Hey guys,

latley Ive been getting a whole bunch of my favorite fruits and veggies and juicing them. I find it easier to get most of my daily vits, minerals etc by juicing and it saves me a world of time (i stick them in the vitamix then strain using nut milk bag)

Would it be safe to consume mainly juice? I do eat some cooked foods such as grains and tea.

I know juicng is very healthy, its just I dont want to make myself sick lol. I find im not eating many fruits and veggies in their whole form these days at all.

Am I cool to keep juicing away ??????

[Would it be safe to consume mainly juice? ]

No. The fiber is the best part. Eating them mostly whole with an occasional juice is a better strategy.

arugula,

If one does it in a Vita Mix one still gets the fiber, as long as one doesn't strain it through a nut milk bag.

When you use a blender or a vitamix you partially break down the fibers so that you don't get the full benefit of them.

It's somewhat intermediate between juicing and whole.

arugula Wrote:
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> No. The fiber is the best part. Eating them mostly whole with an occasional juice is a better strategy.

---why and how are fibers the best part...?

---human organism is unable to digest fibers...- fiber in fiber out...

---it is this great myth - an outdated old concept - about how "fibers are good for your health...

---boyd, you should go with your body instinct and mind sense, just drink juice, and if you feel fine, you ARE fine... don't just follow blindly other peoples concepts, as there are so many false-beliefs out there spreading doubts and fear...

[it is this great myth - an outdated old concept - about how "fibers are good for your health... ]

Where is the substance behind your statement?

Here is mine:
Effect of a very-high-fiber vegetable, fruit, and nut diet on serum lipids and colonic function.
Jenkins DJ, Kendall CW, Popovich DG, Vidgen E, Mehling CC, Vuksan V, Ransom TP, Rao AV, Rosenberg-Zand R, Tariq N, Corey P, Jones PJ, Raeini M, Story JA, Furumoto EJ, Illingworth DR, Pappu AS, Connelly PW.
Metabolism. 2001 Apr;50(4):494-503.
PMID: 11288049 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]

Stripping the fiber away would not yield the same results. This paper compared three diets moderate, high, and very high in fiber and the health benefits were practically linear with fiber content. All were high to very high in fruits and vegetables.

arugula Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> >
> Where is the substance behind your statement?
>
> Here is mine:
> Effect of a very-high-fiber vegetable, fruit, and
> nut diet on serum lipids and colonic function.
> Jenkins DJ, Kendall CW, Popovich DG, Vidgen E,
> Mehling CC, Vuksan V, Ransom TP, Rao AV,
> Rosenberg-Zand R, Tariq N, Corey P, Jones PJ,
> Raeini M, Story JA, Furumoto EJ, Illingworth DR,
> Pappu AS, Connelly PW.
> Metabolism. 2001 Apr;50(4):494-503.
> PMID: 11288049
>
> Stripping the fiber away would not yield the same
> results. This paper compared three diets moderate,
> high, and very high in fiber and the health
> benefits were practically linear with fiber
> content. All were high to very high in fruits and
> vegetables.


---the substance behind my statement IS my OWN experience, experimenting with different diets, food combination and forms of foods ingested in connection to fasting. The period following a fast is the best tool to test how, which, and in what form a food is best for you to ingest - drink and/or eat. You should complete a few fasts and try for yourself... Why, because only at that time, your body's all senses are sharpest in order for you to perceive the foods (solid/liquid) as they really are and how they impact your body-mind, not as you think they are, not as you been learned to think how they are...

---if you have some good fasting experience you will understand what i mean...

---as well, here is one of the articles with a sane conclusion on fibers (with which i agree with), just be sure to read the whole article until the end...:

[fibermenace.com]

It's very sad that you'd rather read junk and take it to heart than something substantial. But I find that to be a common theme in this board.

Go, Arugula! So nice and refreshing to see science referenced to back up or to refute claims. People tend to drift off into dreamy lands when it comes to raw nutrition, facts and fantasies, so thanks for providing ground.

Although there is wisdom behind all components of a whole food, the fresh juice contained in a whole food is relatively more valuable to the human body than fiber.

The human body could live for weeks or months on fresh juice alone, but it could live only very briefly on fiber alone.



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 01/17/2009 05:09AM by Omega.

There has been mentioned the effects of the liver, of much fruit sugar at once, not buffered by the fiber. A girl over on GI2MR had her liver enzymes shoot through the roof.

If someone has been fruitarian for many years first, maybe then they will have adapted, their liver and all. (excuse the grammar for they/their).

My browsers dictionary didn't have fruitarian, shame on it! I had to add it.

My understanding is that the worse the diet the more the need to add fiber. Thus those who eat SAD need extra fiber so the gut will have something to push against to get the gunk ( meat, white flour, fat, etc. ) out. Hence the "high" fiber craze.

Many people have been healed with juice diet.
Some juice diets have been 90 days in length.
Some folks on the longer juice diets may use laxatives.
A short juice "fast" lasting about a week can be a nice way to get some mild cleansing.

A raw diet, with some fresh juices, seems to work fine for many folks.

Purely juice long term seems "unnatural" and therefore probably unwise;( although it's probably useful for some medical conditions )

Raw food diet has plenty of fiber. Fiber supplements are processed non-food.

Probably 99% of scientists base their findings on folks used to SAD diet.

I agree with the article posted by Justin 1 that adding the following fibers to your diet will do anyone a disservice:

QUOTE

The June issue of Mayo Clinic Women's HealthSource suggests ways to increase fiber in your diet:

— Eat a high-fiber cereal or add a few spoonfuls of unprocessed wheat bran to your cereal.

- Add bran cereal or unprocessed bran when making foods such as meatloaf, breads, muffins, cakes, and cookies.

— Choose whole-grain bread instead of white bread. Look for breads made with 100 percent whole-wheat flour.

— Substitute whole-wheat flour for half or all of the white flour when baking.

— Experiment with whole grains and whole-grain products such as brown rice, barley, whole-wheat pasta, and bulgur.

— Try adding canned kidney beans, garbanzos and other beans to canned soups or salads.

— Eat snacks that are high in fiber, such as fresh and dried fruits, raw vegetables, low-fat popcorn, and whole-grain crackers.

— Add barley to soups and stews.

END QUOTE

Indeed, Arugula, the study is based on "cooked fooders" eating less than ideal foods, ie grains. The vegetables were most like not only cooked but overcooked.
For "science" specific info on the diets is remarkably sparse. I have no clue what this means: "low-fat (contemporary therapeutic diet)" so I have no idea if the comparison is meaningful in any way at all.

QUOTE

Ten healthy volunteers each took 3 metabolic diets of 2 weeks duration. The diets were: high-vegetable, fruit, and nut (very-high-fiber, 55 g/1,000 kcal); starch-based containing cereals and legumes (early agricultural diet); or low-fat (contemporary therapeutic diet).

UNQUOTE

note the: cereals and legumes

[www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov]

Jiva Wrote:
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> There has been mentioned the effects of the liver,
> of much fruit sugar at once, not buffered by the
> fiber.

That's why low-sugar green vegetable juice is preferable to both fruit juice and high-sugar vegetable (carrot) juice.

Hi Boyd

This discussion seems to have got very complicated. To me, it's quite simple. Juice is a fractured food. When you have juice you are only getting part of the food. Vitamins and minerals work together. Nutrients are present in, say, an apple, in exactly the correct proportions to do their stuff in our bodies. The fibre's a necessary part of the package as well. I wouldn't say 'the most important', but necessary. Look at the pulp from your juicing. There will be nutrients thrown away in the pulp that result in a nutritionally imbalanced liquid entering your body.

NOW, having said that, I have juice each morning, and greatly enjoy it. But a diet of 'mostly', or 'all juice' - that's something I'd never do.

Cooked stuff plus mostly juice - not the greatest of diets. Jettison the cooked, and/or eat more of your plant foods whole.

And, answering Justin, I have skim-read through the article you have linked to.

This article appears to me to be about the ill-effects of people consuming artificially high amounts of fibre - isolated fibre, fibre divorced from the plant foods in which they occurred.

I cannot see that this article applies to those on a raw food diet, eating the fibre that is part of the perfectly balanced package of vitamins, minerals (and, yes, cellulose) that a whole food gives us.

No wonder there are various health problems from 'fibre', when people are stripping the bran from wheat, then sprinkling it on their (cooked grain) cereals, and the article is correct to warn us of these. Sure, those on terrible diets who are constipated need more fibre, but this should be in the form of whole foods.

We shouldn't start adding to the fibre naturally occurring in our foods, but neither should we be taking it away.

Take the fibrous element in an apple for example - pectin, a gel-like substance. This stimulates bowel movements by increasing the volume of bulk in the colon. I've felt the effect myself many times (well, since raw, as I'm more sensitive now to my body's 'movements'!) - it's an interesting sensation, and I only experience it with apples (pears sometimes). The fibre in the apple is in this way helping the apple pass through us, along with anything else that could do with a move along! Now, this is a good thing, and the fibre is all part of the little present the apple gives us. Who knows, perhaps when we desire an apple, it's because things are being a little tardy 'down there' and our body sets up a search for this fruit to put things right!

Likewise, when we eat the fibre of an apple together with the sugars in it, the fibre allows a steady rate of nutrient absorption, helping to maintain a steady blood glucose level, and reducing the amount of fat absorbed.

So, whether or not our bodies are absorbing any nutrients from the cellulose as it passes through us (I guess we have to be sure that scientists know all there is to know about everything to be sure about that...), or whether or not the cellulose passes out of us just as it went in, it's sure doing some useful things along the way.

So...ADDED fibre - no way.

It's the scenario where scientists notice that a certain plant food has health benefits, thinking 'ah - that must be Vitamin X then!', extracting Vitamin X from the whole food, selling it to people devoid of the other vitamins in the whole food that were vital to get it working properly (basic chemistry), then ten years later noticing that people taking large quantities of isolated Vitamin X are getting cancer (then saying 'er, oops - sorry!).

But we must be wary of TAKING AWAY fibre from a food that has it in just the right proportion needed for our body.

So I disagree with your statement, Justin, that to say fibre has health benefits is a myth. As some will read that and assume it is saying that we don't even need it in our whole, natural foods. And if you are saying that, then I disagree. We certainly need the fibre in our foods.

When juicing, we are mucking around with the whole food, as humans are wont to do, to their peril. And I have seen material that suggests other vital things, ie things other than fibre, are being lost in the pulp as well, but don't have chapter and verse on those.

(oh, and Boyd - when I said your diet wasn't the 'greatest' diet, forgive me if that sounded dismissive. It may be light years ahead in terms of health than the diet you left behind. I'd just say 'yes, juice sometimes', but rediscover the pleasures of sinking your teeth into the squishy, juicy, fruit whole!)

arugula Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> It's very sad that you'd rather read junk and take it to heart than something substantial. But I find that to be a common theme in this board.


---...???...of course i take in to my heart the result and conclusion based on my own experience, and the article i gave you is not junk... Man, you need to fast...

---it is a sign of a beginner driven by a restless mind, ever seeking in not wanting to find a real answer... - theories of others, specially these from "schooled doctors", etc are a great tool to entertain your mind and keep on intellectualizing about things you do not want to experience...

---mother nature is the smartest and wisest scientist and doctor who already has equipped your body with the needed inner intelligence and ability to heal and to choose right, the only thing what is required from you to do is to listen and allow space of rest and stillness for your body (and mind) in order to take necessary actions according to the need.

---by occupying and entertaining yourself with "external" concepts you definitely do not promote your own ability to grow and stay healthy...

debbietook Wrote:
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> The fibre's a necessary part of the package as well. I wouldn't say 'the most important', but necessary. Look at the pulp from your juicing. There will be nutrients thrown away in the pulp that result in a nutritionally imbalanced liquid entering your body.


---you get all the nutrients you need from the juice

---fiber do not contain any nutrients needed by your body

---fibers are fibers, and fibers are not digested by body..., fibers confuse body and take long time to expel, and often they are not completely eliminated, but become a compacted adverse matter in your intestines, which lead to adverse effects and illnesses symptoms.

---you can learn squeezing your fruits, specially citrus fruits: lemons, grapefruits, oranges, grapes, etc in a gentle manner, making of them a so called "thick" juice, as well you can learn to "chew" and spit out the fiber which seems in your mouth not easy going...

===in the end all is dependent on your own experience and testing..., my suggestion is to not copy blindly concepts and theories circulating so bravely in this and other forums eagerly promoted by people who lack their own first hand experience...

===sharing of personal "subjective" experience is of so much higher value...

My personal experience is that I have never had fibre compacted as adverse matter in my intestines - nor does it take a long time to expel.

- I've heard people argue that the entire system from mouth to intestine to anus is a kin to a pristine tube, yet it is these same people who believe it is necessary and healthy to have matter constantly pushing through that tube in order to function. Now both points have their possibility, but they are certainly incongruent.

- If someone indeed did not have internal deposits they would freely absorb from the air, sun, light, water, and juice without the need ever for any such matter to flow much as the flow of water in any plumbing system does not benefit from putting even natural matter though it. Now if one was to push dense matter through such a system it would either obstruct or help the system along (you can see this when some people after consuming nuts or certain cooked foods actually 'layer' their elimination process in a good way). the loose juicer material and rougher plant fibers would of course serve its own function in such a system, to gently cleanse. I won't get into all the particulars as to why I believe this is VERY naive model, other then it being a helpful guide to correcting certain basic ailments.

- So from the standpoint of observation from your average person in disease or transition, yeah it would seem fiber would be of utmost benefit, but this is already also assuming that the system in itself is already functioning at this high degree of pristine, which the likelihood it is not, which again would defeat the whole purpose of requiring fiber in the first place as the body does not need NEW matter but needs to break down old matter.

- The very notion of fasting is to allow for the stopping of entering matter in order for existing accumulated debris and recent cellular decay to leave the body (whether this happens successfully is another matter). IMO juicing on a regular basis (used consciously to extend the nightly 'fasting' process) is great for facilitating this process on a small - regular - scale. making it perhaps not necessary, but certainly beneficial, and not at all detrimental. After all you do plan on eating don't you? LOL...if not its just a matter of whether the body is healthy enough to remove that material on its own..you know?

- I would say for the OP that you might benefit from eating more of the the juicer fruits in their whole form and eating the fibrous veggies with your cooked meals as juice with dense foods alone might pose some trouble long term.

best,




[www.giveittomeraw.com]



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/18/2009 02:22AM by anaken.

IMO lots of fiber is a good thing. Jay Kordich, the juiceman, in his book "The Power of Juicing" says that he likes to juice the veggies and eat the fruit. He says its the best of both. You get plenty of fiber along with plenty of nutrients and juiced veggies taste good and so does eating whole fruits. Jay says this works well for him.

After reading the posts here, and looking at the video
of the author of "Fiber Menace", I cast my Vote with those who favor
a Low-Fiber, or No-Fiber, Diet. In my own case, fiber causes pressure
in the Colon which affects the connecting Nerves and other organs of
the body. I always feel best on a Liquid Diet......WY

- Another idea is that is fairly incongruous is that it is unnatural to consume juice. As if that has any meaning anyway.

- Whenever posed with this argument, I usually shrug and agree, as I am personally a big proponent of doing what is appropriate in un-natural circumstances, as opposed to listening to idealistic dogma

- however a few points on 'natural' juice.

- As raw foodists it is imperative that we question this 'base' survival-of-the-fittest view of pre-historical man that he would lack the higher intelligence of 'mechanically' tampering with his foods in any such way, even though the juicier and squishy fruits by their very 'design' seem - to me - to suggest a delivery mechanism of juice to the 'higher' intelligent life. Especially with the oft quoted abundance of material in a natural state.

- their also exists the example in the vegetable world a practice that many animals participate known as 'wadging'

- it is thought by some that this process of mastication until liquid is of utmost importance in the proper assimilation of nutrients and for digestive ease.


- if one was to purchase a bushel of celery and consume the entire thing with the discipline of the palette and tongue as to not take any non-liquid material. one would quicker have a mouth full of inswallowable 'lump' then finish the bushel.

- Now I'm not going to go so far as to say this lump, even as it becomes almost clear has NO nutritional value or is IMPOSSIBLE to digest or serves NO purpose .................................................................................
but you get the picture


[www.giveittomeraw.com]

>After reading the posts here, and looking at the video
of the author of "Fiber Menace", I cast my Vote with those who favor
a Low-Fiber, or No-Fiber, Diet. In my own case, fiber causes pressure
in the Colon which affects the connecting Nerves and other organs of
the body. I always feel best on a Liquid Diet......WY<

Me too, WY. :-) I'm juice fasting right now (14 days so far) and just had a wonderful healing this week of joint discomfort. 80/10/10 is great, but it's not the only game in town.

Sharrhan:


[www.facebook.com]

I had a thought that alludes to what happyway wrote above.

For those eating a SAD diet with lots of fiberless animal foods and sloppy cooked food, fiber in the diet is more important than fresh juice.

OTOH, for a 100% raw vegan with a "perfect" intake of fiber (all raw vegan foods contain it), fresh juice (especially green) becomes a very valuable addition to the diet.


For the medical establishment with a cooked food mindset, fiber IS very important for preventing disease by pushing the toxic animal foods and sloppy cooked food through the digestive system.

For the raw vegan "establishment," however, fiber can be taken for granted. As long as you're eating some, and NOT eating any fiberless food, it's all good, and one can set one's sights higher than simply "getting enough fiber" by adding fresh green juice to the diet.

Therefore, the relative importance of fiber all depends on one's position on the dietary spectrum.



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 01/18/2009 04:31AM by Omega.

kwan Wrote:
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> Me too, WY. :-) I'm juice fasting right now (14
> days so far) and just had a wonderful healing this
> week of joint discomfort.
Great!! That inspires me to do a Juice Fast
too. My Sciatic Nerve has been a problem of late. Bet
the pain would go away on a Liquid Diet.
Omega had some good thoughts.....it's all a question of
where you are in relation to Fiber......WY

Justin,

Let me first remind you that, with the respect of fibre and its adverse consequences, I made it clear in my post that I was talking about 'added fibre' rather than naturally occurring fibre. That was a salient point. However, in your reply you have made no reference to that, which after all was a central theme of my post.

Instead, you picked up on minor parts of the post, as follows: you commented in reply that fibre contains no nutrients, as if I had claimed it did. What I actually said was 'whether or not', ie I keep an open mind, ie I don't assume that scientists have discovered everything there is to discover about our bodies. Secondly, I talked later of the 'pulp' (from juice), which is a different thing from 'fibre' alone. Now, for example, pulp from the juiced flesh of an orange will contain the pith, which contains calcium, and in fact most of the calcium present in an orange I believe.

You commented in reply that fibre is not digested by the body, as if I had claimed it was. What I attempted to show is how the fibre eg in an apple assists the body's digestion of that apple.

I'm not sure what theory I am 'blindly following' here, but, as you advised yourself in one of your posts, Justin, trust mother nature. She has ensured that an apple gives you what your body needs (including the fibre, which will have a role to play in the way our body deals with that apple).

In the third part of your 'reply' to my post, you state that fibre 'confuses' the body. Justin, I cannot for the life of me see why the fibre that naturally occurs in a whole food would'confuse' the body! Again, I made it quite clear throughout my post that I was talking about naturally-occurring fibre. (Or, do you think that nature has in some way made a mistake, and we should be removing this?)

Finally, Justin, I'm sure you have a lot of interesting information to share, and in fact the article you linked to did (in my opinion) highlight the dangers of adding isolated fibre to our diets. But unfortunately your posts also say loud and clear that you are not very tolerant of anyone who has an opinion that simply differs from your own. You have implied, either directly or indirectly, that those who have offered their opinions (backed up) ie that 'mostly juicing' is not optimal, are 'blindly following', are 'beginners', 'lack experience', etc, and your reply to arugula is incredibly patronizing.

I look forward to more of your posts, but I do hope you will be able to resist the temptation to paint those who might not agree with you as complete duffers.

PS, Boyd, I hope the fascinating and diverse opinions expressed in this thread have been helpful :-) (Where are you, Boyd...)

Debbie - you were up even later than me - ha ha - night owls

Justin!

I read the info on the link to fibermenace.com. Then I read about the author(can you say, Soviet civil servant?). Then I did some research on his writings and theories. I now think of him as "Dr. Dostoevsky Diet." Though I may make myself some beet kvass shortly(good idea!), I am certainly not going to start eating "bone soup" and butter by the bucket-full. He's advocating the diet he was raised on as a Ukrainian, minus good rye bread perhaps--how could he have developed any digestive problems on it? This makes no sense. Maybe his theories do apply to some peoples' disorders; he has glowing reviews on Amazon. Why this sort of diet would be generally beneficial, I don't know. But I do know this: I'd LOVE to get Konstantin Monastyrsky in a room with Victoria Boutenko and see who wins!