The Best Leafy Greens To Juice

Leafy greens are one of natures best super foods. That’s why so many health advocates and doctors recommend that you have several servings a day. The problem with this is that it can be difficult to eat that much. Leafy greens are awesome for your body, but they contain lots of fiber. While fiber is good for you, it’s also very filling. You don’t need to overload your body on fiber. You will get enough fiber from a salad, some fruit, a lunch of rice and beans or oatmeal. What you won’t get enough of just by eating leafy greens are the powerful anti-oxidants, vitamins, enzymes and nutrients.

People who are looking to treat things such as cancer, macular degeneration, diabetes, and other health problems want to get as much antioxidants and nutrients as possible. Things such as kaempferol (which has shown promise in dealing with cancer), chlorophyll (very powerful, tons of information at the Linus Pauling institute) quercetin, and zeaxanthin plus lutein (beneficial for helping eyesight.)

Now The Question: What Are The Best Leafy Greens To Juice?

Once you’re ready to start juicing leafy greens, you’re going to have to figure out which ones you will want to get. Should you juice lettuce, kale, chard, spinach, dandelion, wheatgrass, parsley, arugula, endive, collard greens…the choice can be confusing at best. Luckily, you don’t have to just grab a whole bunch of greens from your supermarket, hope you picked out the best ones, and juice them. No, that’s not a great idea.

What you want to do is find the best tasting and most nutritious leafy greens. Most people tend to focus on a few select leafy greens, and for good reason. The most popular ones are highest in nutrients, won’t wilt quickly (a problem with some fragile leafy greens) and don’t taste too bad–with the exception of wheatgrass!

Top 4 Leafy Greens To Juice

Kale ( better to juice than to blend)

Kale is one of the best leafy greens to juice. It has a rather mild flavor and can be masked with apples or lemons. This means you can make a big kale drink and not have to worry about not being able to drink it. If you’re concerned about your eyesight (maybe there is a history of macular degeneration in your family) then kale is a super leafy green. It has more lutein and zeaxanthin than spinach.

Now, the big issue when it comes to kale is picking the right type. Kale is a unique leafy green in that it comes in several varieties. There is curly kale, one of the most common, red leafy kale, and dino kale (also called Tuscan or lacinato.)

If you’re going to juice kale several times a week, then it’s best to use dino kale. This is because it is lower in oxaliac acid than red leaf or curly. Some people say you should quickly blanch the kale in order to rid it of some of the oxaliac acid, but this can destroy some of the enzymes.Plus, you will then have to cool it down before juicing it otherwise you’ll have a hot drink.

Dino kale is a broad leafy green, whereas curly and red leaf have smaller leaves. The lacinto kale is also easier to deal with. You wash it and simply chop it up. You can even, if the leaf is small enough, feed it right though the juicers feed chute.

I suggest mixing kale with lemons and apples (as you should with all leafy greens) and then you can add celery. Celery is not a leafy green, but it is nevertheless a super-food and should always be added to your juices.

Spinach (great for eyesight)

Spinach has must of the same benefits as kale. Some people prefer the flavor of spinach to kale. The major issues that need to be considered are iron levels and oxaliaic acid. Because of this, you should decide if you want spinach or kale. It’s not a great idea to stack up and load up on both kale and spinach.

When you choose spinach, you can get baby spinach or regular spinach. For juicing it doesn’t really matter what you get. Baby spinach is better for making a smoothie, but when you are making a juice it doesn’t matter.

What you should do is choose an organic spinach. Spinach is difficult to wash properly, it’s one of the most tricky of all leafy greens in fact, like wheatgrass, so you need to soak it properly. It’s probably a good idea to get an organic vegetable wash and use it when rinsing your spinach.

Parsley (a super green)

Parsley is an herb and many people don’t appreciate how powerful it is. There have been numerous studies that have shown that parsley an help inhibit cancer tumors. So this is definitely something you want to juice. This leafy green doesn’t belong o the side of your plate, it belongs front and center.

You can get curly or Italian parsley. Personally, I  find that curly parsley lasts a bit longer and doesn’t wilt as quickly. So, if you can’t head to the shops everyday, it might be good to get curly parsley.

Parsley is one of the best things to add to a kale or spinach drink because it compliments them and adds additional phytonutrients that they lack.

The one thing you need to be aware of is that parsley is a diuretic. So, if you juice too much you will get feelings of thirst and end up going to the bathroom. So you shouldn’t juice an entire bunch of parsley for one juice it would be simply too much. A small handful is best.

Wheatgrass (don’t mind the taste)

Finally we have arrived at wheatgrass, one of the best and also most infamous of all the leafy greens. It’s got a notorious taste. If you’ve had it once, you won’t forget it. But there are people so devoted to this super strong leafy green that they get a dedicated wheatgrass juicer and drink it like a shot of whiskey.

I personally don’t drink wheatgrass straight. What I do is add it to apples and lemons. I use organic lemons because the oil in the lemon skin is capable of masking the taste of wheatgrass.

You can grow your own wheatgrass if you have room in your home. There are kits sold on Amazon that provide you with a tray and the seeds. If you want to really control the process, then this is an awesome way to do it. Otherwise you will want to get organic wheatgrass from a health food store. Do not buy dried wheatgrass powder. There might be some benefit, but its not as good as getting fresh wheatgrass and juicing it.

If you want to mix it into a large juice, keep in mind that you will need something powerful to mask the flavor. The two go to flavors are cranberry or lemon. Lemon skin, not lemon juice. The juice is great to add to the juice, but it’s the juice of the actually lemon skin that has the super powerful oils. Both cranberries and lemons need to be organic

If, when you add wheatgrass to your juice you find it is too much even with the additional lemons, you can just make a pure wheatgrass shot. You can juice it like other leafy greens in a masticating juicer, but you might also want a dedicated wheatgreass juicer. These are manual juicers that have a hand crank mechanism. They are great for those times you just want to juice wheatgrass and not other leafy greens or fruits.

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