Detoxification, increased energy, improved digestion clearer skin are just a few of the many benefits provided by cleanses – short-term diets, where your food is replaced by juices for one to seven days. You don’t have to blend anything yourself – everything is done for you by professionals. Just place an order! These three brands that deliver to the Bay and Waikato are really worth the buzz.
Images: Alex Spodyneiko
GREENROOTS JUICERY
PRICE: $99.99 per day
Our world has become so polluted that we carry at least 700 contaminants in our bodies at all times. Unfortunately, a vast amount of nastiness comes with the food we eat. That’s where Juicery comes in very handy. Will and Katie, the two creative souls behind the brand, saw no point in trying to flush out toxins with toxin-laden produce, so made sure they only used certified organic ingredients in their cleanses. Katie also suffered from food-related auto-immune diseases, and switching to an organic plant-based diet helped her to heal. Of course, she just had to share this secret recipe for health with the world! Every ingredient used in their cleanses is seasonal and grown in New Zealand.
They use traditional techniques to create raw, unpasteurised cold-pressed juices that preserve a high percentage of living enzymes, vitamins, and minerals from fruit, vegetables and nuts.
Juicery cleanses are extremely satisfying. Morning ‘Mint Choc Chip’ superfood smoothie with banana, raw cacao nibs, cacao powder, activated cashews, mint, peppermint essential oil and dates is enough to fuel you for half a day, so when ‘Sun Rising’ juice time comes in two hours, you almost feel too full to have another drink.
If I’ve been indulging in rich foods, a cleanse is a wonderful way to hit the reset button. My skin glows when I finish day three. And it inspires me to think about what I put in my body.
Salma Hayek
Juice cleansing opponents often complain about the lack of fat and protein in a diet based solely on fruits, veggies and water, but with ‘Mint Choc Chip’ in the morning and ‘Vanilla Dream’ cashew mylk at night, it definitely won’t be a problem.
In the 1-Day seasonal cleanse there are three 550ml cold-pressed juices, one 550ml superfood smoothie and one nut of the same size, plus one 60ml immune shot to kick start the cleanse and 275ml activated tonic to wrap up the day – probably more than you’ll find in any other detox pack. That makes Juicery the perfect option for virgins, who think they might be tempted by their food cravings.
Visit @focusmagazinenz Instagram on 9 December to win a 1-Day Juicery cleanse.
GREENLEAF ORGANICS
PRICE: from $79.00 per day
We all tend to fall into the trap of buying the same products every time we go grocery shopping. But are we getting
all the nutrients we need? Greenleaf Organics cleanses are full of beneficial, lesser-known superfoods – spirulina, maqui, flaxseed, psyllium husks, moringa – that provide our bodies with everything they’ve ever dreamed of.
And the best part? The ingredients are blended, not juiced, to make sure all the nutritional goodness reaches your body. With fibre still inside the bottle, it takes longer to digest the blend, so you’ll feel full for hours. Having essential fats like hemp-seed oil and activated nuts among the ingredients also helps.
GREENLEAF ORGANICS CALMING SMOOTHIE RECIPE
(2-3 serves)
- 1 cup organic pineapple chunks with juice 1⁄2 cup mixed red or green organic cabbage
- 1⁄3 cup fresh organic mint leaves
- juice of 1⁄2 freshly squeezed lime or lemon
- 1 tsp
- 1 Tbsp organic hemp seeds 100ml coconut water
- 265ml Greenleaf Organics Switchel
Put all ingredients in a blender and blend onhigh until smooth.
The flip side of indulging in these new ingredients is the unfamiliar . Some of the blends might taste funny for an unprepared palette. Take morning 50ml GLOimmunity shot, for example – apple cider vinegar (ACV), mixed with grapefruit and cayenne pepper, or charcoal and lemon, or any of five on offer. Avid wellness junkies will love it; beginner cleansers might need to take a few deep breaths before slugging it down. But the benefits of drinking ACV on a daily basis are unquestionable – it lowers blood glucose levels, assists in weight loss and aids digestion by increasing enzymes in the gut, to name just a few.
The comforting and deeply hydrating Ocean that you can drink at any time during the day refreshes the palette, while pink super-berry Lotus with coconut kefir, chia seeds, hemp-seed oil, banana, flax seeds, maca, maqui, brazil nut, cashews, dates cinnamon tastes so yum you’ll be tempted to order a whole pack after the cleanse ($8.50 per bottle).
The other juices have equally poetic names, by the way – Fern, Bodhi, Enlighten, Sunset.
Visit @focusmagazinenz Instagram on 16 December to win a 1-Day Greenleaf Organics cleanse.
V ON WHEELS x JUST BLEND
PRICE: $99.00
That one time Mila Arena agreed to supply food to a Tauranga gym for athletes who were ‘shredding’, she swore to keep away from all things detox for the rest of her life. Bland broccoli with steamed vegan ‘chicken’ is a long way from what and flavourful V on Wheels meals are all about. Mila’s philosophy revolves around hearty, mouthwatering food thatis fun to share with the whole family.
The detox box is not your typical cleanse of low calories and no chewing for days, but rather a set of wholesome meals to get you back on track to healthy eating after all the Christmas festivities. It consists of five generous portions of V on Wheels signature dishes and five bags of smoothie ingredients from Just Blend – you can either switch to this food entirely for a few days or stretch it out for a week by swapping your breakfast and lunch with one smoothie and one meal from the box. Read our detailed review of one of the V on Wheels detox boxes here.
V on Wheels food is vegan, and , and creates a great habit of making better food choices that are easy to stick to even after this initial week. In her cooking, Mila focuses on from all over the world, so you’ll try curry, risotto, polenta and other on-trend dishes with a healthy twist. The dish that will send every Kiwi to taste heaven is her lentil roast with balsamic onion gravy and peas – dense, moist, perfectly balanced classics.
The researchers say we should be eating around 10 portions of fruit and veggies per day (approx. 800g for those who prefer more precise figures). With V on Wheels x Just Blend detox box, reaching those quantities finally becomes achievable!
Brown rice and quinoa risotto nutritional information:
- Energy: 2,110kj
- Protein: 13.5g
- Fat: 12.3g
- Carbohydrates: 80.2g
- Fibre: 8g
Visit @focusmagazinenz Instagram on 23 December to win V on Wheels Detox Box.