5-day Juice Challenge

It all started when I watched a documentary film called "Fat, Sick & Nearly Dead". It's all about an Australian guy who's battling from obesity and some sort of an autoimmune skin disease. He's at his 40s, almost 300 pounds and taking a lot of meds for his skin condition everyday. He came to a point thinking of becoming healthy enable to lose weight and at the same time to stop taking any meds. That's when he started his juice diet.

Juice diet is, as what the word suggests, drinking just juice made of fresh fruits and vegetables. Yes, this means your brekky, lunch, dinner and even snacks are all liquid! So after watching this documentary, I challenged myself to go through the same process this guy has been. I am neither obese nor suffering from any kind of disease but what made me accept the challenge is that I felt really inspired with this guy's story. He did his juicing for 60 days which is, for me as a food (esp meat) lover, CRAZY!

Anyway, the day after watching this film, I decided on getting myself a juicer. Man, there are loads of juicers in the market to choose from which depends on person's needs! I bought the Kenwood 700-watt centrifugal one. And to be honest, I never thought I would really love and enjoy using it! This is specially made for lazy pips like me. :P So I started juicing September 1, after knowing that my body fat is 1kg over! Lol. Yes, I went to some electronic health device in a mall which measures your BMI, body fat and so on. That really helped me decide on doing this challenge.

Trial day: I bought loads of veggies and fruits the night before. Being a newbie, I cut and prepared everything that I bought and slammed them all in the juicer. I have created a pitcher (1 liter) of juice and started on drinking it. The taste is... well of course, like veggies! I put the rest in a separate container and brought it with me in the office. This juice contains: carrots, celery, green apples, baby spinach, cucumbers and some lemons. Refreshing but not to be considered a tasty juice. Then I started searching for recipes online. I was immediately hooked and started researching more about this juice diet. There are numerous amount of positive feedbacks on juicing up, although there are some risks of being in this type of diet. I actually don't know what to believe but I am still convinced on continuing my diet plan. After doing a lot of readings, I found out that drinking your juice fresh from juicing is best. The longest time you can keep it is 3 days otherwise you won't get any nutrition out of it anymore. For me, drinking it right there and then is hard but the best I can do is to drink a freshly-juiced glass of fruits in the morning and juice up more to bring with me to work for my lunch and do another fresh one for my dinner when I return from work. So far, it's working perfectly fine with my schedule. Honestly, I was quite impressed of myself getting up as early as 6 in the morning just to prepare my brekky and lunch for the day. People who really knows me would think this is quite an achievement, knowing that I really hate getting up early. So here goes my 5-day juicing recipes.

Day 1: brekky is 4 fresh oranges. Leftovers from trial day as lunch. Dinner is 10 medium-sized asparagus, 4 carrots, 2 apples, 2 cucumbers and 2 tomatoes.

Day 2: brekky is 1 pack of strawberries, a handful of raspberry and a handful of mint. Lunch is 6-7 leaves of kale, 2 green apples, 4 stalks of celery, 2 cucumbers, 1/2 lemon and a thumb-sized ginger. I call this the "mean green juice". Super yummy and very healthy too! Dinner is 4 cucumbers, 1 apple, a handful of baby spinach and 1/4 beetroot.

Day 3: brekky is a pack of strawberries, 1 green apple, orange I call it "strawrangeapple". Lunch is 1/2 beetroot, 2 carrots, 1 cucumber, a bunch of watercress, 1/2 pear, 1/2 lemon and 1/8 purple cabbage. This made me 1 1/2 glass so I treated myself with a snack out of it. Lol. This juice is well-known for cleansing your liver. Not really my favorite as it tastes like earth but knowing that I'm drinking something to clean my liver, well, bottoms up! Dinner is another glass of mean green as so far, this is my favorite!

Day 4: brekky is 5 green apples and a handful of mint. Lunch is 1 bunch of cilantro, 1 bunch of baby spinach, 1 stalk of broccoli and 1/2 ginger. They say this is a healing juice - helps heal your wounds fast. I doubled the quantity of this healing juice to make me self another glass for dinner.

Day 5: brekky is 1/2 pineapple, 2 cucumbers and 6-8 pieces of mint. Man, this was the most refreshing drink I've ever tasted in my entire life. I am not a fan of pineapple but I did changed my mind because of this recipe! Lunch is 2 handful of baby spinach, 4-5 pieces of romaine lettuce, 1 cucumber, 2 stalks of celery and 1 pear. Dinner is 1/2 pineapple, 1/2 beetroot and 1 bunch of watercress.

After this 5-day juicing, I went back to check on my weight and surprisingly, I lost 1.6kgs! Wow! The best part is that I have never felt nauseated or weak or hungry although whenever I see my favorite fast-food chains, I have this urge of getting myself everything I can order! But overall, I feel great! Also, I need to mention that I have so much relied on water during this 5-day period. My coffee intake was down to 1 cup a day from 3-4 cups.

So what I did after this 5-day juicing? Anyone who have not heard of a cheat day is a complete moron! Well, kidding aside, yeah I did my cheat daysss. Lol. I am craving for solid foods so I decided to have my weekend as my cheat days. After eating my favorite steak, veal chops, kofta, and teriyaki yakisoba (with small portions if course!), I head back to check again my body composition analysis. So far, everything is normal and optimal.

Anyway, I just want to share this experience to you. I am recommending this diet but be sure to check with your doctor first to see whether you are fit to do this diet plan. I have decided to continue this for another week to reach my desired weight. So, wish me luck! Ta-ta!