Drink Your Fruit-and-Veggie Smoothies in the Morning

"I personally try to eat about 85 percent of my food raw", said Dr Mercola^[1]. Maybe it is also wise for us to strive to get as much raw food in our diet as possible . You can read [2] for more information on "Raw Foods and Healthy Living."  One way to achieve that goal is to drink fruit-and-veggie smoothies.^[3]

Starting from 2006, I have been drinking my fruit-and-veggie smoothies in the morning. This morning juice will flush your large intestine and provide you with vitamins and minerals that are essential for your good health.^[8,16] As a result, my metabolic syndrome^[13] disappeared years ago as shown below:

Health Benefits of Drinking Fruit-and-Veggie Smoothies in the Morning

After a good night sleep, your body becomes dehydrated. Adding fruit-and-veggie smoothies in the morning can help hydrate your digestive tract and aid your colon in the elimination of fecal matter. For years, I have been annoyed by hemorrhoid due to long-hour's sitting in front of computer. However, after introducing my morning smoothie routine, my bowel movements^[6,8] become regular in the morning and thus relieve my hemorrhoid symptoms.

As discussed in [4], vegetables and fruits contain lots of minerals (i.e, Calcium, Sodium, Potassium, Magnesium, Cobalt and Copper). So, they are alkalizing foods. Ideally, human blood pH should be slightly alkaline, at about 7.35 to 7.45.  Morning smoothie can help bring your blood pH to that healthy range.

However, as most vegetarians can testify, most of them yearn for sweets in the afternoon. As shown in [4], sugar, flour and grains are acid-forming foods. So, that's one of our body's mechanisms to keep the acid-alkaline balance by taking some acid-forming foods after taking some alkalizing foods.

After my morning smoothie routine, I have found that I feel hungry regularly around 11:30 am. This has prepared me for a full meal at noon time.  As centenarian Frances shared her health tips with us at age 101^[5]. One of her secrets is that she eats her heavier protein-based meal for lunch and enjoys a light chicken soup and fresh bread in the evening.

This health tip is really important—our body produces the most digestive juice around noon time. Therefore, our biggest daily meal should be the lunch. Because your morning smoothie, you have emptied your bowels and raised your blood pH higher (i.e. more alkaline). This has prepared you for a heavier protein-based meal which provides you more acid-forming ingredients.

Avoid a Heavy Dinner

After my morning smoothie and heavy protein-based lunch, I often feel hungry again around 3 pm. This is the time that I enjoy whole fruits, nuts, and occasional sweets. As a surprised side effect, I have found that I don't yearn for my dinner anymore. As centenarian Frances do, I just take a light dinner in the evening. This has made my family members wonder why I don't eat much in the evening. They have described that I have become god (成仙了? 不吃不喝的) because I don't seem to eat anything in the evening.

Eating at the appropriate times throughout the day will help to maximize satisfaction and keep hunger at bay. To nurture healthy eating habits, following my example, start your morning with fruit-and-veggie smoothies. This will help your body go through the following cleansing cycles daily:

• Detoxification
• Nutrients absorption -> Body Repair and detoxification^[11-12] -> Body wastes Elimination 
• Blood acid-alkaline balance
• More alkalizing foods -> More acid-forming foods -> Healthy acid-alkaline balance

Know when and how we eat can make a huge difference^[9,10]. In this daily routine, I have also lost weight around 20 pounds.  Here I have shared with you my 8 year's personal experience. At my physical examine of this year (i.e., 2013), I can proudly tell you that all my bio-markers are in the healthy range.  Cheers!

References

1. When You Heat Natural Plant-Based Foods You Can Get Cancer-Causing Acrylamide
2. Raw Foods and Healthy Living (Travel and Health)
3. "Juiceman's Power of Juicing" by Jay Kordich
4. Acid-Alkaline Balance (Travel and Health)
5. Health Tips From People Who've Lived 100-plus Years
6. Constipation and Its Remedies
7. What Does It Take to Clean Fresh Food? (NPR)
8. HOW TO CLEAN OUT THE COLON NATURALLY WITH FOOD (LiveStrong.com)
9. Eat less live longer (Travel and Health)
10. The Best Times to Eat for Weight Loss
11. Sleep helps 'detox' your brain
• The glymphatic system clears away toxins or waste products that could be responsible for brain diseases, such as Alzheimer's disease and other neurological disorders.
• In this study, the team conducted a series of new experiments on mice and found that the glymphatic system is nearly 10 times more active during sleep. 
12. Is carbonyl detoxification an important anti-aging process during sleep?
13. What Is the Metabolic Syndrome?
14. Could You Have Type 2 Diabetes?
15. Four Important Cleaning Tasks In Your Morning Routine (Travel to Health)
16. Want to Lose Weight, Boost Energy? 5 Reasons to Eat Breakfast
17. Which Food Fights Cancer Better? (Travel to Health)
18. Evening Hours May Pose Higher Risk for Overeating, Especially When Under Stress, Study Finds
19. Self-help steps to get through hemorrhoid flare-ups
• Some effective steps you can take to care for hemorrhoids:
• Step up the fiber
• Less strain, more gain
• Off-the-shelf hemorrhoid remedies
• Time for hemorrhoid removal?
20. Hemorrhoids: The Definitive Guide to Medical and Surgical Treatment (Cleveland Clinic)