Spring is finally here, bringing with it the usual boost of energy, everything looks brighter and maybe you find yourself in need of that little kick to shake off the winter leftover…What better moment to start a Spring Detox plan?
It can be about losing some weight, or simply about eliminating some toxins and helping your body feeling cleaner, more energetic, and lighter!
The season is on your side, the energy around is all about renewal and rebirth, and the brighter weather just calls for lighter meals, everything works with you to support you while you go ahead with you detox break.
I believe I need to go for solid 3 weeks, but you can adjust the duration to your needs, even 1 or 2 weeks is good according to what you want to achieve: on the long term it will lead you to lose weight (3 weeks or more, with a few tweaks to adjust it to the preferred duration) in the short term is a purifying and cleansing regime, that will make you feel better and rechanged!
What about this spring detox plan?
What we want is gently purify our body helping it eliminate all the excess of toxins, and ensure a great boost of nutrients that will give us energy and purify our stomach and digestive system that has surely being burdened by the winter diet.
Real Food = Real Nutrition
We want to eat food that is real nutriment for our body, as opposite to a bunch of calories thrown in while doing something else, just for the sake to keep us moving, or to comfort us!
Nature of course can be a great help when planning our spring detox plan, and comes to the rescue with all we need to support the plan. Using fresh fruit and vegetables, herbal teas, and a few herbal remedies we can create the perfect food regime for our needs!
Your Spring Detox plan in 5 steps
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Cook for yourself as much as possible.
Avoiding processed food is key to ensure you know exactly what you are eating, you’d be surprised by the amount of unnecessary sugar and flour that is added to many recipes just to adjust their flavour and texture! Hence, the more you prepare your food yourself, the more successful your detox plan is going to be. Furthermore, adding the care of the preparation, means focusing on what you want to achieve, and adding your intention to the meal preparation and the commitment, are more powerful that you think.
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Drop refined carbs.
Carbs are not the devil, refined ones are! And you can do yourself a favour: just swap refined carbs for whole ones, and you’ll find yourself assuming less calories straight on, and going for a much healthier choice as well. To do that you want to avoid all cereal-based flours, and with it I mean avoiding pasta, pizza, crackers, biscuit, cakes etc. Yep, I hear you complaining already, I know, but a detox plan is not made of good wish only! So, swap all of the above for grains or whole grains, even better. Rice, barley, oat, spelt, rye. They are all perfect to replace pasta and create delicious salads, boosting the nutritional values of your dish.
The swapping game
Swap bread for rice cake or corn cake, or for the German rye bread, it is made with roughly grounded wholemeal rye and sourdough, so it does not really contain flour! You can swap your standard wheat pasta for the protein based one: coming from legumes flour like pea, or lentil, soya, or even buckwheat (not a legume but is not even a cereal so lower carbs intake!). The great win here is that swapping to this type of pasta you not only cut down your carbs intake, but even the calories: for the same amount of pasta the legume based one has half the calories of the traditional one.
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Avoid cheese for the duration of the detox plan.
Cheese is one of my big loves, but unfortunately it is quite rich in fat, so you want to avoid it for the duration of the plan.
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Breakfast
Start with a canary every morning, while preparing your breakfast: a warm glass of water with freshly squeezed lemon, it is the perfect to wake up your organism, and it’s the perfect detox start! For breakfast make sure you eat some fresh fruit, and pair it with yogurt, or some wholegrain sugar free cereals with dried fruit, a rice cake with some sugar free jam or a couple of slices of avocado. Just remember to keep things variated! A cup of green tea will keep the detox benefits at its maximum.
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Lunch
Swap your normal lunch with a super salad every day for the duration of your detox plan! Don’t be scared: I am not talking about a sad salad with a couple of lettuce leaves and 2 slice of cucumber, I am referring here to a good plate of a well composed salad, that caters for all your nutritional needs and adds a bit of flavour while maintaining you full for long.
Get Creative!
All you need is to get a bit creative in the prep, and mix a good amount of mixed vegetables with a part of protein and some cereals. Add dried fruit, nuts, seeds, in order to add flavour and healthy nutrients and ensure you do not get bored with your detox plan… If you need more ideas stay tuned as I am going to focus on salads in the incoming days! In the meantime check my recipe section for some healthy and easy recipes.
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Snacks
For your morning and afternoon breaks: fruit and herbal teas and smoothies are your best friends, they grant that you do not feel hungry, topping up the vitamins and mineral you consume, furthermore they can be very helpful to enhance the detox of you plan:
- Add a couple of cups of green tea daily, it is the detox drink “pour excellence”, if you want to know more read here 🙂
- Use pineapple juice for its draining properties
- Nettle herbal tea is a great detox ally, and it has many minerals too. Great before going tobed as it is caffeine free!
- Smoothies made with water and fruit, or a bit of yogurt or vegetable milk would be fine (To have it superlight, adding a bit of texture cut the amount of milk with water 50% /50%!) Check this great smoothie recipe for inspiration
- Prepare fruit salads, seasoning with fresh lemon juice and a dash of agave syrup (lighter than sugar and with lower Glycemic index)
- If you are starving and in need of something a bit more sustaining, go for a small bowl of nuts, alternate macadamia nuts, walnuts, almonds, pistachios, cashew.
- A bowl of crunchy veggie stick is ideal: carrots, cucumber or celery or fennel are great to break the fasting and keep you going.
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Dinner
I’m going mainly for protein based meal for dinner, as they work much better for me, but the main point here is: go for grilled, or oven baked lean meats and fish, reduce the quantity you usually eat by a good 1/3 and increase the quantity of vegetables to make up for it. Here are a few tips to tweak your dinners to fit your Spring Detox plan:
- For instance, if you would regularly go for a 100g pasta portion with some veggies on the side, make it a 70gr portion with a vegetable based sauce, so that the dish is more filling and you do not feel the difference in portion size. (If you are swapping the pasta with a legume based one, you can maintain the same amount, or decrease it slightly if you are going for weight lost plan!)
- Change the way you cook your meat: avoid frying and over cooking, prefer steaming, grilling or oven baking, choose leaner cut of meat, or stir fry and use only vegetable oil to cook.
- Pair your main meal component be them grains or proteins with a big plate of vegetables! To ensure you have enough variety, stock your fridge with plenty of frozen vegetables: broccoli, mixed veggie, spinach, the more the better. This way you don’t have to panic if you did not have time to buy fresh vegetables, and you have a solution already chopped and ready to cook, which will save you time on meal preparation!
- Swap potatoes for the sweet ones and eat them boiled: they are slightly less caloric, with more minerals and a much lower glycaemic index (particularly if boiled!) this way, you are most likely to feel full for longer. (Want to know the difference? Check here!)
In conclusion
Applying these simple tweaks to your meals, and focusing on fruit and vegetables is the key to have the most benefit from the detox, and boosting your energy levels at the same time.
Are you ready to start your detox plan? Any things you would do differently? Let me know in the comment!
And stay tuned for some super healthy recipes to integrate in your detox plan!
Images Credit: Pixabay