Green Smoothie Precautions

Green smoothies, that blended combination of fruit and green leafy plants, provide you with a wonderful array of nutrients to replenish and rebuild your body. With a few wise precautions you can enjoy them in abundance.

Oxalates in Greens

Oxalates occur naturally in plants and can be a problem for certain people that form oxalate stones in their kidneys. Most of us do not have this problem, but how do we know whether we do or not until a stone formed in a kidney tries to pass inducing extreme pain?  So we may need to use some precautions.

Some greens contain higher amounts of oxalates than others. Spinach, kale and beet greens tend to be higher in oxalates, so choose a lot of other greens to go with them or rotate the use of different greens on different days.

Adding lemon juice to the smoothie helps keep the oxalates from depositing in your tissues. And drinking lots of water flushes them out of your system.

Some folks believe so heartily in green smoothies that they drink 1-2 quarts of green smoothies per day. You may find a more moderate approach appeals to you especially if oxalate stone formation is a concern for you.

Of course, you can eat a lot of fresh raw vegetables without blending them into smoothies to get the health benefits you’re looking for too. However, you may find you digest the veggies in green smoothies better than the ones you chew because blending breaks up the cell walls, releasing the nutrients. If you have low stomach acid which a lot of us do, then blending the veggies into a smoothie helps you digest the veggies a lot better too.

Rotate Your Greens

Along with all the wonderful nutrients green leafy plants also contain alkaloids. Some scientists think our Creator put alkaloids in greens to keep cattle and other animals from over-grazing an area. If that’s true, isn’t it amazing cattle and other animals are smart enough to not overeat something that in large amounts would eventually cause them harm, but human beings are not that smart.

Somehow all of the junk food makes us dumb. Our taste instincts and cravings are deceived so we crave death-food instead of the food that we provide the nutrients we need.

Therefore, we need to teach each other the smart way to eat. So with green leafy vegetables, use a big variety of greens in your green smoothies to avoid collecting any one alkaloid in your tissues that may cause unwanted symptoms. Our bodies can eliminate small amounts of a variety of alkaloids better than large amounts of any one alkaloid. We have to be smart and balanced in what we eat.

Victoria Boutenko and her son Sergie will spark your creativity in finding a variety of greens.

Sergie posted a wealth of videos on YouTube.com about finding wild edible greens in nature. Simply go to YouTube.com and do a search for Sergie Boutenko. Then enjoy your viewing of his informative videos.

In the following article Victoria lists the greens her family has been able to find and incorporate in their green smoothies in the last year: (You may want to read the whole article and order Victoria’s book, The Green Revolution.)

http://www.rawbc.org/articles/greensinstore.html

Greens:

• Arugula
• Asparagus
• Beet greens (tops)
• Bok choy
• Broccoli
• Carrot tops
• Celery
• Chard
• Collard greens
• Endive
• Escarole
• Fresee
• Grape leaves
• Kale (3 types)
• Mitsuna
• Mustard greens
• Pumpkin leaves
• Radicchio
• Radish tops
• Rhubarb
• Romaine lettuce green and red leaf (no Iceberg or light colored leaf)
• Spinach

Weeds:

• Borage leaves and flowers
• Chicory greens and flowers
• Chickweed
• Clover
• Dandelion (greens and flowers)
• Fiddlehead ferns
• Lambsquarters
• Malva
• Miner’s lettuce
• Plantain
• Purslane
• Sorrel
• Stinging nettles

Herbs:

• Aloe Vera
• Baby dill
• Basil
• Cilantro
• Fennel
• Mint
• Parsley (2 types)
• Peppermint leaves
• Spearmint

Sprouts:

• Alfalfa
• Broccoli
• Clover
• Fenugreek
• Radish
• Sunflower

If any of you readers are familiar with the wild edible greens (often known as weeds) in your area, feel free to post that information in the comment section following this article.

Maybe we need to plant some “weeds” this year.

Enjoy your adventure in creating a big variety of green smoothies.  And become familiar with the nutrients in green smoothies in the next post.

Blessings,

Dr. Jo