Robyn's Blog

Hi, my webmaster just posted a new GreenSmoothieGirl.com video demo of me making “Almond Joy” from Chapter 4.  It’s yummy!

http://in.youtube.com/watch?v=EYf5QvEB-6g

If you’re not a subscriber to my vids on YouTube, it’s free and easy.

Coming up on this blog, I’m going to talk about all the sites and newsletters and experts out there in the nutrition, raw food, and alternative health space–my unvarnished opinion of each of them.  Also BPAs in plastics/metal cans and what to do about that issue.  And I’ll do a series on the FDA–some of its biggest screwups lately and what’s so fundamentally wrong with that agency.

Dear GreenSmoothieGirl: I heard you on the Babies and Moms radio podcast recently, where the host Nancy was talking to you about me and how I am trying to lose weight to have a baby next year with green smoothies.  Is it possible to use carrot tops/greens and turnip greens in green smoothies? Do you happen to know if there is a lot of nutritional value in those things? I was also wondering, is there nutritional value in the stalks of collard greens? I just bought a big bunch and was cleaning them and cutting off the stalks when I thought “Man, what if the stalks are really good for you nutritionally and I’m throwing them away?”
 
Answer:  The link to the radio podcast with GreenSmoothieGirl hosted by Babies and Moms Radio a few months ago, referred to in this question is here:

http://babiesandmomsradio.com/blog/2008/11/04/easy-healthy-recipes-for-kids/  

That’s part of the beauty of green smoothies—the ability to use the entire plant.  Yes, the stalks of the collards (or chard, or turnip greens, or anything) are high in nutrition and off the chart in fiber.  So throw them in your BlendTec Total Blender, definitely!

And carrot, turnip, and beet greens are highly nutritious and belong in your green smoothies, too (washed well).  Strawberry tops are fine except that strawberries are always sprayed, so I generally throw those away (they don’t amount to much anyway).

Okay…so I was doing some research and I have come across a lot of conflicting information regarding phytates. What I really want to know is what grains, etc. require “soaking” before eating/cooking to prevent any negative effect and release nutrition. I have read that cereals should be soaked overnight as well as batters, doughs, etc. I have Robyn’s sourdough bread recipes, but should I be soaking my oats overnight before making oatmeal for my family in the morning? What about home made pancake batters, etc.? Thanks for any help I can get on this!

Study Finds High-Fructose Corn Syrup Contains Mercury

I wonder if Liz who originally posted this topic has read the Washington Post Article.

Here it is, the official questionnaire, which will tabulate responses and be reported in my upcoming book.  Please take the poll now if you’ve been doing green smoothies for 30 days or longer.  If not, come back when you have!

Answer these questions completely honestly, thoroughly if possible, and THANK YOU in advance for helping advance nutrition science, GSG-style!  I will use your testimonials on the site, in my book, and to encourage others!  I’ll even post some here, LOVE YOU GUYS.

http://www.greensmoothiegirl.com/poll.html

p.s. Sorry I went off the grid for a few days–made a last-minute decisions to run to San Diego for a couple of days while I didn’t have my kids.  Sunny, fun, hiking, relaxing, watching movies, and . . . of course . . . taught my friends there how to make green smoothies, including 10-year old twin boys, who ran around in circles outside yelling, “MY EYESIGHT IS BETTER, MY EYESIGHT IS BETTER!”  I love how literal kids are.

Then I came home and made a pink smoothie for breakfast.  Problem is, I “lent” my ex my BlendTec several months ago and all I’ve had is my VitaMix.  The stupid thing came on for 30 seconds and died.  Permanently.  For no reason.  So I took the blenderful of strawberries and beets and carrots and stuff over to my ex-husband’s house, to see if I could dump it in his BlendTec and get my breakfast that way . . . but he wasn’t home.  When I called him, he informed me that he recalls things differently than I do and the BlendTec is HIS.  Permanently.

Not worth the conflict.  I went to the gym, still hauling around my unblended container full of pink smoothie.  Really hungry now.  After 50 minutes on the Stairmaster, I couldn’t take it any more.  I drove over to BlendTec, all sweaty, walked in and said, “PLEASE GIVE ME A NEW MACHINE, AND FAST!” and handed over my credit card.

That’s at least the 7th time something has gone wrong with my VitaMix.  Pretty lame when you have to have two machines because it breaks so often.  Does a great job when it works, just wish it always worked.  I’m happy I just got myself another BlendTec. 

BUY BLENDTEC.  It’s pretty telling, don’t you think, that the ONLY thing my former husband and I have had conflict over, property-wise, is that BLENDER!

Hal, can’t WAIT to see that written up in the questionnaire!  You have made my day!  (Everyone else, see the response to yesterday’s blog entry.)

That’s the BEST kind of evangelizing there is, the EXAMPLE kind.  Just do what you do, and people will ask–no lectures or persuasion needed.  I was just writing in my book about how Victoria Boutenko used to run people down in the Safeway and tell them they needed to eat a raw-food diet.  It’s a funny image.  That is Never. Gonna. Work.

But there is no shortage of miserable, ill people, and they are looking for a prophet–anyone who knows more than they do, anyone experiencing good health, anyone willing to help.  I know that a lot of you are helping others, many of you helping LOTS of others, and I want to hear about that in the questionnaire.  Because my new book challenges readers to not stop at just changing their own health, but at influencing others you care about (who in turn influence more people, and more people, and it never ends—it becomes quantum).  It’s RADICAL.  Not like the teenagers use the word, but like the original definition.

I got a call this morning from a man who has lost 80 lbs. and bought a Total Blender on GreenSmoothieGirl.com, asking the usual questions about how much to feed the kids, how long it keeps in the fridge, etc.  He said he got an email blast from his doctor, an M.D., saying,

“Here’s a link to something that will absolutely change your life, that has the power to help you lose 100 lbs. or more, with no other lifestyle change.  DO IT.” 

And what was that “something?”  It was a link to my goofy little 3-min. home-video green smoothie demo on YouTube that has now had 50,000 hits.  Green smoothies rock.

I want you guys to be thinking about something.

In about two days, I will have an interactive questionnaire posted on GSG.  Be thinking about what the changes are you have experienced as a result of drinking GS regularly.  The questionnaire will automatically generate tabulations for me to use as research, to be published in The Green Smoothie Rx (or The Green Smoothie Diet . . . depending on the day, based on my conversations with the publisher).  (Any opinions on that, the title controversy?)

Be thinking about whether you’ve evangelized, teaching others about this easy, 10-minute step to get 1000% more raw plant food in the daily diet than most Americans are getting.

Be thinking about your chronic conditions or diseases that may have improved as a result of drinking GS.  I cannot and will not make claims about the curative effects, but I can certainly report testimonials and reports from my research.

Thus far, the only GS research out there is Boutenko’s Roseburg Study of only 30 people for 30 days!  I hope to get 1,000 responses (which will be less than 1/3 of my mailing list), so be prepared to be part of this.  At the end of the questionnaire, you’re asked to optionally write a GS testimonial, which will be published with part or all of your name, whatever you choose to give.  (You’re also asked optionally for a 12 Steps to Whole Foods testimonial.)

I am ESPECIALLY INTERESTED in the testimonials of mothers of children!  (But, everyone’s input is highly encouraged and valued.)  I want only those who have been drinking at least a pint, at least three times a week, for at least a month.

Watch for an upcoming blog and be thinking about even the minor things you may not have noticed since you started drinking kale, collards, and chard after a lifetime of “greens deprivation.”  Thanks in advance for participating!

Dear GreenSmoothieGirl:  I LOVE green smoothies, but lately, since it’s getting cooler outside, I’m wanting something warm . . . got any ideas?

Answer:  Yes, what I do is have my green smoothie (never warm, yuck!) PLUS something warm or hot that I really enjoy, like warm sourdough bread or a bowl of soup.  Eat the hot thing last!  (That’s a better idea anyway, as enzymes are already in your stomach when cooked food arrives, signaling to bodily systems not to tax themselves providing manufactured enzymes which take resources away from metabolic functions.  At my house, we always eat the green smoothie or salad FIRST, then our other food.)

[Before today's topic--how fun to "meet" lots of you on Facebook!  Thanks for making me your "friend" there.]

Dear GreenSmoothieGirl: I subscribe to your 12 step information.  I just was diagnosed with cancer of my spleen and liver.  I had colon cancer 2 years ago.  I would greatly appreciate any information you have on alternative ways to heal from cancer.  Anything you could tell me would be greatly appreciated.

Answer: Cancer cannot live in the presence of oxygen.  Therefore, oxygenating blood and tissues makes a lot of sense for a person with cancer.  (I believe, as do many others, that we all “have” cancer—and this is fairly well documented.  But only a person whose immune system is seriously compromised, usually through lifestyle choices or exposures to toxins, actually develops a cancer that is proliferates out of control.)

How do you oxygenate?  With oxygen-rich foods, which are (this will surprise no one who reads this site) plants including fruits, vegetables, and sprouted/live foods including nuts, seeds, and grains.  Lots of alkaline water is another must: http://greensmoothiegirl.com/why-drink-alkaline-water.html

I also suggest looking at Sick and Tired by Robert O. Young, Rainbow Green Live Food Cuisine by Gabriel Cousens, The Cure for All Cancers by Hulda Clark, and The Cancer Battle Plan by David Frahm.

The food of cancer is sugar.  So if you eat refined sugar, you are literally nurturing cancer cells.  So getting immediately off sweeteners like sugar and corn syrup is critical.  Also eliminate completely all acidic foods.  See Ch. 12 of 12 Steps to Whole Foods.  The most acidic foods are soft drinks, coffee, meat and dairy, sugar and white flour.

And of course, surround yourself with positive energies: positive, encouraging people; positive thoughts; laughter and prayer and hope.  Modern medicine’s entire concept of “fighting cancer” (with cutting/burning/poisoning and a “tough” attitude) makes no sense to me.  Instead of “fighting” (or at least in addition to fighting, if the idea of the fully alternative path is too scary), you may wish to nourish the immune elements in your body to help those elements get the big job done of eliminating the cancer.  That’s what the immune system does, for healthy people. 

May God bless you in this trial in your life!

Dear GreenSmoothieGirl:  I am nursing my three-month old daughter and at the same time trying to lose the rest of my baby weight (I have about 43 pounds to lose…I gained 70 . . . oops!).  I have been trying to incorporate the smoothies into my diet, but it seems that I do not lose in the weeks when I am very consistent with drinking them.  This is what I am typically eating:

hot pink breakfast smoothie

1 small homemade pumpkin muffin (with wholegrain flour and agave nectar)

1/2 portion of whatever we had for dinner the night before (we are vegans, so usually some kind of veggie soup, stew, etc….always low fat)

1 quart green smoothie

vegan dinner…small portion

1 small homemade muffin

i also drink 2 cups of decaf chai and mother’s milk teas with stevia and a splash of vanilla almond milk

I am 6 feet tall and weigh approx 225 lbs (weighed 185 when I conceived, but would like to get back down to 165 eventually) and work out a few times a week.

I love drinking the smoothies, but am worried about the scale not moving down when I am drinking them . . . should I make my lunch only the smoothie and not any leftovers?

Answer:  I’m not a fan of strict calorie counting, but it helps to know some essential information.  First, your body can handle 600 to 800 calories at a time.  So, when we eat a huge meal of well over 800 calories, the body has to store some of that food energy as fat.

Second, a quart of green smoothie (good job!) is about 400 calories, or 500 if you’re adding a Tbsp. of flax oil.  So just keep an eye on that.  It’s obviously very nutritionally dense and low in calories.  If your leftovers portion is 600 calories, however, you might want to eat a smaller amount.

In general, your menu sounds good.  So, third, if you are eating in accordance with principles of good nutrition, not overeating, and not indulging in processed foods, and you are still not losing weight you need to lose, then my next suggestion for you would be to have your thyroid checked.  Don’t go to your OB/GYN or a standard lab for this.  Find a clinic specializing in women’s hormones, and the practitioner may be a nurse.  Have a full blood panel run, because the T3 measurement your OB/GYN would likely have you test does not tell the whole story.  You will need to have your blood workup analyzed for a fairly complex interplay of a number of factors, including T4 and some other hormones that work with your thyroid.

If you are one of the burgeoning number of women suffering from low thyroid (estimates seem to fall about 25% of American women), ask to be prescribed a bioidentical thyroid hormone rather than a synthetic drug (like Cytomel or Synthroid).  The natural bioidenticals are also cheaper than the drugs, since you can’t patent a natural substance.