Purple yam juice. These yams are not too sweet. I used to get purple yams from a different farmer that almost tasted like blueberries. I placed two dark purple grapes by the yams for color comparison.

For me, there is a hint of blueberry flavor compared to straight up garnet yam juice.

I like stirring yam juice with orange juice and a bit of coconut milk together.



I found this special yam as I was selecting my weekly stash of purple yams. He looks like a man to me. I wish I had taken better care of him so I could have replanted him. I forgot my yams in a plastic bag over night and a few were damaged from moisture. This root is dying, unfortunately. Lesson bitterly learned yet again not to use plastic.



Yam man on video

[www.youtube.com]

Do you peel them before juicing?

JTP:
Do you peel them before juicing?

Tai:
No, they are organic. I wash them though.

JTP, this juice is awesome. A close second is garnet yam juice. I prefer it over carrot juice.

I forgot to add that the juice I drank with the yam juice was different today. It was a base of cantaloupe with passion fruit juice and the yam juice. So delightful and dreamy. The floral passion fruit hints enveloping the blueberry yam starch and the sweet milky cantaloupe frothiness was paradisical. I never was a connoisseur of wine, but I learned to be one of juice.

I never had purple yam juice but I would love to try just do not know where to get the yam.
I do juice root veggies like potatoes (white or sweet)

Raw Practicalist wrote:
I never had purple yam juice but I would love to try just do not know where to get the yam.

Tai:
While westerners do grow them and you might find them in health food stores at times, you will often find the centers a blend of white and purple.

BUT the asians grow deeply rich purple yams. My old asian farmer grew the most heavenly purple yams. The color was unbelievable. I wish I had taken a picture back then, because he stopped coming to the market. When I juiced those yams, I really tasted blueberry. IT was mind blowing. I keep asking where he is, so I can drive and get some of those roots to grow.

This current asian farmer has deep colored yams, but they are not as richly bluish purple as the other man and these are not as sweet as the other ones. THese are more starchy, but when juiced, there is still a blueberry hint of flavor.

Okay, so look to the asians for these yams.

You say Yam - I say Sweet Potato!

[www.youtube.com]

Hey Tai,

Check out my File Preview on Sweet Potatoes and Yams, especially the 2 sections highlighted in red and in bold and tell me what you think.

…File Preview…
• What is the Difference Between a Sweetpotato and a Yam?
•
•
• Yams & Sweet Potatoes
• It is possible to make an enormous fuss over the difference between sweet potatoes and yams. Botanically speaking, the two vegetables share nothing except for some flowery associations. The yam, a tuber, is a member of the lily family, while the sweet potato is a member of the morning glory family, Yams are usually sweeter, moister, plumper, denser, and a deeper orange color than sweet potatoes -- though not always. The two plants also come from different parts of the world. The yam probably originated in Africa (although it may be the same plant that had been cultivated in Asia since 8000 B.C.); the sweet potato is a New World plant discovered by Columbus (although it may have mysteriously traveled to Polynesia hundreds of years prior to Columbus's first voyage).
• For all practical purposes, it might be more intriguing to think of the yam and the sweet potato as twins separated at birth, growing up with different quirks and twitches but retaining the essential sweet nature that makes them virtually interchangeable from a culinary perspective. Furthermore, the yams generally available in this country are really a variety of sweet potato. (True yams do offer one element missing from sweet potatoes; they contain a compound from which the sex hormone estrogen was first manufactured.)
•
•
• Sweet Potatoes or Yams
• Part 1: Sweet potatoes and yams are quite different
•
• The Sweet Potato
• Sweet potatoes (Ipomoea batatas) are the root of a vine in the morning glory family and native to the New World tropics.
•
• The Yam
• The true yam is the tuber of a tropical vine (Dioscorea batatas) and is not even distantly related to the sweet potato. Rarely found in US markets, the yam is a popular vegetable in Latin American and Caribbean markets, with over 150 varieties available worldwide. Generally sweeter than than the sweet potato, this tuber can grow over seven feet in length. The word yam comes from African words njam, nyami, or djambi, meaning "to eat," and was first recorded in America in 1676.
•
• Sweet Potatoes or Yams
• Part 2: Yams, unlike sweet potatoes, can be toxic when eaten raw
• Sweet potato selection and storage
•
• Yam selection and storage
• If you find them, they will most likely be sold in chunks sealed in plastic wrap, since they grow up to 7 feet in length and weigh up to 150 pounds. As with sweet potatoes, choose yams with unblemished, tight, unwrinkled skins and firm flesh. Store in a cool, dark, dry area for up to two weeks, and do not refrigerate. Although you may find canned vegetables labeled as yams, they are most likely not true yams. However, true yams can generally be used in any sweet potato recipe. Yams, unlike sweet potatoes, are toxic if eaten raw, yet perfectly safe when cooked. Cooked yams can be kept refrigerated for 2-3 days. Cooked yams can be frozen using the same method as sweet potatoes.
•
• Solanine
• "The nightshade plants contain an alkaloid steroid called solanine. The foliage & unripe fruit contain dangerous levels of this steroid. The ripe fruit are the least toxic part of this family of plants but may be deadly under some circumstances. Solanine is also found in potato sprouts and the green spots on some potatoes. Sweet potatoes and yams are totally safe."
• Dr. Shulze's formula
• Strong help with regulation and balancing of the femal hormones. Aids in normalization of the menstrulal cycle. Boost fertility and sexual desire. Also provides the herbal phytochemicals that create hormones while helping to calm the nerves.
• Formula contains: Vitex agnus-castus (Chaste Tree berry), Discorea villousa (Wild Yam rhizome), Angelica polymorpha sinensis (Dong Quai root), Damiana leaf, Licorice root and Hops flowers.
• Raw Yams
• There is no reason that I know of for you not to eat raw yams, but most people will find that they do not have the digestive enzymes to adequately break down the inherent starches. Because of the complex carbohydrate nature of yams, one will find them quite filling. Personally, I will pass, thank you. Dr. Doug
• Re: the Light side of Nightshades
• Jesse, it's mostly women (80%?), cattle and other creatures who react to those foods. Messes up ones bone formation and other stuff. You may be a lucky person who doesn't have problems; we are all different. Some people love raw sweet potato and yam. If you have no trouble with gas and weight gain, go for it! If you feel irritated inside and suspect your joints are swelling up and you have pain, swelling and tenderness in the a.m. or when you get cold, get rid of them. Flora
• Re: Raw Restaurant Opening in Austin, Texas!
• The restaurant is called Compassion Kitchen and it's run by Chad, a wonderful raw chef! He made a raw yam pie for me and I gave it to my family for Thanksgiving. My mom was scared to eat it, hhehe, she was like "it could be toxic" LOL.... but my sister who eats NOTHING but ****, cream cheese and meat, threw herself at that pie with such enthusiasm......i'm telling you guys! it was AMAZING to watch... my Dad and I got only one slice....she finished off the rest......
• Display individual nutrients for selections
• Food 1 SWEETPOTATOES-RAW 3.5274::1 oz::100.00179 grams
• Food 2 YAM-RAW 3.5274::1 oz::100.00179 grams
• Sweet potato plants are toxic, so definitely cut out any green sprouts and eyes, and don't feed those pretty leaves to animals ...
• My input on the Garnet Yam variety:
•
• Sweet Potato Pie (Yam Pie)
•
• Re: Green Potatoes
•
• Just Say No
• 4. Raw sweet potatos - Compounds form cyanide in their stomachs.
• 7. Green potato skins & eyes - Contains a toxin called solanine.
• Solanine in Potatoes
•
• Potato poisoning
• : Sweet potato plants can develop a fungus, (I can't remember the name: but it is poisonous but is also used as a drug).
• Ipomeanol, which is probably made by the fungus (Fusarium, I think) as a way to detoxify the ipomeanone. Ipomeanone is an antibiotic chemical made by the sweet potato. So successful fungi have to overcome the ipomeanone. Ipomeanol is harmless in most animal organs, except that when it reaches the lungs it is converted into a tissue-damaging derivative. Therefore ipomeanol has been investigated as a targeted drug for treatment of lung cancer.
• Problems in Food
• Nightshades
• Sweet potato, for example, supports a fungal growth (Fusarium solani), especially when the tuber's surface is damaged. The fungus alters the potatoes' metabolism, and toxic stressors are produced. Ipomeanol is one such chemical that is liver and lung toxic.
• 7. Toxic substances and antinutritional factors
• Sweet potato
• Sweet potato contains raffinose, one of the sugars responsible for flatulence. Three of the sugars which occur in plant tissues, raffinose, stachyose and verbascose are not digested in the upper digestive tract, and so are fermented by colon bacteria to yield the flatus gases, hydrogen and carbon dioxide. The level of raffinose present depends on the cultivar. In some parts of Africa the cultivars used are considered too sweet and cause flatulence (Palmer, 1982), Lin et al. (1985) have established that sweet potato shows trypsin inhibitor activity (TIA) ranging from 90 percent inhibition in some varieties to 20 percent in others. There is a significant correlation between the trypsin inhibitor content and the protein content of the sweet potato variety. Heating to 90°C for several minutes inactivates trypsin inhibitors. Lawrence and Walker (1976) have implicated TIA in sweet potato as a contributory factor in the disease enteritis necroticans. This seems doubtful since sweet potato is not usually eaten raw and the activity of the trypsin inhibitor present is destroyed by heat.
• In response to injury, or exposure to infectious agents, in reaction to physiological stimulation or on exposure of wounded tissue to fungal contamination, sweet potato will produce certain metabolites. Some of these compounds, especially the furano-terpenoids are known to be toxic (Uritani, 1967). Fungal contamination of sweet potato tubers by Ceratocystis fimbriata and several Fusarium species leads to the production of ipomeamarone, a hepatoxin, while other metabolites like 4-ipomeanol are pulmonary toxins. Baking destroys only 40 percent of these toxins. Catalano et al. (1977) reported that peeling blemished or diseased sweet potatoes from 3 to 10 mm beyond the infested area is sufficient to remove most of the toxin.
• Yams
• The edible, mature, cultivated yam does not contain any toxic principles. However, bitter principles tend to accumulate in immature tuber tissues of Dioscorea rotundata and D. cayenensis. They may be polyphenols or tanninlike compounds (Coursey, 1983). Wild forms of D. dumetorum do contain bitter principles, and hence are referred to as bitter yam. Bitter yams are not normally eaten except at times of food scarcity. They are usually detoxified by soaking in a vessel of salt water, in cold or hot fresh water or in a stream. The bitter principle has been identified as the alkaloid dihydrodioscorine, while that of the Malayan species, D. hispida, is dioscorine (Bevan and Hirst, 1958). These are water soluble alkaloids which, on ingestion, produce severe and distressing symptoms (Coursey, 1967). Severe cases of alkaloid intoxication may prove fatal. There is no report of alkaloids in cultivated varieties of D. dumetorum.
• Chemical Food Poisoning
•
• Chapter 27: Poisoning Emergencies
•
• All About Flatulence
•
• SWEET POTATO FACTS
• Never put sweet potatoes in your refrigerator unless they have first been cooked. They will develop a hard core and sunken spots and will spoil much faster than if you keep them at room temperature.
• WHAT IS THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN A SWEET POTATO AND A YAM?
• SWEET POTATOES
• The sweet potato is the 6th principal world food crop, and approximately 90 percent of the worlds' crop is grown in Asia.
• Sweet potatoes are a Native American plant that was the main source of nourishment for early homesteaders and for soldiers during the Revolutionary War. These tuberous roots are among the most nutritious foods in the vegetable kingdom.
• Raw Food Toxins
• Sweet Potato
• Sweet potato shows trypsin inhibitor activity. That means it contains an enzyme inhibitor that blocks the action of trypsin, an enzyme that digests proteins. The trypsin inhibitor prevents the digestion of protein. Sweet potatoes with higher protein levels have more of the trypsin inhibitor. This makes raw sweet potato difficult to digest. The trypsin inhibitor is deactivated by cooking.
• One way the raw food diet helps people is by supplying food enzymes. Food enzymes do part of the work of digesting the raw food. Enzyme inhibitors increase the amount of work that your body needs to do to digest foods. Enzyme inhibitors force your body to produce more digestive enzymes. This uses up resources that could be used to produce detoxifying enzymes. When animals are regularly fed enzyme inhibitors in research, they become sick. Sweet potato should not be eaten raw.
• Sweet potato
• Sweet potato contains raffinose, one of the sugars responsible for flatulence. Three of the sugars which occur in plant tissues, raffinose, stachyose and verbascose are not digested in the upper digestive tract, and so are fermented by colon bacteria to yield the flatus gases, hydrogen and carbon dioxide. The level of raffinose present depends on the cultivar. In some parts of Africa the cultivars used are considered too sweet and cause flatulence (Palmer, 1982), Lin et al. (1985) have established that sweet potato shows trypsin inhibitor activity (TIA) ranging from 90 percent inhibition in some varieties to 20 percent in others. There is a significant correlation between the trypsin inhibitor content and the protein content of the sweet potato variety. Heating to 90°C for several minutes inactivates trypsin inhibitors. Lawrence and Walker (1976) have implicated TIA in sweet potato as a contributory factor in the disease enteritis necroticans. This seems doubtful since sweet potato is not usually eaten raw and the activity of the trypsin inhibitor present is destroyed by heat.
• In response to injury, or exposure to infectious agents, in reaction to physiological stimulation or on exposure of wounded tissue to fungal contamination, sweet potato will produce certain metabolites. Some of these compounds, especially the furano-terpenoids are known to be toxic (Uritani, 1967). Fungal contamination of sweet potato tubers by Ceratocystis fimbriata and several Fusarium species leads to the production of ipomeamarone, a hepatoxin, while other metabolites like 4-ipomeanol are pulmonary toxins. Baking destroys only 40 percent of these toxins. Catalano et al. (1977) reported that peeling blemished or diseased sweet potatoes from 3 to 10 mm beyond the infested area is sufficient to remove most of the toxin.
•
•
…End of File Preview…

By the way, was that video helpful?

Hi John,

you wrote:
Sweet potatoes (Ipomoea batatas) are the root of a vine in the morning glory family

Tai:
That is so good to learn. My yams/sweet potatoes and morning glories grow right next to each other and I have eaten both sprouts and I always thought it was so strange they tasted so similar to each other.

THanks for clearing up the distinction. Yes, the medicinal yams are really tough and fibrous. We have them too in Chinese medicine.

I am going to comment about all your data a bit later when I can share about the medicinal yams.

Thank you so much for sharing this.

"Strong help with regulation and balancing of the femal hormones. Aids in normalization of the menstrulal cycle."

From my research into female hormones, I've discovered that this actually isn't true. Wild yams are a plant source of diosgenin, which can be converted in a laboratory into progesterone but the body cannot convert diosgenin into progesterone, DHEA, or any other sex hormone, and wild yam does not naturally contain any progesterone that your body can use.

[www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov] - Effects of wild yam extract on menopausal symptoms, lipids and sex hormones in healthy menopausal women - "After 3 months of treatment, no significant side-effects were reported with either active treatment or placebo, and there were no changes in weight, systolic or diastolic blood pressure, or levels of total serum cholesterol, triglyceride, high-density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol, FSH, glucose, estradiol, or serum or salivary progesterone... This study suggests that short-term treatment with topical wild yam extract in women suffering from menopausal symptoms is free of side-effects, but appears to have little effect on menopausal symptoms".

jtprindl Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> "Strong help with regulation and balancing of the
> femal hormones. Aids in normalization of the
> menstrulal cycle."
>
> From my research into female hormones, I've
> discovered that this actually isn't true. Wild
> yams are a plant source of diosgenin, which can be
> converted in a laboratory into progesterone but
> the body cannot convert diosgenin into
> progesterone, DHEA, or any other sex hormone, and
> wild yam does not naturally contain any
> progesterone that your body can use.
>
> [www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov] -
> Effects of wild yam extract on menopausal
> symptoms, lipids and sex hormones in healthy
> menopausal women - "After 3 months of treatment,
> no significant side-effects were reported with
> either active treatment or placebo, and there were
> no changes in weight, systolic or diastolic blood
> pressure, or levels of total serum cholesterol,
> triglyceride, high-density lipoprotein (HDL)
> cholesterol, FSH, glucose, estradiol, or serum or
> salivary progesterone... This study suggests that
> short-term treatment with topical wild yam extract
> in women suffering from menopausal symptoms is
> free of side-effects, but appears to have little
> effect on menopausal symptoms".

Jtprindl, you've got that right. There sure still is a lot of fake info from a lot of fake diploma mill "doctors" being quoted as gospel around here. Will they ever learn?