By Jen Hubley Luckwaldt, Prevention
If you frequent juice shops or flip through celebrity gossip magazines, you've likely heard of wheatgrass,
a juice made from young grass blades. Everyone from Angelina Jolie to
Ansel Elgort is reportedly throwing back shots of the chlorophyll-rich
liquid, which is said to reduce blood glucose levels, give skin a
radiant glow, and aid weight loss. (Got 10 minutes? Then you've got time
to lose the weight for good with Prevention's new 10-minute workouts and 10-minute meals.
[post_ads]While it would be fantastic to undo the effects of fried food and general slothfulness with a daily shot of green juice
(OMG, so fantastic), the idea of a super-powered green potion sounds
too good to be true. But scientists aren't exactly calling foul. Then
again, they don't really know enough to have an official stance on the
stuff, either, says Shereen Lehman, MS, adjunct faculty member at the
University of Bridgeport Human Nutrition Institute. "There are few human
studies on the benefits of wheatgrass, and scientists have yet to
figure out if humans can benefit and how much they'd need to consume for
better health."
The official verdict may still be out, but there are enough devoted
fans out there to make me want to try it for myself.
Here's what happened when I took a wheatgrass shot
every morning for two weeks:
I opted for organic wheat grass powder ($22, amazon.com) because it was far cheaper than forking over $4 for a single shot at my local juice bar. It was also far easier than juicing fresh wheatgrass myself.
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In its dried form, wheatgrass looks a lot like green sand. Mixed with
water and vigorously stirred, it's even worse. It looks like the inside
of a lawnmower bag and tastes like how a compost pile smells. I gagged
drinking it. By day two, I developed a new technique. I huffed out a few
breaths before knocking it back and tried not to breathe as I choked it
down. It seemed to work; at least I couldn't really taste it.
OK, so I should tell you that I decided my
daily wheatgrass shot would be my breakfast. Don't ask me why I did this
when I easily could have downed it along with my usual peanut
butter-topped apple. I guess I thought that having wheatgrass on an
empty stomach would be the best way to feel the effects. But I have to
admit, I've made better decisions in my life.
While a wheatgrass shot has about 20 calories, my usual breakfast has
around 200 calories. I was expecting to be hungry, but the surprise was
that I wasn't hungry right off the bat. Instead, it was a delayed
hunger that still left me ravenous by lunchtime, which means that I
probably ate more during the rest of the day, without even noticing it.
Not exactly a recipe for weight loss.
When I asked about my approach after the fact, diet pros agreed that I
should have continued eating breakfast: "Eating something like oatmeal
and yogurt would be a better breakfast than just drinking wheatgrass,"
Lehman said. Isabel Smith, RD, founder of Isabel Smith Nutrition,
agreed: "A wheatgrass shot isn't calorie-dense enough to count as a meal replacement. It would have been better to drink it in addition to a meal."
About 10 minutes after my first shot, I felt a
surge of energy. I noted a similar effect on subsequent days. Whether
that was the magical power of chlorophyll or a placebo effect, I
couldn't say for sure, but I'm leaning toward the latter. While Smith
mentioned that the vitamins and chlorophyll in wheatgrass might help promote healthy digestion
and aid the body's natural detoxification processes, she didn't mention
improved energy as a possible benefit. And I'm pretty sure I talked
myself into finding some benefit as a pep talk/apology for making my
body chug this disgusting stuff.
[post_ads]I started taking wheatgrass shots right
around the time that Easter candy started invading grocery store
shelves—historically, a very dangerous time for my diet. I'm not going
to lie and tell you that I didn't put a dent in a few bags of pastel
M&Ms, but the daily ritual of drinking something green reminded me
that woman cannot live on candy alone. (Instead, try one of these summer fruits that taste just like candy.) I found myself consciously trying to add more leafy greens into my diet, and thinking about things like fiber and portion size. In other words, things I should be thinking about anyway, but often don't.
Perhaps because of my ravenous appetite, I
didn't see any weight loss while drinking wheatgrass. I did, however,
feel like my clothes fit a little better. It's possible the extra
veggies and fiber I was eating helped to get things moving, thwarting any bloat.
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