Sarah's "Extreme Green" Challenge - Day 1

Raw green foods are the NUMBER ONE missing link in the modern western diet.

Whether someone is on the standard diet, is vegetarian or is vegan, it is almost guaranteed they are eating too much fat and sugar and not enough vegetables, of which greens are the most nutritionally potent.

And most people continue to eat in this way when they go raw - just using different foods to get their fat and sugar fix, and favouring these "instant satisfaction" foods over the less appetizing green veggies. 

We have been conditioned to think that five small servings of fruit and vegetables a day is enough and that is still the official word from most western governments. Chances are, if you have been researching raw food for a while, you already know that is rubbish!

In restaurants, it always amazes me to note that the average person will polish off every morsel on their plate except for anything green and leafy. Lettuce leaves or sprigs of herb that the chef added "as a garnish" (since of course this "rabbit food" is not an essential nutritional component of the meal) are usually to be found neatly pushed the side of the otherwise empty plate.

Greens are the missing link in the diet for two reasons: the MASSIVE amount of nutrition they provide with NO undesirable trade-offs, and the fact that when you are consuming them in large quantities you'll naturally be eating less - a lot less - of the foods that don't serve you.

Greens are also the ultimate BALANCING food. Eat enough of them and they balance your appetite, they balance your blood sugar, and they balance your mood, all of which helps you to achieve balance in your external world : )

More about all of these subjects soon. For now, here are the results of day 1 of the challenge... 

WHAT I ATE:

Breakfast: Green smoothie: two bananas, juice of two oranges, 100g of spinach.
Lunch: Came in hungry after a morning out so ill-advisedly hoovered up two tablespoons of Rainforest Nut Butter while preparing lunch, in direct contravention of rule no 3 ; ) Around 20g of wild rocket salad, two nori wraps (50g) with 50g of alfalfa sprouts, grated carrot and half an avocado.
Afternoon snack: Juice of 180g kale, 2 pears and 1 lemon
Afternoon snack II: Juice of 100g spinach and 4 carrots
Dinner: Exactly the same nori wraps as at lunch (soooooo good), which equals 100g of greens, plus 100g of mung bean sprouts. Juice of 200g chard, 1 lemon and half an apple.
DAILY TOTAL = 900g :))

COMMENTS:

I was definitely "green loading" towards the end of the day ; ) I think I probably ate, if anything, less than usual yesterday in calorie terms (not that I count them but let me tell you, I eat A LOT!)

With green leafy vegetables containing anything from around 15 to 35 calories per 100g, astoundingly my 900g target only contributes around 200 calories per day. I don't think there is any other way to get 200 calories that (a) is such a gigantic volume; (b) contains so much nutrition and (c) "fills you up" so much.   

In fact, I was already pretty full before I had the last 300g of greens - the mung beans and the last juice (which did not taste good).

I was determined to get there on day one, but in general I don't believe in consuming food when you're not hungry, no matter how much goodness it contains.

Point is, lately I have been eating wayyyy too many low-nutrition foods (more about THAT soon too!) so I am re-setting my appetite here. What I am hoping is that the discipline of consuming such a huge volume of greens per day will leave no room in my diet for those foods that are heavy on the body but light on nutrition.

I am off to a great start with this experiment because for the first time in months I experienced no cravings for foods like that, and my energy and mood were high and steady throughout the day and evening.

Let the experiment continue.......