08 Mar

Carrot Juice Side Effects – Can You Drink Too Much Of It?

While drinking carrot juice in moderation has significant health benefits, drinking too much can have side effects. Carrot juice is high in beta carotene, which converts to Vitamin A in the body. Consuming a lot of carrot juice can affect the color of the skin. Carrot juice is also high in sugar and calories, so people with diabetes should be mindful of this.

Carotenemia Is One Of The Carrot Juice Side Effects

A change in the color of the skin is one of the carrot juice side effects. Due to the high level of beta-carotene in carrot juice, drinking more than three glasses per day can result in an orange hue to the skin. The orange coloring is most likely to be seen on hands, feet and around the mouth. This condition is called carotenemia and is not dangerous. It disappears without treatment as soon as consumption is lowered or stopped.

Carrot juice side effects - too much beta-carotene

High glucose content

Carrots are naturally sweet (lots of sugar). This sweetness is the reason many people use carrots for their juice, but too much glucose can be dangerous to diabetics. Another of the carrot juice side effects applies to people with diabetes. Small amounts of carrot juice are okay and can even be good for a person with diabetes. The glycemic index of an eight ounce glass of carrot juice is about 45, with about 22 grams of carbohydrates.

High sodium content

Carrots are also quite rich with sodium. Too much sodium in your diet can lead to all sorts of problems. The main one is that lots of sodium (salt) can lead to Hypertension (HTN) or high blood pressure. Hypertension is then a cause of all sorts of heart and health related problems. But you would probably turn yellow from carotenemia and stop drinking carrot juice before this sodium carrot juice side effect would start to show. As with all the natural juice side effects juices are safe and very beneficial to our bodies as long as we don’t exaggerate when drinking them.

01 Dec

Health Benefits Of Cucumber Juice: A Delicious Cooler That Keeps Your Body In Balance

A lot of people like cucumbers for their fresh crispy taste that is light, never overpowering, yet delightful and satisfying. The juice of the cucumber leverages that same light taste for a refreshing beverage. Most people think cucumbers are merely 95% water — and they are — but what’s astonishing about it are the enormous health benefits of cucumber juice delivered by this “watery” vegetable product.  (Note: technically, cucumbers are classified as a fruit, although for legal and tax reasons, government regulations consider cucumbers a vegetable).

Whatever you want to call a cucumber, the science is undeniable that drinking cucumber juice is not only healthy, but the payback it supplies to the human body is far reaching. Let’s check off some of the main known health benefits of cucumber juice:

Cucumbers

Cucumbers Juice Regulates Ph Of Your Blood

Human blood Ph must be maintained within a narrow range to be considered healthy. The optimum Ph level of blood is between 7.35 and 7.45. This makes our blood just slightly alkaline. If the blood goes below 7.35 is becomes to acidic, which can lead to problems. Cucumbers juice contains minerals that increase alkalinity or reduce acid levels in the blood, and therefore the body. So cucumber juice is an excellent blood balancer, especially for people with acid-related problems. Cucumber juice also helps regulate normal blood pressure.

Connective Tissues

The bones in our body are connected to muscle by something called connective tissues. People with arthritis, for example, are suffering from a deterioration of their connective tissue. Cucumber juice is a natural source of silica, which is an integral element in building and maintaining healthy connective tissue.

Cool Off, Ever From A Fever

Everybody knows that drinking something cool when you’re hot is a way to cool off. Chilled cucumber juice is good for this, but not only because the temperature of the drink is cool. Enzymes found in cucumber juice help balance the electrolytes in the body, which help regulate a natural temperature for the body in hot weather. Note that this also makes cucumber juice an excellent choice for treating a fever.

Elimination and Cleansing

Health benefits of cucumber juice are also the result of its mild, natural diuretic effect – that is, it will make you need to go the bathroom slightly more often, as does coffee and other caffeinated drinks. But cucumber juice is not as powerful a diuretic as coffee and colas, and not harshly acidic like those drinks. It’s a gentle diuretic, which makes you go more, and helps you eliminate toxic substances from your body.

Health benefits of cucumbers
Hair Growth

Are you ready for this one? Cucumber juice to help grow hair? Well, if you are already bald or balding, drinking cucumber juice will not bring back the flowing locks of your youth. However, the specific mineral content of cucumber juice promotes healthy hair growth, and can help you keep what you have, while also making your hair look more healthy, thick and lustrous.

Healthy Skin

People with skin conditions such as psoriasis, eczema, or just dry flakey skin can see a tremendous benefit from cucumber juice because it is high in Vitamin C, but also a range of other antioxidants that our skins needs to retain healthy cell growth and a normal balance. Note that diseases such as arthritis are often linked to psoriasis, and that we have already seen that cucumber juice helps maintain healthy connective tissue.

Sun Burns

Speaking of skin, applying cucumber juice to a sun burn is a fantastic cooler to inflamed skin, and will have a healing effect on sun burned skin.

Health Benefits Of Cucumber Juice Come From A Long List Of Nutrients

How does cucumber juice get all of the above done? When you look at the list of nutrients in cucumber juice, it becomes obvious that it’s jam-packed with healthy stuff, including: Vitamin C and A, folate, manganese, molybdenum, potassium, silica and sulfur. It also has smaller amounts of Vitamin B, sodium, calcium, phosphorus and clorine. Try getting that in a diet soda!

The power of cucumber juice can be magnified if you mix it with other vegetable juices, especially carrot juice and celery juice. This also helps you find a flavor of beverage that more suits your individual taste.

Finally, strive to buy cucumbers and cucumber juice that is certified organic, and grown without the use of pesticides and herbicides. That means growing your own (which is easy and fun to do), or buying from farmer’s markets or other trusted organic producers. Making your own juice is also a snap if you own a juicer, or even a blender in is the best way the get the most health benefits of cucumber juice.