Are Green Smoothies Bad For Your Diet?

Are Green Smoothies Bad For Your Diet? Everyone has an opinion about the subject, but I want to know what science says about the subject in a non-biased way.

Dr. Greger takes us on a scientific trip which ends up revealing that the consumption of green smoothies is good for you. I must make the distinction clear that green smoothies and green juices are not the same and they affect the body differently.

Making green smoothies by blending leafy greens keeps everything, while juicing greens removes the fiber and phytonutrients that are bound to the fiber.

Why Focus On Greens

Leafy green vegetables, along with fruits, are the most nutrient dense foods, and they are our natural source of nutrients we need to support homeostasis.

It would seem that consuming lots of vegetables would be ideal because you would saturate your body with vitamins, minerals, and phytonutrients that are needed to support and protect health.

Green Smoothies

Naturally you would use your teeth to masticate your food, which would appear naturally to work best with the digestion of your food. Blending is an unnatural process so there was concern that is could cause complications with the natural digestive process.

Studies showed that blending plants actually assisted the digestive process by breaking down the plant to smaller particle sizes which released more of its vitamins and minerals from its cell walls. More of the plant’s vitamins and minerals therefore ended up in the bloodstream to be used for metabolic processes.^[1]

The concern about blending plants therefore centered of the plant’s fiber and its phytonutrients. Under normal chewing most of the plant’s phytonutrients remained bound to the indigestible fiber which escapes digestion and ends up in the colon.

The concern about making green smoothies was the process might also release most of the plant’s phytonutrients into the bloodstream as well, which would be bad for the colon.

Indigestible fiber and the phytonutrients that are bound to the fiber are prebiotics that feed that good flora in the colon, which supports the health of the colon and protects it against colon cancer.

Fortunately studies have shown that the phytonutrients still stay bound to the miniaturized blended plant particles which are not digested and travel to the colon where they are feasted on by its good flora.

Good Ole Green Smoothie

So blending vegetables appears to have no downside. Another good thing about making green smoothies is your able to consume much more plants throughout the day. It is very easy to consume 4 cups of kale blended to make 1-2 cups of kale smoothie than it is to eat 4 cups of whole kale.

Kale and other leafy greens are also not calorie dense foods, which means you can drink a lot of nutrient dense green smoothies without gaining weight.

A short term diet green smoothie diet can be a great way to detox and lose weight. Since leafy greens are not calorie/energy dense consuming a lot of green smoothies will give your body a chance to burn stored fat and glycogen, leading to weight loss.

Saturating your body with the vitamins, minerals, and phytonutrients of green smoothies will provide the compounds the organs of the body need to heal themselves.

The phytonutrients from green smoothies will have the chance to target pathogens and toxins that are already in the body, without having to address newly added pathogens and toxins from meat, dairy, and processed food consumption.

Green smoothies rock!