I recently read an article written by a guy who read an article about how Gwyneth Paltrow swears that drinking a green juice in the morning gives her more energy than drinking coffee. I am an avid, unapologetic coffee drinker. I drink one cup every morning but sometimes that cup is the size of a big gulp (in my defense, most of the time it’s the size of my normal coffee mug). However, I thought in the name of blogging, I could switch up my morning routine for a month and see if there’s any weight to Gwyneth’s claim. I should also note that the only caffeine I drink comes from my morning coffee, so by default I went caffeine free for the month.
The first thing I did should have been to actually read what Gwyneth said instead of reading a synopsis written by a guy who read something written by a guy who spoke to Gwyneth, but what I actually did was take to social media for tips on good juicing recipes. Most people had the same suggestions – kale, pineapple, mint, apples, spinach. Someone recommended pear which I cannot say I enjoyed, and another person recommended ginger which I really loved. In the end, though, I just bought a bunch of green stuff and threw it in my juicer. By the end of the month my go-to juice was:
[yumprint-recipe id=’5′]I also cheated a little because juicing and then cleaning the juicer took me a good 15-20 minutes in the morning and some mornings I didn’t have that kind of time so I bought a green juice powder mix and used that a few of the mornings. It was sweeter than my homemade juice, but I didn’t mind it at all.
Every morning I wrote a quick note about how I was feeling that day. Here are a few of the highlights.
- Day 1 – I have a headache and worry I might commit multiple homicides today.
- Day 2 – Headache gone, still feeling stabby.
- Day 3 – I pooped green.
- Day 4 – Woke up before my alarm. Green juice or coincidence?
- Day 10 – Accidentally used collard greens instead of kale, was good. Got a burst of energy when I was done, like a sugar rush. Maybe too much apple?
- Day 11 – No green juice today, no time to make it and no desire to drink it. Already hating this idea.
- Day 12 – Had to be at work at 6:00, I would pay a lot of money for a central line of coffee.
- Day 15 – I have a pimple. Is this detox? Or a result of not washing my face all weekend?
- Day 16 – Can I have coffee yet? So cranky and tea isn’t cutting it.
- Day 19 – Put pineapple in my juice, that’s a mistake I won’t make again.
- Day 22 – Added a scoop of TerraGreens, HOLY ENERGY. I haven’t felt this alert in weeks.
- Day 25 – I choked on my chamomile tea yesterday. What an embarrassing way to die – death by chamomile tea.
- Day 28 – Bought a green juice with kale, cucumber, swiss chard, celery, dandelion, parsley, lemon, ginger. It’s not unlike what I imagine eating grass would taste like.
- Day 31 – Wasn’t paying attention and drank juice for one more day than necessary. Insert expletive here. Well that was an uneventful end to something I’ll never do again.
I took before and after pictures, I’m pretty sure I look exactly the same.
So, what did I learn from this? I learned nothing. Except that I am so glad to go back to drinking coffee. Because, here’s the thing – coffee isn’t actually bad for you. And I love the whole ritual of using my french press in the morning. I put a little cream in my coffee that I get from a local creamery and that’s it. It’s quick, not full of calories/carbs, and I only drink one of them a day. So, sure, I guess my insides are a bit more squeaky clean from drinking veggies every morning for a month, but I was not so impressed that I’m going to give up my favorite morning activity. That’s not to say I’m throwing my juicer away. I definitely enjoy the occasional morning greenie, but I’m definitely ready to be back to my nice warm coffee.