ღ the liver loves beetroot ღ
Eating right for healthy digestion is essential, therefore learning and putting into practice the following 7 Healthy Liver & Gallbladder Habits is a powerful step to improving digestion and detoxification. These include:
- Bitter foods in meals such as dandelion greens, watercress, rocket, mustard greens, and chicory which can also be made into a salad or vinegar dressing are eaten for their bitter principles. It is the bitter principles of the foods that stimulate the bitter receptors and evoke the taste of bitterness in the mouth. Bitter herbs from the time they are placed in your mouth and held there for a few seconds, begin to prepare the body for digestion. They stimulate stomach acid, pancreatic enzymes, liver function and bile production improving the digestion of food in the stomach and small intestines.
- Prebiotic Foods - Eating foods such as sauerkraut, kefir, leeks, peas, chicory root, dandelion root, Jerusalem artichokes, root veggies all provide the prebiotics to feed your probiotic colonies for healthy gut function reducing the burden on the liver.
- Don’t Skip The Fibre - Fibre from plant vegetables, ground flax seeds and slippery elm help to keep the bowel moving as well as pulling out toxins for elimination preventing reabsorption of the toxins back into circulation.
- Ensure Your Meal Portions Are Not Too Big - Smaller portions are more manageable to digest and take less stomach acid and bile to complete the process.
- A Balance of Fats, Carbohydrates And Proteins - Don’t follow low-fat diets. Ensure your meals contain a balance of fats, carbohydrates and proteins to optimise gallbladder function.
- Eat Your Meals In A Peaceful Environment - Eating on the run does not allow for proper digestion as it does not allow the appropriate interaction between the parasympathetic nervous system (rest and digest), the digestive tract and optimal bile production.
- Chew Your Food Well - By breaking down larger food particles into smaller ones makes it easier for the rest of the system to digest your food ensuring you receive maximum nutritional value from it. You need to chew your food until it is liquefied and lost all of its texture.
If you want to take it a little further and show your liver some TLC check out my 21 Day To Wellness Detox Program or add a liver loving tea into your daily routine.