As we may have already know, carrots contain many vitamins and minerals. High in Vitamin A, high in carotene and aitioxidants (reduce risk of cancer). It helps to boost our immune system, protect our skin from sun damage, cleanse our liver, reduce the risk of high blood pressure, fighting aneamia and most importantly improve our eye sights.
Children today enjoy playing computers, PSP, DS and whatever and it is very damaging to their eyes. As a result, we see more children are wearing glasses today and it is alarming to see children as young as 4 years old have started started wearing thick glasses. My girl has developed a bit of myopia too. That was why I started to find ways to make her consume more carrots.
It was always tough to hide some carrots in her soup bowl and she would always complaint about it. Why today has more carrots than yesterday she would ask? She hated carrots to the extend that I had to cut them into very very small tiny size and she practically swallowed them in together with the soup rather than chewing them. And the maximum pieces of tiny carrots she consumed was hardly more than 5. That would amount to like 1.5 inch of carrot!
Recently, I found some good ways to make my girl take more carrots, much more carrots than before. She is in fact taking a carrot a day now.
Some vegetables or fruits are best taken raw, some worked better with light boiling. Chewing raw carrots has least benefits in terms of percentage our body can actually digest and absorb unless you juice them first (the absorption is only 5% based on studies!). Light boiling of blended carrots gives the maximum body absorption of 90% though. Unfortunately, my girl dislike cooked carrots totally. So I have opted for second best solution which is to JUICE them!
I found and tested some recipes that I am very sure your kids will enjoy. What you will need is a good juicer to start off with. Do go for more powerful juicer so as to cut down preparation time ie. need not cube them before juicing them which save a lot of time!
2 carrots - skin peeled, cut small *
1 red apple - seed removed, cut small *
1 orange - cut small * and squeeze them seperately if it is seeded orange
* how small depends on how powerful your juicer is.
This serving size gives you approximately one glass of juice.
Practically any fruits or vegetables can be juiced with carrots. And in general, carrots are the dominant ingredient. Carrots are sweet, so mixing them with something sour would give a balanced taste, eg.
- green apple + carrots in 1:2 proportion
- skinned pineapple + carrots in 1/4 : 4 proportion
- strawberry + carrots in 1 cup : 4 proportion
- seedless grapes + carrots in 1 cup : 4 proportion
- skinned cucumber + carrots in 1:4 proportion
Many people said celery is also good especially for those with high blood pressure. I tried out this juice with celery. It was not that bad too. Though you would experience a bit of celery after-taste but overall experience was not that bad. Once you get used to the after-taste kind of thing, in fact the juice was quite pleasant to consume!
3 carrots - skin peeled, cut small
1 red apple - skin peeled, cut small
1/2 stalk of celery - cut to 2 inch length
If you are more adventurous, the following are some interesting websites with many many more fruits ~ vegetable juice recipes that you can give it a try!
http://www.carrotjuice.com/grape-carrot-juice-recipe.html
http://www.soymilkquick.com/fruitjuicerecipes.php
http://www.healthrecipes.com/fruit_juice_recipes.htm
www.bestjuicerrecipes.com - once you register with them for free, you will get list of recipes and smoothies to start off with!
Enjoy Juicing!
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