Drinking Your Way to a Slimmer Waistline with Healthy Smoothies

Drink Your Way To A Slimmer Waistline With Healthy Smoothies
By Jovia A. D'Souza
After any festive season, we are high on the guilt trip. Seeing the number of pounds you've added, you vow to strictly abstain from the high-fat, high-sugar and high-sodium foods you gorged on.
Cutting back on calories is the only way you can probably shed some of the fat. But then, dieting is not everyone's cup of tea. The hunger pangs tempt you back to the plate. Smoothies are the answer to keep your tummy full, at the same time keep your weight in check.
Did we see you wrinkle your nose?
Smoothies for weight loss need not be bland and boring. Prepared well, with the right mix of ingredients, you can churn out some of the most delicious and healthy smoothies.
Best Smoothie Ingredients
1. Leafy greens - Spinach, lettuce, kale, green endive
Adding leafy greens makes your drink a real nutritional powerhouse. They provide the body weight amino acids, needed to synthesize proteins. They also supply Vitamins (A & C) and minerals such as iron, potassium, magnesium that regulate metabolism. You also get the benefit of Omega 3 fatty acids.
2. Fruits
Fruits bring flavor to your weight loss smoothies. Fruits also have tons of fiber; just the ingredient you need if you are serious about losing weight. Load your glass with blueberries, strawberries, blackberries and raspberries, bananas, mangoes, pineapples and peaches. The high fiber content of fruits prevents mindless snacking.
Avocado is another ingredient to drop in. They supply ample monounsaturated fats (healthy fats) necessary to keep your metabolism chugging. They also make for a creamy smoothie.
3. Honey
Honey is good substitute for sugar. It is sweeter than sugar, but lower in calories. The antioxidants it contains also make it beneficial for general health.
4. Protein
If you are talking weight loss smoothies, you cannot miss out protein. It keeps weight gain in check by slowing down digestion. You can get your daily intake of protein by adding low-fat milk or Greek yoghurt. For Greek yoghurt, settle for the plain variety rather than favored as the latter contains artificial sweeteners. Soy products and nuts also add protein to your smoothie glass.
5. Flaxmeal and chia seeds -
They are an abundant source of fiber and protein. Added to your smoothie, they keep you satiated for longer. They are as good as tasteless, and therefore, don't really affect the taste of your smoothie.
How to have your weight loss smoothie?
� Commercially available smoothies are a real time saver. But they might not be as effective for weight loss because of the ingredients such as high fat milk and sugars. Homemade smoothies are your best bet. However, if you must get them from out, do inquire about the ingredients.
� You cannot expect to lose weight by drinking smoothies alone. It must be coupled with healthy lifestyle habits and regular exercise for the best results.
� Morning is the ideal time to have a smoothie for weight loss. It fires up your metabolism. The high fiber and protein content also tricks your brain into believing you are full, reducing hunger cravings throughout the day.
� Any kind of smoothie tastes good immediately after blending. Allowing it to stand for long causes it to lose its flavor.
Smoothies are easily portable. That's an advantage of including them in your weight loss diet plan. They are also easy on the stomach. They are not a quick-fix or weight loss, but definitely make a healthy step towards sustained weight loss.
If you are thinking of incorporating smoothies in your weight loss program, you can consider the Red Detox Diet Program. The smoothie diet plan advocates the use of red smoothies to shed the pounds instead of the traditional green smoothies.
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8 Benefits to Juice Fasting

There are many health benefits to juicing, especially if you prepare them yourself:

1. If drank fresh, the juice contains live enzymes, which is helpful the body.

2. Unlike being brought out of a packet, the juice is fresh and not pasteurized. Pasteurization many have its benefits but it has produced nutritionally dead meals. During pasteurization, high heat is used and this damages the essential nutrients within the juice.

3. You take in more vegetables by drinking than by eating. As you probably have experienced, it's not always possible to consume as many vegetables as you would like. Drinking fresh vegetable juice helps take charge of this problem.

4. Digestion and assimilation of the vegetable nutrients is much easier. Your body is in fact, like a juicer. When you ingest a celery, your body will digest the celery by extracting the juice to obtain the nutrition. The fiber is destroyed via the colon and bowel movements. However, if you juice, you have already extracted the juice for the body thus making it easier for your assimilation. Nevertheless, it's still important to eat whole vegetables and fruits because you need some amount of fiber as well.

5. Fasting gives your digestive system a break. Since fresh vegetables and fruit juices require little digestion, they are quickly acculturated into your body. The majority of the 10% of bodily energy normally involved in your assimilation, digestion, and elimination is freed up. The end result? You feel a sense of renewed energy after the fast.

6. A fast helps to also decompose toxic materials - fat, abnormal cells and tumors-- and releases diseased tissues and their cellular products into the circulation for extermination.

7. In addition, new cell growth during fasting is stimulated and accelerated as the required proteins are re-synthesized from decomposed cells (during autolysis). Your serum albumin reading, that is blood-protein level, remains constant and ordinary throughout your fast, as your body very smartly uses protein and other stored nutrients where required.

8. Juice fasting is a much gentler technique of detoxification as compared to water fasting. For a juice fast, a broad range of fruits and vegetables should be used in combination and that is necessary to enhance health during the fast. In this particular manner, the body still gets its daily calories from the easily-digested juices as compared to the more extreme water fast. Thus, the release of toxins from the fat cells in a juice fast is much more gentle and gradual.