Chef V is often lauded by supporters as one of the best juice-cleansing products you can buy. Over the past few years, it’s exploded in popularity online as a potential “cure-all” for a variety of ailments. But is celery juice good for migraines and gut health like they say? Is a celery juice diet really going to make you lose weight and feel great? Since we take juice diets seriously, we consider it our duty to get you the celery information you never knew you needed.
What are the benefits of celery juice?
To understand what has people so excited about celery juice, it’s probably best to get right down to the basics. The nutritional basics, that is. According to the US Department of Agriculture,
1 cup of chopped celery includes the following:
- 40 mg calcium
- 14 calories
- 2 grams fiber
- 263 mg potassium
- 1 gram protein
- 80 mg sodium
- 453 IU of vitamin A
- 3 mg of vitamin C
- 30 mcg of vitamin K
For most of you, that’s just a bunch of numbers. So let’s highlight a few standouts. Most notably, celery has a ton of vitamin K, an essential vitamin for helping us repair our body from injuries. Celery also has decent showing in calcium, potassium, and vitamin C.
But, overall, celery’s nutritional profile could be best described as “inoffensive.” It’s not packed with any particular vitamin or mineral, but its calorie count is also pretty low. This isn’t to say it isn’t healthy. Celery is undoubtedly a super healthy vegetable, and with its low-calorie count, it’s great for a snack.
If you were to turn celery into juice, it would be an equally inoffensive juice. In an age with so many sugar-laden drinks, we can respect that. Getting more veggies in your life is never a bad thing, whether it comes from celery stalks or drinking juice. Lots of fruit and vegetable juices, celery included, feature antioxidants that have anti-inflammatory properties.
Problems with celery juice
What’s the main negative side effect of celery juice? Well, it’s got one obvious and dangerous side effect. Hype. Celery juice isn’t magically going to make all of your serious ailments suddenly vanish, no matter what your favorite celebrity tells you. It’s just a juice made from a single vegetable and a fairly innocuous vegetable at that.
Of course, plenty of people want to focus on that tantalizingly low-calorie count and assume celery drinks are great for juice diets and fasting. Trying to go for a juice fast based on celery juice isn’t a great idea. Firstly, the juicing process tends to strip most of the fiber out of celery juice. This can give you tons of digestive issues if you’re relying on celery juice alone for nutrition.
There’s also the fact that the low nutritional profile of celery juice means it’s just not sustainable for something as long as a 7 day cleanse, let alone a longer 21 day cleanse. The lack of serious nutritional value can lead to the infamous “celery juice headaches” as your body goes without what it needs.
Beyond the digestive concerns and celery juice headaches, there are also some adverse side effects of celery juice that are concerning for specific people. If you have a celery allergy, you should obviously stay away from large amounts of the stuff. However, people on blood thinner medication may also want to avoid too much celery due to the abundance of clot-promoting vitamin K.
The verdict
In the end, celery juice is just juice. That’s about it. In reasonable doses, you’re fine drinking it. The negative side effects of celery juice only start to kick in when you try to lean on it for a juice cleanse. If you want a juice cleanse that works, make sure to cleanse with Chef V. Our green drinks, detox soups, and detox smoothies have all the essentials to get you through even the legendary 21 day detox, no problem.