Fruit and vegetable juices are healthy if they only contain natural, real ingredients. Ingredient lists may be difficult to decipher at the beginning, but the main unhealthy ingredients to avoid include high-fructose corn syrup or corn sugar, artificial colors that include Red No. 40 and flavors such as asparatame, saccharin, sucralose or monosodium glutamate or MSG, which may be disguised behind the phrase "natural flavors".
Fresh Squeezed
Fruit and vegetable juices are healthiest when they are fresh squeezed, because they retain vitamins that are sensitive to heat. Some store bought juices are pasteurized for safety and heated at high temperatures. Vitamin C is one of the most heat-sensitive vitamins. If you want a juice with vitamin C, check its nutrition label to make sure the juice has the percentage of your daily intake of vitamin C you are looking for. If you make the juice at home or order it freshly made at a health food store, the juice will be full of live enzymes and nutrients that provide you with energy and can aid your digestion.
Orange Juice
Orange juice primarily offers vitamin C and antioxidants. It now contains fortified nutrients, including vitamin D and calcium. It is high in natural fructose sugar. If you are on a low sugar diet, mix a portion of orange juice and water.
Pomegranate Juice
The University of Maryland Medical Center states that drinking 8 oz. of pomegranate juice daily may prevent prostate cancer. If you are not concerned about prostate issues, pomegranate juice also provides you with plenty of antioxidants called polyphenols and vitamin C to strengthen your immune system.
Cranberry Juice
Cranberry juice is known to help rid your body of a urinary tract infection. Not all cranberry juices are equally as effective. The best kind to drink is the pure, unsweetened juice. Its taste is very bitter and sour. Pure juice refers to drinking only cranberry juice as opposed to a blend of fruits and cranberry.
Wheatgrass Juice
Wheatgrass juice is full of healthy nutrients including vitamin A, B-complex, C, E and K, protein, amino acids, plus chlorophyll, which promotes the production of red blood cells. Dr. Nicholas Perricone from Oprah.com states wheatgrass contains a "glyco-protein" P4D1 with antioxidant-like qualities to eliminate cancer cells. Wheatgrass is also an anti-inflammatory. You can find freshly juiced wheatgrass at some juice bars, you can grow and juice your own, or in bottled green drinks.
Combined Fruit And Vegetable Juice
Some juices mix a variety of fruits and vegetables together and sell bottled at grocery stores and gas station convenience stores. They often contain banana, apples, pineapple, kale, carrots, wheatgrass and spirulina. Spirulina is a blue-green algae that offers healthy minerals and chlorophyll.
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