Grapes are a real storehouse of nutrients. It carries the warmth of the sun and the generosity of fertile land. Since ancient times, people have revered this product. Even in the literature of the ancient world, one can find lines about the healing properties of grapes. Warriors used the juice of this berry to increase strength, girls - to prolong youth and beauty. What is really valuable grape juice? The benefits and harms of this product for the human body are still being studied by doctors around the world. What is the secret of the healing properties of such a drink, we will tell right now.
Grape Juice Composition
Grape juice has a unique composition. First, the sugar in this product is found in the form of easily assimilated fructose and glucose. These substances saturate the body with essential carbohydrates, helping maintain energy.
And secondly, a berry drink contains a whole complex of minerals and vitamins. This product in its healing composition, the amount of useful substances can compete with industrial medicines. In a large amount in the juice is potassium, calcium, phosphorus, iron and magnesium. Vitamins such as C, B, PP, A prevail.
In the medical literature, one can often find a comparison of grape juice with mineral water. What are these products similar to? The fact is that grape juice consists of 80% of water, which is saturated with organic acids and minerals.
Beneficial features
Thanks to this healing composition of grape juice, this product has a number of useful properties for the human body:
- is a natural digestible energy drink;
- provides the body with a mineral and vitamin complex;
- cleanses, is an expectorant and tonic.
In addition, doctors often recommend expectant mothers to use grape juice to raise hemoglobin in the blood. The benefits and harms of such a drink for a pregnant woman and her fetus are not fully understood. But it is noted that regular use in small doses of grape juice significantly improves the patient's blood count.
Recommendations for use
Pure grape juice is prescribed as a medicine in both folk and traditional medicine. The benefits and harms of an acid-rich drink are often unpredictable. Therefore, you should know the measure in the use of such a product and regularly undergo examinations.
With proper use, grape juice copes with the disease even better than tablets, while having a minimum of contraindications and adverse reactions.
Used grapes as a medicine in the ancient world. And in the XIX century, a separate direction in medicine was formed - ampelotherapy (in translation means treatment with grapes).
What health problems recommend regular consumption of grape juice? The product helps with such diseases:
- Heart and vascular insufficiency. Due to the high content of potassium in the drink, the product restores the heart muscle, improves hematopoiesis and normalizes blood flow through the vessels.
- Due to the similarity in composition with mineral waters, grape juice helps to eliminate toxins from the body, normalize the water-salt balance, restore metabolic processes, and the drink also has a diuretic property.
- Grape juice can reduce body temperature, reduce fever and cramps, and eliminate swelling.
- It is an expectorant, reducing the viscosity of mucus. Therefore, the juice is used for bronchitis, pneumonia and even tuberculosis.
- Useful product for pregnant women in the early stages. Grape juice contains a large amount of folic acid, which is responsible for the normal formation of the neural tube in the fetus.
- Helps with reduced hemoglobin, restores strength after blood loss (including during menstrual flow in women).
- A real discovery in medicine was the research of an American university, which proved that grape juice blocks the action of carcinogens in the body, thus protecting a person from the growth of cancer cells. It is scientifically proven that a glass of such a drink drunk on an empty stomach is an effective prophylactic against breast cancer.
- Juice is also good for children. The product helps to gain body weight, strengthen immunity, increase intellectual and physical capabilities. But you need to enter such a drink literally a few drops and not earlier than the two-year-old baby.
- Apply juices from light grape varieties and for cosmetic purposes: make masks, creams, lotions for face, body and even hair.
Health hazard
Freshly squeezed grape juice contains a high concentration of acids. Therefore, in some conditions, this product can be harmful to health. It is undesirable to consume such a drink:
- with a stomach ulcer or gastritis;
- diabetes mellitus;
- obesity;
- chronic kidney disease;
- predisposition to caries;
- do not give grape juice to babies under two years old;
- the use of the product in the last months of pregnancy can lead to overweight, swelling, excessive body weight of the fetus;
- nursing mothers should also limit the use of such a drink, as the baby may form flatulence, disorders of the digestive tract, and the occurrence of allergic reactions is not ruled out.
Packaged grape juice: benefits and harms
It is safe to say that the benefits of juice from packs are few. But it can bring tangible harm, especially to children and expectant mothers, since it usually contains a whole complex of chemical preservatives and dyes.
How to prepare grape juice for the winter?
Fresh juice really has various healing properties. But, unfortunately, grapes are a seasonal product. Even if it is sold in the winter season, then there will be little benefit from such a berry. Therefore, the hostesses procure juice for the future. How to do this in order to maximize the preservation of all useful substances, as well as increase the shelf life of preservation?
There are two options for harvesting grape juice for the winter. More details about each of these methods below.
Canned freshly squeezed grape juice: benefits and harms
It is believed that this is the method of preserving juice from grapes that preserves the maximum amount of nutrients. This is actually not the case. Firstly, freshly squeezed juice is a perishable product in which oxidative processes literally begin immediately. And secondly, boiling and sterilization, which can not be done without in this case, destroy most of the vitamins and minerals.
To improve the taste and extend the shelf life, apple-grape juice is made. The benefits and harms of such a drink are identical to canned grape berry juice.
Juice from a juicer: is there any benefit?
In the past few years, modern housewives have appreciated such a household assistant in the kitchen as a juicer. This technique will be especially useful for young mothers. How to make grape juice in a juicer, the benefits and harms of which are still not explainable? To make juice in this type of machine is very simple. It works on the principle of a double boiler - loaded fruits are processed with hot steam. Thus, beneficial substances are maximally preserved. Due to the natural dilution of the finished product with water vapor, the drink is less concentrated, so it is absolutely safe to offer it to children.
Undoubtedly, such a product as natural grape juice has a pleasant taste. The benefits and harms of this product remain a hot topic for discussions between doctors and healers around the world. Despite this, the drink is in high demand by consumers and is a common folk remedy for treating a variety of ailments.