3 Days of Smoothie's.
After the last race of the season, holidays, and downtime brings some some overeating and junkfood consumption. I am plant-based but yes you can overeat and they do make vegan carrot cake and icecream. There are plenty of junkfood vegetarians and vegans out there , I am not one of them but do over-indulge at times probably due to the addictive personality and no immediate race focus. There is lots of stuff on the internet for detoxing , rebooting, cleansing , etc , etc, via fasting, juicing , smoothie's etc. IMO I believe most of those descriptions to be snake oil with nothing really to it other than eating very healthy.
So in honor of starting my OS last weekend , my girlfiend Heather ,and I decided to "jumpstart good habits" if you will and do a 3 Days' of nothing but raw fruits, vegetable's, and greens via smoothie's. The plan was simple , buy lots of fruits, veggies, and greens, throw them in the vitamix everytime we get hungry and drink. Also bought lots of juices to supplement inbetween. Even drank tea for 3 days instead of coffee. Most of the smoothies were made as a batch of 64oz so we each consumed 32 oz for each smoothie. Below is the 3 day experiment followed with a couple of observations.
Sun Day1
Naked Juice Blue and Tea--- before 1hr bike (FTP test)
Smoothie 1 --- water , bananas,dates,rasberries,lemon,beet greenss
Tea
Smoothie 2 ---- carrot juice,beets,aaple,apple cider vinegar,ginger,dinosaur kale
Smoothie 3-----water,pears,celery,pineapple,dinosaur kale, mint
Naked Juice Blue
Smoothie 4--- water,cucumber,garlic,scallions,cilantro,jalapeno,red pepper, avocado,spinach,trader joes v8
Naked Juice Blue
Mon Day 2
Naked Juice Mango and Tea ---before 1hr swim
Smoothie 1--- water,banana,dates,blackberries,lemon,swiss chard
Tea
Smoothie 2----carrot juice,beets,aaple,ginger,lemon,parsley,avocado
Trader Joes V8(gardenpatch)
Smoothie 3 --- apple juice,cantelope,strawberries(tops included),banana, mint
Smoothie 4 --- sweet potato,coconut water and meat , garlic, scallions,jalapeno,cilantro,spinach,avocado
Smoothie 5 ----Naked Mango w/bananas
Tues Day 3
Naked Juice Green and Tea before 1.5 hr run/swim workout including 5k run test on TM
Smoothie 1--- apple juice,banana,dates,blueberries,lemon,purple kale
Tea
Smoothie2--- water, sweet potato, cranberries(whole bag raw),dates,grapes,lemon,avocado,purple kale
Smoothie3---carrot juice,lemon,ginger,parsley
Smoothie4--- water,cucumber,ginger,celery,garlic,scallions,cilantro,jalapeno,red pepper,avocado,spinach, trader joes v8
Smoothie5---water,bananas,strawberries,pineapple,coconut,mint
Trader Joes V8
Naked Juice Green
Observations---- I felt good before, during, and after the 3 days. I missed chewing my food. I missed hot food. Aside from the 1-1.5 workouts each day , activity was kept to a minimum. Probably lost a pound or two but that was not the goal in fact I didnt count calories but made sure to get enough in. Everything was raw, cold, unseasoned, with exception of some cumin , tumeric, and curry power. I Seemed to be extra cold??? Urine which there was alot of since so well hydrated was almost crystal clear which I didnt expect with all the colors of food. It was fun. Would I do it again? Probably not. I will say every single smoothie was very tasty and enjoyable.
Questions, comments, or discussions welcomed! Just thought I would share!
Comments
- What effect did it have on bowel movements?
- Nevermind, thats too much information
- Hey this reminds me of that time my friend told me about when a coworker of his was trying to explain the benefits of a multi-day cleanse, claiming it gives the colon/bowels a much needed break because 'they work so hard the rest of the time' - to which my friend responded 'so does my heart, but I'm not about to stop it from beating for a few days!'
Really interesting that you seemed to be cold. I would not have expected that.
@Jess- YW- Lemme know what you do and how it works out !
What about protein?
Any plants in particular? I'm not hating, here. I'm curious. I was under the impression that protein was critical for muscle growth/regeneration. I guess you could throw some whey into the blender, but I'm guessing that's not what you do.
@Andrew....I am not an expert or a nutritionist, I never played one on TV, but I do have a Holiday Inn Express 1 mile down the road from me. .
All plants have protein....There are many very large/strong animals that only eat only plants(after they are weaned from thier mothers milk) and seem to be ok, like gorillas , horses, etc(.... Did you know that a 100 calories of spinach has more protein than 100 calories of meat? Granted its not very practicle to eat a 100 calories of spinach but you get my drift. The following foods all have 1gram of protein in them , 1 banana, 1 aaple, 2 dates , 1 cup spinach , 8 oz carrot juice (so almost 1 serving of anything has at least 1 gram protein). Heck 8oz of V8 juice is 50 cals and 2 grms protein. Keep in mind that when you do not consume meat and dairy that your daily caloric intake still remains the same , meaning you must consume more of everything else....All that really adds up.
In the context of this thread where I only consumed only fruits and vegetables for 3 days , I would roughly calculate the daily caloric intake to be around 2500 cals (give or take 500) with daily protein intake around 25-35grams... Most research will state the average male needs 50-70 grams of protein per day (this is debatable and probably excessive) I certainly fall to the very low side in either case being 120-125lbs ....
In the context of normal every day nutrition and to answer your question. Plant foods that are known to be higher in protein and in my normal diet are , legumes , nuts , seeds, tofu , tempe, whole grains . Some of my favorites are garbanzo beans, black beans , lentils, cashews , pecans, walnuts, almond butter, hemp seed, chia seed, sesame seed, sunflower and pumpkin seed, quinoa and buckwheat.
Todays intake so far(more normal)... This am coffee and 2 dates (140 calories and 1 gram protein) , 65 min run , recovery drink smoothie of 16oz almond milk, 1 banana , 1 cup spinach, 1 scoop plant protein(made from sprouted nuts,grains, seeds). Recovery drink had 340 cals and 21 gram protein. Lunch will be large raw salad of every color you can imagine with usally tempe/tofu or beans but today will have the stuffed muchroom caps from last nights dinner which were stuffed with buckwheat, pesto(pistachio,spinach,basil), sundried tomatoes. And probably a piece of Trader Joes dark chocolate. Yep you guessed it 115 cals of TJ's dark chocolate has yet another 1.5 grams of protein ....
Reference Whey Protein---NO I dont use it as it is derived from milk....
@tim - Thanks for the comprehensive answer. Very very interesting. Yeah, that is a helluva lot of spinach! You've given me some great ideas for my own food intake. Keep the updates coming. Cheers.
Looking at consumer reports, vitamix is a high ranked BLENDER.
however, under juicers, the high ranked ones are a lot cheaper.
what should i get?
Cool. Glad i asked. So high end blender, like vitamix, is what i need.
I couldn't do a full-on cleanse do to work/life, but this has definitely helped with refocusing my diet and really boosting my fruit and veggie intake. Thanks for posting, Tim!