Miscellaneous Info About Beets

Have you noticed that I like beets? They get used often here in fresh juice, in salad or roasted. When beets are local and in-season I become obsessed with them and seem to pick them up each week. Local beets have come to market so I wanted to share some beet facts with you. I have not always loved beets in fact until about 5 years ago I avoided them for which I have my mother to thank. The only beets I had growing up for pickled and I didn’t like those at all. Fortunately I had some simple roasted beets one day and was shocked that I enjoyed them. Now I am happy to report that I really like beets.

Did you know that beets are in the same botanical family as chard and spinach? I was surprised when I found that out myself. Beet leaves have a similar flavor to chard only a little more bitter in my opinion. However since I like bitter food I love beet greens. They are a wonderful addition to salad and are good wilted like spinach.

Beets are said to have been first cultivated by the ancient Romans. We Italians are responsible for everything good you know. (just kidding.. well, sort of) ;-)

Beet greens are more nutritious than beet roots as they contain more calcium, iron, as well as vitamins A and C. The beetroot is a good source of folic acid. Beets have also been used for disorders of the liver. They are high in betacyanin which is reported to be a cancer fighter. The greens contain a lot of oxalate which can be a problem for those with oxalate-containing kidney stones. Also eating beets can result in a harmless pink or red color to your eliminations.

When you buy beets look for fresh attached greens and firm beetroots. Before you store them in the refrigerator cut off the greens and store those separately like you would store other greens and lettuces.

Beets can be eaten raw or cooked. I like them either way but tend to eat them most often raw either in fresh juice or salad.  However you can add beets to your diet I think they are a good thing. We can all use more blue/purple foods on our diets.

What is stopping you from getting healthier?

I get a lot of questions asking me how we are able to eat as healthy as we do. These emails frequently will say things like “I could never live like you because my family wouldn’t go for it” or they give some other reason why they can’t do it. As you may expect this makes me a little sad because I worry that these people are setting up roadblocks before they can even get started. Since these emails come quite often I thought I should tell you how we were able to make dramatic changes to our lifestyle.

Once I made up my mind that our focus was going to be health everything else was easy. When you approach life from the perspective of “what is the healthiest choice I could make right now“ you naturally make better choices. Sure it is easy to grab a muffin and coffee at work for breakfast, but no one actually believes that it is the healthiest choice they could make. Do you see how this simple thought (what is the healthiest choice right now) could get you moving in the right direction if you followed it most of the time?

Like you I also have nagging little thoughts that come up for me all the time. Things like “diet can’t overcome cancer”, or “we have been this way a long time so we can’t change”. When things like that creep into my mind I write them down and then I ask myself these questions:

• Is that really true?
• Why do I believe this … or why do I have this thought?
• Do I want this to be true?

Typically when I ask myself these questions I quickly realize I am making things up to give myself an excuse. I think it is natural to not want to fail and that is the reason I suspect our brains make up stories. After all if something is impossible than it isn’t that we failed we just weren’t superhuman. However I find that I am capable of much more than I ever thought possible. Also if we aren’t willing to make changes nothing in our respective lives is going to change or improve. The least we can do it give life our best shot. What do actually you have to lose from trying to change other than your bad habits?

The next step in this process is to imagine what life would be like if you had what you wanted (which is our case is complete health)? Can you visual what your life would be like if you reached your goal? What would you look like? What sorts of things would you do if you were a changed person? How would you interact with others? How would you feel? Once you can imagine how your life would be it becomes very easy to make good choices so that you start moving in the direction of what you want. Using us as an example if we were the healthiest we could be at 49 and 56 we would drink green smoothies and fresh vegetable juice, and eat salads, beans and whole grains. We would also be active and would stay away from known toxins (alcohol, processed foods, etc.). Do you see how this happens? First you decide what you want then you go after it with each decision that you make.

The converse is true however if you get stuck on the nagging doubts you have. Let’s say you want to be healthy but you tell yourself that you can’t do it because you don’t have time. You just gave yourself a reason why you aren’t going to be healthy. However, is really true that you don’t have time? Instead of spending hours online, watching TV or talking on the phone you could be going for a walk, making healthy food, or going grocery shopping. As you can see you really had time but you choose to spend it doing things that weren’t helping you to reach your goal.

Let’s say you tell yourself that you can’t get healthy because your family won’t eat what you cook. Now ask yourself is that really true? If you say yes then the next question is are you sure? Have you tried to serve them healthy food? What if you try to serve healthy food and they won’t eat it … now what do you do?  Ask yourself, do you want it to be true? Of course you don’t but you also probably don’t know to do next. Sounds like it is time to brainstorm to me. You have a few options that you could try. First you could try explaining to your family that nutrition makes a difference in health and seeing if that makes encourages them to eat the more healthy food. If it doesn’t you can still “have have your cake and eat it too” so to speak. You could make some whole grains, beans and veggies for dinner for yourself. However you could feed your family a similar dish with extra nuts, oil or a little cheese. It might not be perfect but Rome wasn’t built in a day and sometimes people need to ease into change.

I hope that reading this has given you some insight into how we were able to change our lives so dramatically with small steps here and there which eventually resulted in significant change. When I look at the changes we made in total even I think it is remarkable. However, when you take things one step at a time I think you will be surprised how much progress you can make in a relatively short period of time.

I hope that this makes modifying your diet seem more manageable. No one likes change we would all prefer to stay exactly where we are because we know that place. However unless you change your actions you won’t change your situation. Start small with one step and keep adding more changes until you get where you want to be.

If any of this makes sense to you and/or you want me to write more about this let me know.  This is a topic that I could write a lot about if there is interest.

Happy Thoughts:

• Monday we had the loveliest weather. There were blue skies and temperatures in the mid 70s. It was a welcome change from our cold rain on Sunday. Any day where we have sunny spring weather is all good in my book.

• Today I decided to give myself a break from photographing my food. I hope you don’t mind. Some days I am just not in the mood and this was one of those days. You didn’t miss anything I had a green smoothie, flax and oat crackers with salsa, and orange and Brazil nuts, a big green salad and veggie soup. Nothing exciting just healthy food. It was good to just be myself today since I don’t do that often any more. I will get back to photographing food tomorrow.

• I am also thankful for my husband today. One of my birthday presents arrived today. My husband is once again being too generous with me but I think it is very sweet as much as I wish that he wouldn’t do it. I had strict orders today to stay out of the package so that I had something to open on my birthday. The rooster cookie jar (from the post yesterday) was also one of my presents but needless to say it won’t get wrapped. I am bad about not waiting for presents. The same thing happens when I buy presents for others early I just can’t wait until the occasion to give them either. Patience is not one of my strengths.

• All the azaleas are gorgeous now. I love walking around the neighborhood looking at everything in bloom. Spring is a magical time of the year. Also on a positive note my mint is about 4 inches high now which is wonderful. I love mint and can’t wait to start adding it to all my salads with fruit. I also love smelling the wisteria when I go for my neighborhood walks.  Have you noticed that I love spring?  LOL

• Dan and I seem to have gotten into the habit of walking together when he gets home from work. The weather this evening was perfect for an evening walk. It was nice to get some activity in while talking and catching up on our respective days.

• I had time today to read another book which was a relaxing way to spend my morning. It is good to be reducing my inventory from the library.

• Dan and I may be going on another date during the week which is something nice to look forward to. I am hoping to hear more about that tomorrow. It is a long story but I will explain it later in more detail if it happens. *fingers crossed*

Signed Book Give Away:

If you haven’t yet entered don’t forget about “The 21-Day Weight Loss Kickstart” give away that was signed by Dr. Barnard. I will be choosing the winner for my Saturday post and you have multiple ways to enter to win. It is a great book full of nutrition information and very well sourced which I reviewed here. I loved the book enough that I bought a copy after checking it out at the library.

Signing out:

Like always Dan and I have stayed up later than we should have. Some things never change do they? 

I have a number of errands to run tomorrow so I won't be online much. However I will be talking to you again tomorrow late in the day.  I hope that you had a good Monday.  Good night!

Beet Carpaccio and Savory Oatmeal

Saturday:

We woke up to the most beautiful fall morning. The air was crisp, and there was a gentle breeze and not a cloud to be seen. I love a cloudless blue sky day. There is just something about waking up to the perfect weather to put me in a great mood.

Since it was Saturday (our only day to sleep in) we didn’t get up until 8 which is what happens when you are completely involved in a conversation at midnight. It seems like my husband and I could talk for hours. Whoever said men don’t have much to say should see us in action. ;-)

We started the morning with a nice mug of hot green tea with a little ascorbate C powder to keep the EGCG bioavailable longer. While we sipped tea I preheated the oven and started beets roasting for a salad with my parents at mid-day. I thought today would be a good day to make my version of Ian’s beet carpaccio. I am going to add a few things and take others away. Hopefully I don’t change the entire feel of the dish because we both enjoyed the original but I want to make a version that is my own.

Food thoughts:

Last night I was doing little research on a product I have not had before. Any guesses what this is? The only hint I will give you is that it is sold for human consumption and it is vegan.

INGREDIENTS:  Soy protein concentrate, dehydrated onion, soy sauce granules (soy sauce [water, wheat, soybeans, salt], maltodextrin, salt), yellow cornmeal, spices, dehydrated garlic, tomato powder, masa harina (ground corn treated with lime), sea salt, less than 2% of brown rice syrup solids, non-GMO expeller pressed canola oil, onion powder, maltodextrin, caramel color, salt, yeast extract, natural flavors, torula yeast, modified food starch, vinegar solids, celery powder, jalapeno powder, hydolized soy protein, lactic acid, silicon dioxide (anticaking). Contains wheat, soy.

Would I eat this? Not if I knew what I was eating. I wanted to highlight the ingredient list because when I read it to my husband last night (the less health concerned half of this family) even he said it sounded like a science project. This is why it is so important to read labels. Just because something is vegan doesn’t mean it is fit for human (or animal) consumption.

When I first became vegan I foolish thought that vegan food was healthier than omni food. That is so far from true it is sad. It is just as easy to be an unhealthy vegan in America as it is an unhealthy omnivore.

So what is wrong with this product? The first problem is the main ingredient is soy protein concentrate. First we know it isn’t organic which means it is undoubtedly “Roundup ready technology soy”. Nothing like knowing which pesticide is in your food. *rolls eyes* Additionally it is processed soy protein which elevates IGF-1 and you don't want that. The third ingredient listed is sodium. It contains two forms of sugar, brown rice syrup and maltodextrin. I am always suspicious of products that use more than one type of sugar.

I am not naming the product because I don’t want to hear from any corporate lawyers and I don’t think the specific product is important. The reason I listed the ingredients was to show you what is actually in a product that claims to be “natural”. This product doesn’t sound overly natural to me.

This is why the vast majority (probably over 95%) of what we eat is whole food in the form of produce, whole unprocessed grains, beans, nuts or seeds. When you eat a diet like that you don’t need to read the fine print on a box or bag.

I hope looking at the ingredient list of the “natural” vegan product above resonates with some of you. Just because a food is vegan doesn’t mean it is good for you. As you can guess this is a serious hot button issue for me. A vegan diet can be the healthiest diet on the planet, or it can be garbage and only you can decide what happens at your house.

Breakfast:

Dan was busy logged into to work from home because there is a computer upgrade is going on. Our phone rang early (it was the office) and a 20 minute task turned in to multiple hours. How my husband gets stuck with miscellaneous computer tasks since he isn’t IT is beyond me. It isn’t like he has all the free time in the world. *rolls eyes*

Dan had planned to run to the plumbing supply house this morning for an unusual part he needed for our old (okay over 100 year old) house. Of course it closed at noon so by the time he was finished with work he needed a smoothie to go and had to run out the door.

For breakfast I made Dan a green smoothie of: 4 kale leaves/stems roughly chopped, 2 frozen bananas, 1 tablespoon ground flaxseeds, ¼ teaspoon cinnamon, ¼ teaspoon powdered ginger, 1 handful of walnuts, water to process and a little stevia. I poured this into a mason jar and he ran out the door to the plumbing supply house. Thankfully he made to the store on time and all the plumbing is now functioning as intended. It is so nice to have a handy husband.

For my breakfast I had something similar but with a twist. Friday on Twitter Ricki (Diet, Dessert and Dogs) mentioned adding cranberries to smoothies and that sounded interesting to me. I always find banana smoothies to be a little too sweet so I wanted to try it. My smoothie this morning contained: 4 kales leaves/stems roughly chopped, 1 frozen banana, ¼ teaspoon cinnamon, ¼ teaspoon powdered ginger, 1 tablespoon of ground flaxseeds and water to process. Once this was completely smooth I added two small handfuls (somewhere between ¼ and ½ cup) and processed until they were just broken up because I didn’t want the smoothie to be the color of mud. ;-) I really liked the tartness they added to the smoothie.

Lunch:

We had my parents over for lunch and I served the lentil and barley soup from the other day and both of my parents liked it. The fact that they liked the soup was a minor miracle considering their typical unhealthy omni diet.

To accompany the soup I made my version of Ian’s beet carpaccio. Since I wasn’t certain if he cooked the beets or not I roasted mine just to be safe. Looking at color difference I am fairly certain Ian’s were raw. Next time I will change that. This is going to be a method rather than a recipe.

You can either roast the beets or slice them thinly raw (use a mandoline). Lay the very sliced beets on the base of a plate by slightly overlapping so the entire plate is covered. To dress the beets I combined the juice of ½ half and orange with a fat tablespoon of pomegranate molasses and whisked until it was smooth. Next I thinly sliced a fennel bulb (also on the mandoline) and added that and baby arugula to the dressing and tossed to coat. I placed this salad on top of the beets. Now zest the orange and set that aside. Peel the orange and cut it into bit sized pieces. I stopped supreming oranges after reading of the health benefits of the orange membrane in the oncologist’s office. Finish the salad with the orange pieces, sliced almonds, a few slivers of olive and the orange zest. I also sprinkled a little sumac on top the salad but that is optional.

Everyone enjoyed this salad and unlike usual I didn’t add any olive oil to my parent’s servings and they still liked it. I guess that means this is an omni approved dish. ;-)

Snack:

Our snack today was a simple appetizer plate of cucumber slices, carrot sticks, fat free hummus and a few walnuts. This is the picture of my plate Dan had more walnuts since he seems to need extra calories to keep weight on.

Dinner:

What a shock this will be, we had a big salad for dinner. This one contained: shredded romaine, thinly sliced cucumber, thinly sliced carrot, avocado, fat free hummus, salsa, walnut parmesan and dehydrated leeks. We both loved this salad though I don’t really know what made this salad so special, but it was a good flavor and texture combination.

Sunday morning:

Brrrr, it was cold this morning. It was another one of those days where I thought I dressed warmly enough but no go. Jeans, one of Dan’s heavy cotton oxford shirts and flats without socks was not warm enough this morning. I found myself holding the empty canvas bags in front of me to keep me warm. Since it was 51 degrees when we got home it was no surprise this outfit was not enough to keep my warm. Fall is here without a doubt.

We left for the farmers’ market at 6:17 this morning and were there long before the official start time of 7 am. When we arrived Rudy (Cat’s Paw Organic) hadn’t unloaded the truck yet. He was delayed by road construction this morning. Dan jumped into the truck and we had things unloaded in well under 5 minutes.

From Rudy this morning we picked up acorn squash, cucumbers, kale, red bell peppers, beets and cauliflower. I was so happy to see the cauliflower, I love that stuff. ;-)

Next we went over to Calvert Farm to see Pam and Paul and get our Fall CSA goodies. There we picked up: carrots, shitakes, more kale, eggplants, the most gorgeous green celery with beautiful dark leaves, and green onions.

Then we needed to pick up another 25 pound box of tomatoes to dehydrate. Hard to imagine I am still doing that isn’t it? I have 8 quarts (started as 100 pounds) of them so far but that won’t last all winter. We talked to the farmer and they will have boxes of Romas until the first frost which I hope is still a few weeks away. *fingers crossed*

Breakfast:

About a month ago my vegan dietitian buddy Courtney mentioned savory oatmeal. Since it was hot and I was having smoothies most mornings I didn’t get around to trying it until this morning. Savory oatmeal is absolute genius! Thank you so much for sharing that Courtney, I LOVE IT! I tried to talk Dan into the savory oatmeal this morning but he wanted his usual wild blueberry and walnut oatmeal. Can you tell Dan is not the most culinary adventurous half of this marriage? LOL

My oatmeal this morning contained: ½ cup oats, 1 cup water, about a cup chopped broccoli (I used frozen that I defrosted), nutritional yeast to taste, and 1 clove garlic finely minced. I cooked this until the oats were soft. Next I stirred in 1 tablespoons of ground flaxseed and topped the dish with salsa and walnut parmesan. This was so good there were no words to describe it. I absolutely loved it! I hope some of you give this a try.

Signing out:

I need to get moving and figure how what I am making for the 3pm meal with my parents. I will be back soon to let you know what I came up with.

Beet Barley Risotto with Wilted Beet Greens

Sorry for my absence this week. We have had a lot going on this week, much more than normal. I had forgotten that part of our eye exams yesterday would be the drops that dilate your eyes. I looked stoned for half a day after the exam. With my eyes dilated I wasn’t able to read easily so I didn’t even try to do anything on the computer. After our eye appointments my hubby decided to take the day off with me, which was really nice. He has gone back to work today so my day today will return to normal.

On Wednesday of this week I spent the day with my friend Sue and we were cooking for hours. This was the day we decided to veganize the first few recipes from the cookbook. It was a good thing we decided to make the dishes together as there was a lot of cooking and cleaning that was required to make three dishes at once. Had I been doing this by myself I would have had to start making dinner right after breakfast.

As part of the “cookbook project” we needed one beet to make beet chips. They were only sold in a bunch of 6 beets so I decided we would make a beet barley risotto for our lunch before we started making dinner. This is what we had on Wednesday for lunch.

Beet Barley Risotto with Wilted Beet Greens
Serves 6

Ingredients:

1 small yellow onion (about 1 cup), peeled and chopped
¼ cup water to sauté
pinch of salt
2 cups barley
½ cup dry white wine
water (or vegetable stock) sufficient to cook barley
2 cups beets (5 medium beets, finely diced into about ¼ inch pieces)
1 ½ teaspoons dill weed
salt and pepper, as necessary
beet greens and stems from the 5 beets, finely chopped

Directions:

Water sauté onion with the pinch of salt until the onion is soft. Add barley and white wine and mix. Add diced beets, dill, 2 cups of water, and simmer, stirring occasionally. Continue to add water and stir until the barley is tender (about 40 minutes). Taste the risotto and adjust the seasonings (salt, pepper and dill) as necessary. When the barley is tender turn off the heat and stir in the beet greens and serve immediately. If desired you can drizzle with a little extra virgin olive oil when serving.

Dan and I had leftover beet risotto for lunch yesterday. It reheated well in the microwave.

Nutritional Information:

Amount Per Serving
Calories - 256.39
Calories From Fat (3%) - 7.08

Total Fat - 0.85g
Saturated Fat - 0.18g
Cholesterol - 0mg
Sodium - 151.29mg
Potassium - 511.68mg
Total Carbohydrates - 54.94g
Fiber - 12.04g
Sugar - 1.31g
Protein - 7.63g

Comments:

If you like beets you will love this risotto. It is the most beautiful magenta color. The barley is tender and the beet greens have a little firmness.

Each serving of this recipe is packed with nutrition containing approximately 2,400IU of vitamin A, 80mg of calcium, 3mg of iron, 25mcg of folate, 150mcg of vitamin K, 170mg of phosphorus, 85mg of magnesium, and 25mcg of selenium. Not too bad for something we decided to make on the fly after having more beets than we needed for beet chips.

Unrelated Note:

I haven’t had time to exercise since Tuesday so I really need to do that this morning. I also need to catch up on responding to comments and reading blogs. I hope to have time to post at least one more recipe today (hopefully more). Talk to you all again soon.

Middle Eastern Spiced Beets, Orange, Red Onion, Mint and Pistachio Salad

Beets are a food that people are passionate about. You are either a beet lover or a beet hater. My husband is a beet lover and I have learned to love them to, but it did take a while. If you aren’t a beet lover because you had some bad childhood beet experience give beets another chance. They are so good for you, and the flavor is wonderful if they are treated properly.

I decided to go Middle Eastern today with the beets. I knew I wanted to use them roasted and in a salad, but didn’t decide on the middle eastern twist until I went in the kitchen and saw the ras el hanout looking at me from the spice drawer. There is a recipe for the spice blend on my blog with a link in the recipe.

This salad is a combination of things that make me think of Middle Eastern food. I have included spiced beets, oranges, red onion, fresh mint and chopped pistachios. The beets are high in anthocyanins. The oranges provide vitamin C. The red onion is packed with antioxidants and is reported to be good for your heart and well as preventing cancer. The pistachios provide healthy fat. Most herbs are full of flavonoids, so I assume that mint is no exception.

Middle Eastern Spiced Beets, Orange, Red Onion, Mint and Pistachio Salad
serves 4

Spiced Beet Ingredients:

2 ½ pounds of beets, cleaned and cut into bite size pieces
2 teaspoons of ras el hanout
½ tablespoon of extra virgin olive oil
3 tablespoons of champagne vinegar (or red wine vinegar)
freshly ground black pepper, to taste

Remaining salad ingredients:

1 orange, segmented and cut into bite sized pieces
½ red onion, thinly sliced
2 tablespoons of vinegar to soak the onion
½ cup of fresh mint, roughly chopped
2 tablespoons of pistachios, roughly chopped

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 325 degrees. Put all the ingredients into a glass baking dish (if using metal increase the temperature to 350 degrees) and toss to combine the spices.

Roast the beets in an uncovered pan for 60 minutes and check the beets for tenderness with the tip of your paring knife. The exactly cooking time will depend on the size you cut the beets. Cook the beets until they are easily pierced with the tip of a paring knife.

Cool the beets and refrigerate until you are ready to serve. These beets can be served cold or hot. It serving hot you can reheat them in the microwave if you don’t want to make the salad.

Add the segmented orange to the cold beets. Soak the slivered onions in a little white vinegar to take the edge off the bite. After 15 minutes drain the vinegar from the onions and add them to the cold beet and orange.

Add the roughly chopped mint just before serving. Sprinkle the pistachios on the top of the salad and serve cold.

Nutritional Information:

Amount Per Serving
Calories - 196.73
Calories From Fat (18%) - 35.66

Total Fat - 4.21g
Saturated Fat - 0.59g
Cholesterol - 0mg
Sodium - 330.95mg
Potassium - 1062.22mg
Total Carbohydrates - 37.59g
Fiber - 10.8g
Sugar - 19.47g
Protein - 6.34g

Comments:

These beets have a lot of flavor and a terrific aroma from the ras el hanout. The beets could be served hot on their own, or as part of this salad.

The next time I make this salad I will add another orange. If you weren’t watching your fat as closely as we are the salad would be fine with a few more pistachios, and the inclusion of a few sliced black oil cured olives would take the salad over the top.

Beet, Apple, Carrot and Cucumber Juice

For breakfast this morning we had a piece of two whole grain toast with peanut butter and banana slices. Since the bread was posted previously I didn’t bother to take its picture or post the stats again. However, I did make a vegetable and fruit juice this morning that I have not posted previously.

Those of you who know me know how much I love my Vitamix blender. I use that blender everyday, and sometimes more than once a day. That blender makes the best smoothies, juices (with the fiber) and quick soup. If you haven’t tried a Vitamix I highly recommend them. I waited a few years to buy one due to the price tag and now I can’t imagine not having this blender.

Since our breakfast was devoid of vegetables I decided to make a vegetable and fruit juice. My husband is not crazy about tomato based juices so I didn’t want to use tomatoes. Then I remembered the baby beets I bought to make a salad. Two little baby beets were enough to make this juice a beautiful magenta color. This juice tasted mostly of apple.

I really enjoyed this juice and particularly the nutrition it packed. One serving of this juice contained over 6900 IU of Vitamin A (the RDA is 3000 IU’s for adult males). Vitamin A is required for normal functioning of the immune system and plays a critical role in the development of white blood cells, which is important for preventing and fighting disease. Studies in cell culture and animal models have documented the capacity for vitamin A to reduce carcinogenesis significantly in skin, breast, liver, colon, prostate, and other sites.

To increase the nutrition of this juice, I used organic products and scrubbed the skin, but left it on the vegetables when they were “juiced”. With all the nutritents in and just under the skin I think it makes a big difference in terms of overall nutrition to leave the skin on the fruits and veggies.

This juice is mild in flavor and tastes mostly like apple, with a little beet flavor in the background. We liked this juice enough that I may make it everynight and keep it in the refrigerator to have with our breakfast. This juice is a tasty way to get a little extra vegetable nutrition in each day.

Beet, Apple, Carrot and Cucumber Juice
Serves 2

Ingredients:

2 baby beets, scrubbed
1 apple, scrubbed and cored
1 large carrot, scrubbed
4 inches of seedless cucumber
1 cup of filtered water

Directions:

Cut fruit and vegetables into chunks and place in your blender with the water. Blend until completely smooth. You may need to add additional water depending on the power of your blender. Serve immediately or refrigerate.

Nutritional information:

Amount Per Serving
Calories - 85.69
Calories From Fat (4%) - 3.3

Total Fat - 0.4g
Saturated Fat - 0.08g
Cholesterol - 0mg
Sodium - 66.21mg
Potassium - 490.55mg
Total Carbohydrates - 21.1g
Fiber - 4.46g
Sugar - 13.59g
Protein - 1.89g

Comments:

This juice tastes like apple with a little beet in the background. The overall flavor is mild, but pleasant. Both my husband and I liked this juice. I plan to make this juice regularly and keep it in the refrigerator so that we can add a little extra nutrition to our diet when we are thirsty.