Review - Vital Juice

Brand:  Vital Juice Co.

Flavor:  Vital Almond w/ Carrot

Where to get it: here @ VitalJuice.com

                I got really excited about this juice, partially because the company is based in Seattle (where just about everything cool is based…you be quiet over there, Portland), and partly because I get really excited about new cold-pressed juice. I took one sip of this guy and it was all over. It’s SO bitter. I had a fleeting thought that maybe it would be drinkable if I dumped a packet of Splenda in it, but I was in my car (with no Splenda), and for 210 calories and 14g of fat, why MAKE myself drink the whole bottle if I wasn’t going to enjoy it? The bitterness reminded me of the inside of a banana peel, or when you get a really sour batch of grapes and they suck all the saliva out of your mouth. Maybe they have other flavors that I will like better, I’m not opposed to trying them.     

                 

               

Tastes like:   Bitter-bitter bad-bad times

Taste rating:  2/10

Qualities:   Certified organic, vegetarian, vegan, non-GMO

What’s in it:

Review - Forager Nuts & Vanilla Drink

Brand:  Forager

Flavor:  Nuts & Vanilla

Where to get it:  here @ FreshDirect.com

                                 Forager, I like you. I like your packaging, I like your straight-forwardness…I even like just looking at you. I think we can be friends. I like my “milk” drinks a little sweeter, so I dumped a packet of Splenda in this bottle (don’t judge me), and we made some magic together. The cinnamon in this flavor really ties everything together for me. Perfect amount – you can taste it, but it doesn’t remind you of Christmas. These drinks are great for an on-the-go breakfast (as I drank mine), or before or after working out. I’m a little bit smitten and I plan to taste you again, you cutie pie.

                 

               

Tastes like:   Cinnamon nut milk

Taste rating:  8/10 (after Splenda)

Qualities:   Organic, vegetarian, vegan, gluten free

What’s in it:

Positive Energy Rocks My Socks!

Brand:  Positive Energy

Flavor:  Various

Where to get it:  here @ Positive Energy

                Um, how cool is Positive Energy? They saw my review of their orange juice, and just couldn’t bear the thought of me not being able to try their other flavors, so they sent me a box of them! They also sent some stickers (which my person promptly stole and put on his snowboard), a magnetized + orange, and a page-long HANDWRITTEN LETTER. Color me impressed, I looked at all the words on the page and calculated that, in this day of banging on keyboards all day long, writing that much with A PEN would have seen me take about 17 breaks for hand cramps.  

                Apple juice is my favorite juice, so I went for that first. It was just as good as the orange juice. I put vodka in the cranberry juice as well as the strawberry lemonade. SO GOOD! The rest I drank sans alcohol, like a good girl. I love this line, and I love this company. They really care about their product and the press they get, and they clearly take the time to pay attention to social media – which I’m pretty sure is crucial to being successful in the 21^st century, no shock there. So thank you, THANK YOU, Positive Energy, for the treats, the care, and just for being generally awesome folks!

               

Tastes like:   Juice with a sizzle

Taste rating:  10/10

Qualities:  Gluten-free, Kosher, Non-GMO

What’s in it: (Orange Juice)

Review - Positive Energy Caffeinated Orange Juice

Brand:  Positive Energy

Flavor:  Caffeinated Orange Juice (!)

Where to get it: here @ Amazon.com

                WHY HAS NO ONE THOUGHT OF THIS BEFORE?? I just want to bask in the glory of this genius-ness for a minute. I don’t like coffee. I’m like, the worst at being a Washingtonian. Full disclosure:  I usually drink a bottle of Diet Coke in the morning. Then I drink iced tea all day. But, juice with caffeine in it?? I feel like people would judge me a lot less if I had this in my hand at 7 am. Yes, I see your stares, Judgey McJudgersons. Anyway, this tastes mostly like any standard orange juice, but there’s a little bit of a burn. Kind of an after-burn situation, but it’s not unpleasant. I really see no reason to ever drink regular orange juice again. Does anyone have any vodka?

                 

               

Tastes like:  OJ & cayenne

Taste rating:  9/10

Qualities:   Gluten-free, Kosher, Non-GMO

What’s in it:

Juice Cleanse Final Day (!!) Recap

Day 3 - I made it! Not a carrot, not an egg white, not a single piece of solid food passed my lips in 3 days. I can't believe it, it seems very surreal to me. I think the overall experience was a good one. If I did it again with Jus by Julie, I would select my juices ala carte next time. It's REALLY hard if you hate a particular juice, and it's on the menu all 3 days.

It also kind of bothers me that services like this are advertised as ways to "kickstart" a healthy lifestyle. If me, version 1.5 years ago had tried this, I wouldn't have made it through the first afternoon. I feel like if you've made peace with self-deprivation already, you will have a much better chance of being able to do a program like this. I ended up losing 7 lbs over the course of the 3 days, but I'm not going to weigh myself again for another few days to see how much of it is "real". Hopefully, my brain has gotten a much-needed reset and this plateau is dead on the floor.

Day 3 Intake:

Morning Glory – NOPE

Spicy Lemonade

Sweet Spin

Acai Blend – (10/10, 150 calories) YUM! My favorite juice of the cleanse. Banana is prominent flavor, but it’s perfectly tempered with the other ingredients.

Island Coconut – (10/10, 200 calories) This was also SO YUM! I would rather drink this than a milkshake. Not even lying.

Xtreme Greens

Nutritional Breakdown:

Total Calories:  730

Carbs:  162g

Fat:  14g

Protein:  12g

Day 2 of the juice fast!

Day 2, made it with no solid food intake AND no hypoglycemic episodes! Glory! I felt a lot better too, no headache and not as sleepy in the afternoon. I found myself abstractly hungry, I missed the actual process of eating food. Well, no one said it would be easy, did they? I also skipped the first juice because the thought of having to choke down more Morning Glory made me want to quit on the spot.

Day 2 intake:

Morning Glory - NOPE

Spicy Pome-Nade - (8/10, 100 calories) Tasted a lot like pink lemonade, seemed to have less of a kick than the Spicy Lemonade

Sweet Spin

Chia Berry

Not So Chunky - (4/10, 210 calories) I had high hopes for this, but it tasted more like unripe bananas mixed with peanut butter. It was pretty bitter and it kind of broke my heart.

Xtreme Greens

Nutritional breakdown:

Total Calories:  750

Carbs:  153g

Fat:  16g

Protein:  18g

Juice Cleanse, Day 1 Recap

Well, I made it. Not a morsel of solid food on day 1. Egg whites and a "moderate" amount of raw or steamed veggies are allowed, but I really wanted to make it at least 1 day on the juice alone.

I did pretty well, hunger-wise, until around 7pm. Then the drive-thru fantasies set in, and fierce. But I fought them off with all kinds of guilty pleasure E! shows that I had on the DVR. I think I peed 50 times throughout the day (not exaggerating), and I drank a lot of tea. Blood sugar-levels were good throughout the day, but dipped a little at night, which I corrected with a 100-calorie chocolate milk. I had a low-grade headache for most of the afternoon, but that could be due to not being able to have my first-thing-in-the-morning Diet Coke. I missed it a lot more than I thought I would, which might be a good thing to consider. Addicted, much?? I slept like poo though.

Here's the day 1 intake rundown:

Morning Glory – (0/10, 120 calories) This tasted like a lettuce/celery/dirt milkshake to me. I had to hold my nose to get it down, and chase each swallow with tea. I am not kidding. I couldn’t taste the fruits in here at all.

Spicy Lemonade – (10/10, 70 calories) A lot like Crystal Light lemonade with a kick. The amount of cayenne was just perfect.

Sweet Spin – (6/10, 160 calories) MUCH better than the first green of the day. Heavy on the banana flavor up front with the spinach in the aftertaste, and I tasted zero dirt.

Chia Berry – (8/10, 130 calories) I really liked this one. Perfect balance of tart & sweet, really a pleasant juice.

Choco-Nana – (8/10, 150 calories) I was really hungry when I drank this, and it quieted my desire for solid food a lot more than I thought it would. The addition of strawberries in this juice give it a less-sweet flavor that’s really nice.

X-Treme Greens – (4/10, 150 calories) I would put this one right in the middle of the other 2 green juices that I had today. It tasted a little perfume-y to me. I didn't love it, but it didn't need a chaser, at least.

Nutritional breakdown:

Total calories:  780

Carbs: 182g

Fat:  14g

Protein:  14g

Have mercy on my soul, I'm doing a 3-day juice fast!

I hit a weight-loss plateau about 3 months ago, and I’ve tried a lot of things to bust through it – to largely no avail. I read this article about a lovely gal from Britain who is also a type 1 diabetic, and she had a very successful and fulfilling 3-day juice fast. The company she used is overseas from me, so I set out to find an affordable alternative in America. I actually found Jus by Julie because there was a Groupon for it. This led me to their website, which is awesome. They also have a ton of good Yelp reviews, so I decided this was the way to go.

I’ve never done something like this before, and I’m pretty nervous. I had dreams about it all last night, and slept like poo. I’m not really sure why I have so much anxiety, I chose to do this, no one’s making me, and I can quit on it if I really want to. But still. The most challenging this is going to be balancing my insulin intake, because a few hypoglycemic incidents WILL sabotage this in a hurry. Wish me luck!