut. I used the unsweetened dried stuff. I'm pretty sure that Artisana uses dehydrated coconut as well. I just put a bunch of it in my magic bullet, with the flat blade, and blended the crap outta it :) Yummy!

We do get coconuts sometimes here, but I assume they are not that great, and I also would never be able to open one!

RA is Wild said...

really! So i can toss dried unsweetened coconut into my vitamix and it will make coconut butter? REALLY! WOW! I have got to try that! Thanks Pony, hope you are feeling better!

Pony said...

Really :)

It's probably a little grittier than Artisana, but still amazing! I also have to give credit to Heather over at www.heathereatsalmondbutter.com, who discovered this magic :)

Healthtec Software said...

Smoothies are definitely very useful in various ways.Firstly they are very easy to make and throwing the necessary ingredients for the body and good health it will help maintain a good life.Thanks for the recipes here.
http://www.healthtec-software.com/emr.htm

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