Drink your vegetables

Many busy people turn to fruit juice as a time-saving way of getting part of their daily five servings of fruit and vegetables. However, fruit juice can be high in sugars–even higher than some sugary foods like doughnuts! Vegetable juice, on the other hand, is “lower in sugar than fruit, which means freshly made vegetable juice is lower in calories than fruit juice,” according to this Daily Mail article. You will get valuable nutrients from vegetable juice, especially if you make it yourself. So that Bloody Mary (or maybe even that Michelada) you knocked back at brunch can count as a serving of vegetables, although the Daily Mail suggests that a Virgin Mary is probably better.  If this news makes you thirsty, Food & Wine Magazine has 8 Bloody Mary recipes to give you inspiration.

While you shouldn’t try to fill all of your daily vegetable needs with juice, sometimes a drink is refreshing, especially on long, hot summer days. You don’t have to make a Bloody Mary to enjoy tomato juice drinks. Technically, tomatoes are classified as fruits, but for this purpose they are treated as vegetables. And if we are going make an exception for tomato as a vegetable, we might as well do the same for avocado, and enjoy these delicious avocado drinks.

Moving back to proper vegetables, there’s a whole world of drinks to savor. If you prefer something on the sweet side, carrot juice is a good place to start. Beets also add sweetness, as well as vibrant color, to drinks. Going for the greens will move you back toward the savory side, with delicious options for kale, spinach, and even parsley.

What’s your favorite vegetable drink?