Smoothies in many ways offer the ultimate quick-fix for food. All you are doing here is taking a bunch of ingredients and then dropping them into a blender. While that might seem a little bit simple, the good news is that it means you can pick pretty much any different complementary foods in order to get their unique benefits.
The taste can be amazing too.
And with that many nutrients and healthy ingredients in one place, the bolt of energy can be an amazingly rejuvenating feeling.
We all know someone who is full of energy and beans all the time. And guess what? It’s a good chance they drink smoothies! The following smoothies will help to jazz up your day…
1. Morning Wake Up Smoothie
First up, the recipe. Then we’ll dive into why it works:
½ a cup of cold water
1 Beet
Lemon juice to taste
1 tablespoon honey
2 tablespoons of coconut oil
2 cups of mixed frozen berries
Ice
If you’re used to having coffee first thing in the morning, then you might find that you rely on using something as a pick-me-up. The problem though is that coffee a) doesn’t have all that much nutritional value and that it is addictive. Caffeine works by blocking the receptors in the brain that respond to adenosine – which is an inhibitory neurotransmitter that we produce as a by-product of the energy process. The more time we spend working, the more adenosine builds up and the slower and less cognitively able we become. By blocking these receptors, caffeine can prevent adenosine from having any impact and this in turn means that the brain feels more awake.
The problem is that the brain responds to this. How? By creating more adenosine receptors! The result is that you now need even more caffeine to feel its effects. Worse, is that when you aren’t consuming any caffeine you will feel slow, lethargic and prone to headaches! When you are asleep, you of course aren’t getting any caffeine and some people now believe that the morning grogginess we all experience (sleep inertia) is actually often caused by caffeine withdrawal!
So instead, try using this above option to wake yourself with hydration, natural energy, and some ice! It’s twice as effective and lasts longer.