https://www.nutritionist-resource.org.uk/memberarticles/revitalising-drinks

For me, the summer months are so precious that I want to feel my very best every day. That’s why I’ve created these recipes of truly revitalising drinks that are not only refreshing during the hot weather, but energising and good for your health long-term.

Many of the drinks we buy from supermarkets or during our days out will look appealing — colourful labels stating the various health benefits that convince us to buy them. And they may even offer an immediate refreshment, but how often will you feel your energy drop afterwards?

As an alternative, these recipes have your health in mind, helping to support steady blood sugar levels which is crucial for energy and mood. Their tastes may take time to get used to, but they’re worth it!

Cherry lemonade
Serves 3

Ingredients

250g frozen sour cherries
1 litre coconut water
A pinch of sea salt
3 lemons, peeled
3 tbsp olive oil
1.5 litres of water (filtered or spring)
Method

In a blender, combine all the ingredients until smooth.
Pour into a jug and keep chilled in the fridge until ready to serve.
This drink is delicious and revitalising, and also very cleansing. Sour cherries are anti-inflammatory, benefit brain cognition, and improve sleep, while coconut water is rich in electrolytes — essential minerals such as sodium, calcium, and potassium — vital for many key functions in the body.

Five-flavour green juice
Serves 2

Ingredients

1 cucumber
1 lemon, peeled
1cm chunk of fresh ginger, peeled
4 sticks of celery
3 carrots, peeled
2 apples, cores removed
3 handfuls of salad greens (dandelion leaves are a great addition!)
Method

Chop the fruit and vegetables into chunks.
If you have a juicer, add the ingredients and juice. Depending on your preference, drink immediately or leave to chill in the fridge.
At-home juicing method
If you do not have a juicer, don’t fret! You can either drink this straight from the blender if you don’t mind a thicker texture, or you can juice using some gadgets you likely already have in your kitchen.

You will need:

A blender
A square of cheesecloth
A fine mesh strainer/sieve
A large jug
Add your ingredients to the blender and blend until smooth.
Once blended, set up your straining station!
Place the mesh strainer on top of your jug, and place the cheesecloth over the sieve. Pour the blended concoction slowly onto the cheesecloth. The juice will run through the cloth, leaving the pulp behind.
To catch every drop of juice, gather the cloth by each end, twist into a ball and gently squeeze (making sure to keep it over the jug).
Chill in the fridge until ready to serve.
Vegetables are an essential part of a healthy diet. Raw greens are especially beneficial, containing chlorophyll, essential minerals, and vitamins. Cucumbers are anti-inflammatory and rich in vitamin K (important for blood clotting and helping wounds to heal). Lemon juice is rich in vitamin C, helping to protect and maintain cells, healthy skin, blood vessels, and bones. Lemon juice also stimulates the liver and the body’s production of bile, thus aiding digestion. Finally, ginger, when used in moderation, balances serotonin and dopamine, and supports healthy blood pressure.

Upgrading your water
Many people have an aversion to drinking the volume of water they need to maintain health — from my own observations, this is due to disliking the taste or the volume of water required.

My advice is to drink water in small quantities throughout the day. If possible, buy a water filter to keep in the fridge, and fill up a large bottle to take with you. While plain water is great for hydration, adding one part coconut water can help keep our bodies in balance (thanks to those electrolytes). To boost flavour and get some additional health benefits, add a dash of freshly squeezed lemon or orange juice. A pinch of Himalayan sea salt is another great addition as these contain trace minerals and are very different to refined salt.

These tips are particularly useful if you enjoy fizzy drinks — simply switch out plain water for sparkling, and you have a nutritious, refreshing tipple!

The post Revitalising Drinks appeared first on Food For Consciousness.

Now that the supply of spring wild greens is diminishing I decided to include start this. So far feels great (though not my favourite taste!

https://www.medicalmedium.com/blog/heavy-metal-detox-smoothie

Heavy Metal Detox Smoothie

Ingredients:

2 bananas
2 cups wild blueberries
1 cup cilantro (coriander)
1 cup orange juice
1 tsp barley grass juice powder
1 tsp spirulina
1 small handful of Atlantic dulse
Optional: water or coconut water or fresh orange juice to blend

Directions:

In a high-speed blender, blend all ingredients until smooth. If a thinner consistency is desired, add up to 1 cup of water. Enjoy

Spirulina: This edible blue-green algae draws out heavy metals from your brain, central nervous system, and liver, and soaks up heavy metals extracted by barley grass juice extract powder. Take 2 teaspoons mixed in water, coconut water, or juice.

Barley grass juice powder: prepares the mercury for complete absorption by the spirulina. This nutritive grass has the ability to draw heavy metals out of your spleen, intestinal tract, pancreas, thyroid, and reproductive system. Drink 1-2 teaspoons mixed into coconut water or juice.

Coriander: Goes deep into hard-to-reach places, extracting metals from yesteryear (so it’s great for that mercury inheritance you’re carrying around!). Blend one cup in a smoothie or juice, or add to salad or guacamole.

Wild blueberries: Draw heavy metals out of your brain tissue, healing and repairing any gaps created by oxidation when the heavy metals are removed. It is important to use wild blueberries, as they possess unique phytonutrients with special detoxifying capabilities. The potent antioxidants in wild blueberries help reverse any oxidative damage left behind by the heavy metal removal. This is especially important for your brain tissue—in fact, wild blueberries are the most powerful food for halting or in some cases reversing Alzheimer’s and dementia. Eat at least one cup daily. Note: while cultivated blueberries are nutritious, they lack the metal-drawing ability of the wild blueberries. Wild blueberries can be found in the freezer section of most supermarkets.

Atlantic dulse: In addition to mercury, this edible seaweed binds to lead, aluminum, copper, cadmium, and nickel. Unlike other seaweeds, Atlantic dulse is a powerful force for removing mercury on its own. Atlantic dulse goes into deep, hidden places of the digestive tract and gut, seeking out mercury, binding to it, and never releasing it until it leaves the body. Eat two tablespoons of flakes daily, or an equal amount of strips if it’s in whole-leaf form. Note: As it comes from the ocean, if you are concerned about the dulse itself having mercury, be aware that Atlantic sea dulse will not release any mercury it might possess into the body. It holds on to the mercury as it works its way through, and even grabs onto other metals along the way and drives them out as well. Atlantic dulse is a critical part of the team because it can hang out near the finish line (i.e., our colon), waiting for the other foods that have been grabbing on to heavy metals along the way. It serves as emergency backup, helping ensure that all the heavy metals that made it as far as the colon actually leave the body.

This smoothie recipe gives you a simple and tasty way to get all of these five foods into your daily diet in just one go. Drink this smoothie daily for optimal benefits.

The post Medical Medium Heavy Metal Detox Smoothie appeared first on Food For Consciousness.

I use this method to pick nettles without getting stung. It’s actually easy when you get into the swing of it!

The post Cultivating your own Wild Nettle Patch appeared first on Food For Consciousness.

. Ingredients

Chocolate:
50g cacao butter
1 Tbspn lucuma powder
1 tsp cacao powder
1 /4 tsp vanilla paste

Peppermint Cream:
1 Tbspn coconut butter (sometimes known as coconut oil)
1/4 tsp vanilla paste
1 dessert spoon lucuma powder

To make the chocolate melt the cacao butter over warm water. Stir in lucuma, cacao powder and vanilla
To make the cream filling warm coconut butter until soft and stir in lucuma and peppermint
Spoon chocolate mixture into silicone moulds, add a little cream filling and top with chocolate.
Set in freezer.
Makes delicious peppermint chocolate with a lovely soft texture.

Peppermint essential oil has an uplifting effect on the mind. It also stimulates the production of the satiety hormone ghrelin and suppresses leptin the hunger hormone. After dinner mints make sense!

The post Raw Peppermint Cream Chocolates appeared first on Food For Consciousness.

This smoothie is perfectly designed to include five key ingredients that work together in synergy to pull heavy metals like mercury, lead, aluminum, nickel, copper, and cadmium out of your organs where they accumulate.

Toxic heavy metals are virtually everywhere, and are present in things we come in contact with every day, such as aluminum cans and aluminum foil, batteries, metal cookware, old paint, and even the foods we eat. For instance, pesticides and herbicides (which are hard to completely avoid even on a strict organic diet), are a common source of heavy metals. As a result, most of us are carrying around heavy metals that have been with us for almost our whole lives and which have burrowed deep inside our tissues.

Unfortunately, it is these “old” metals, the ones that have been lurking in our system for prolonged periods of time, that pose the greatest threat. For example, over time toxic heavy metals can oxidize, causing damage to surrounding tissue and promoting inflammation. They literally poison our bodies, and can inflict damage on virtually every system and organ, including our brain, liver, digestive system, and other parts of our nervous system. Toxic heavy metals put an immense burden on our immune system, leaving us vulnerable to a variety of illnesses.

While toxins of every kind are harmful, heavy metals pose a unique threat. Not only are they damaging in their own right, they are also a form of neurotoxin (a poison that disrupts nerve function and confuses your immune system). Heavy metal neurotoxins can inflame and irritate our central nervous system (especially our brain), causing multiple symptoms such as memory loss, brain fog, fatigue, and depression. Toxic heavy metals can also promote inflammation in the digestive tract, releasing poisons into our gut as well. As if this isn’t bad enough, heavy metals also serve as a source of food for viruses, bacteria, parasites, and other pathogens in our body.

For example, heavy metals can serve as a feeding ground for Streptococcus A or B, E. coli, C. difficile, H. pylori, and yeast cells. This can create an overgrowth of multiple bacteria in our gut, resulting in a condition known as SIBO (small intestinal bacterial overgrowth), which is characterized by bloating, abdominal pain, diarrhea, constipation (or both), and can lead to nutrient deficiencies. Additionally, when viruses such as Epstein-Barr and shingles feed off toxic heavy metals, this can produce symptoms such as tingling, numbness, fatigue, anxiety, heart palpitations, ringing in the ears, dizziness and vertigo, as well as neck pain, knee pain, foot pain, pain in the back of the head, and a variety of other aches and pains that are often attributed to other causes.

It’s virtually impossible not to take in a certain amount of these toxic heavy metals in our modern era, so it’s vitally important to our health that we get them out before they can wreak further havoc on our health. Thankfully, it’s relatively simple to remove them from our organs if we consume the right foods to do so. Adding the following all-star team of foods to your diet and being diligent in your efforts to consume them will go a long way toward ridding your body of heavy metals:

Spirulina: This edible blue-green algae draws out heavy metals from your brain, central nervous system, and liver, and soaks up heavy metals extracted by barley grass juice extract powder. Take 2 teaspoons mixed in water, coconut water, or juice.

Barley grass juice powder: prepares the mercury for complete absorption by the spirulina. This nutritive grass has the ability to draw heavy metals out of your spleen, intestinal tract, pancreas, thyroid, and reproductive system. Drink 1-2 teaspoons mixed into coconut water or juice.

Cilantro: Goes deep into hard-to-reach places, extracting metals from yesteryear (so it’s great for that mercury inheritance you’re carrying around!). Blend one cup in a smoothie or juice, or add to salad or guacamole.

Wild blueberries: Draw heavy metals out of your brain tissue, healing and repairing any gaps created by oxidation when the heavy metals are removed. It is important to use wild blueberries, as they possess unique phytonutrients with special detoxifying capabilities. The potent antioxidants in wild blueberries help reverse any oxidative damage left behind by the heavy metal removal. This is especially important for your brain tissue—in fact, wild blueberries are the most powerful food for halting or in some cases reversing Alzheimer’s and dementia. Eat at least one cup daily. Note: while cultivated blueberries are nutritious, they lack the metal-drawing ability of the wild blueberries. Wild blueberries can be found in the freezer section of most supermarkets.

Atlantic dulse: In addition to mercury, this edible seaweed binds to lead, aluminum, copper, cadmium, and nickel. Unlike other seaweeds, Atlantic dulse is a powerful force for removing mercury on its own. Atlantic dulse goes into deep, hidden places of the digestive tract and gut, seeking out mercury, binding to it, and never releasing it until it leaves the body. Eat two tablespoons of flakes daily, or an equal amount of strips if it’s in whole-leaf form. Note: As it comes from the ocean, if you are concerned about the dulse itself having mercury, be aware that Atlantic sea dulse will not release any mercury it might possess into the body. It holds on to the mercury as it works its way through, and even grabs onto other metals along the way and drives them out as well. Atlantic dulse is a critical part of the team because it can hang out near the finish line (i.e., our colon), waiting for the other foods that have been grabbing on to heavy metals along the way. It serves as emergency backup, helping ensure that all the heavy metals that made it as far as the colon actually leave the body.

Ingredients:

2 bananas
2 cups wild blueberries
1 cup cilantro
1 cup orange juice
1 tsp barley grass juice powder
1 tsp spirulina
1 small handful of Atlantic dulse
Optional: water or coconut water or fresh orange juice to blend
Directions:

In a high speed blender, blend all ingredients until smooth. If a thinner consistency is desired, add up to 1 cup of water.

The post Heavy Metal Detox Smoothie appeared first on Food For Consciousness.

Here are my two favourite smoothie recipes for the beginning of the day.

You can get my complete earthly paradise wake up routine including these recipes in a beautiful docoment by subscribing here.

The first is a raw fruit smoothie but one that doesn’t raise blood sugars excessively and what is more is alkalising to the body.

The second is a herbal elixir which also contains raw goodness as well as heated herbs. It is designed to lift your neurochemistry whilst getting you into a mainly fat burning rather than sugar burning mode, ideal for weight control, sustainable energy and brain function.

Both recipes are vegan, alkaline and ketogenic diet-friendly. Of course, you can vary the ingredients according to your own preferences.

Note the images here are for decorative purposes. The ingredients you use will largely be preprepared!

Cherry Coconut Smoothie

sour cherries

120g frozen sour cherries

100g frozen strawberries

30g frozen blueberries

1 banana

1 tsp noni powder

350ml raw coconut water (Tiana supply a good one)

noni fruit, juice and powder

Simply blend all the ingredients together until smooth and creamy.

Serves 2 to 3 people

Sour cherries are a wonderful fruit. They taste delicious and are also low-glycemic and alkalising so you can get the fruit in without overdosing on sugars. Noni gives an amazing mind lift. It helps tryptophan to be absorbed to boost serotonin levels. Raw coconut water so much more energising and refreshing than the pasteurised version. You can feel the difference over a period of time.

Creamy Herbal Elixir

passion flower tea

Tea herbs:

1 Tablespoon passionflower tea

I Tablespoon tulsi tea

½ tsp rhodiola powder

Smoothie ingredients:

cacao beans

2 Tablespoons raw organic coconut butter

3 Tablespoons yacon syrup

1 Tablespoon ground cacao paste or cacao powder

1 Tablespoon maca

1/2 Tablespoon lecithin (GMO free)

½ lentil size piece of shilajit

pinch chilli powder

pinch sea or Himalayan salt

tulsi aka holy basil

1g cardamom (tiny sprinkle)

1g cinnamon (tiny sprinkle)

Tonic Herbs:

All or some of these tonic herbs plus any of your choosing:

2g he shou wu (a small sprinkle)

ginseng

2g lions mane (a small sprinkle)

1g brahmi (a tiny sprinkle)

5g/1 teaspoon ashwaghanda

½ dropper ginseng tincture (e.g. Jing Herbs shen nong)

Make the tea with the tea herbs in a cafetiere.

Put the remaining ingredients in a blender jug and add a little cool pure water (spring or distilled). Add a cup of tea and blend it all together.

Add the rest of the tea.

Serves 2 to 3 people

This is a tasty and convenient way to consume a selection of tonic herbs, either those suggested here or ones of your choosing. Coconut butter is a precursor for essential hormones and provides clean energy. Maca helps keep hormones in their pristine state. Shilajit supplies a broad range of trace minerals. Lion’s mane is a brain builder. Passionflower tea contains Maoi’s which boost neurotransmitter levels and can noticeably uplift mood. Rhodiola is an adaptogen which boosts mental energy and serotonin levels. Lecithin is another magic ingredient which supplies essential phospholipids for the brain whilst also acting as an emulsifier, making the smoothie nice and creamy. 

All in all, this is an ideal alternative to a morning coffee! Enjoy 🙂

The post Good Morning! Cherry Coconut Smoothie and Creamy Herbal Elixir appeared first on Food For Consciousness.