If you had one wish, what would it be? Boundless wealth? World peace? Well, we can’t give you those, but what we can give you is pretty incredible, too – the ability to lose weight while you’re sleeping. It sounds like a dream, and it is, literally. All you have to do is drink the juice we’ll describe every night before hitting the sheets.
Of course, to extend and improve your weight loss, you’ll need to exercise and pay attention to your overall diet, so you can’t sidestep actual effort entirely. But this near-magical beverage is full of healthy stuff that’s been proven to boost metabolism and burn through fat, especially the stubborn belly kind. We’ll take a look at each of the ingredients separately and discuss how each one works, then finish up with the recipe.
Water
Drinking more water is the first place to start when you want to lose weight. Not only does it help you to feel full with less food, but studies also show that water increases the number of calories burned for at least a solid hour after consuming it.
One study that involved overweight children discovered a 25% increase in resting energy expenditure (calories burned while doing nothing) after drinking cold water. In a study of overweight women, it was discovered that increasing water consumption to more than 1 liter per day resulted in an extra 4.4 pounds of weight loss over the course of a year.
Lemon
Some people swear by drinking lemon water for weight loss, but it’s not so much the drink that makes a difference. It’s whether or not that drink is replacing something else with a lot of sugar, like soda, heavily sweetened coffee, or juice. However, lemon is a mild natural diuretic, which means it can reduce bloating.
Lemons, like all citrus fruit, also contain a lot of vitamin C, which helps to burn fat at the cellular level. C is a required part of the process that transports and mobilizes fatty acids within cells to be used as energy.
Cucumber
Cucumbers are high in both water and fiber, two things that are critical to weight loss. They are also very low in calories, so they don’t add much to your daily total. One cup of cucumber has just 16 calories, hardly worth counting. Studies show that regularly eating foods with a lot of water but few calories are linked to significant weight loss.
Cucumber is also thought to boost metabolism or the speed at which your body burns calories. It also, like lemon, contains a fair amount of vitamin C and serves as a natural diuretic.
Ginger
Ginger is a flavorful root that can help to control appetite by regulating blood sugar and serum cholesterol. Spikes and dips in these numbers often lead to overeating, or excessive snacking on unhealthy foods. Ginger can also suppress the fattening stress hormone cortisol and give you a boost of energy. It’s not enough to keep you awake, but you may find that ginger means you wake up refreshed and ready to go.
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