Goji Juice Information – Pros and Cons without Biased Goji Juice Information - Benefits, Controversy and History

The goji berry is a red, sweet fruit that has been one of the main plants in Chinese folk medicine for about two thousand years. If you believe the legend, that figure may be over 4,000 years.

Some of the other names for this fruit are Himalayan goji berry and Tibetan goji berry that are both incorrect. The reason being that the berry that is in turn manufactured into juice comes from China. Some related spices do grow in the aforementioned regions and they may have very well been the plants that were bred into the commercially cultivated goji berry of today, but the climate is too unfavorable to growing just about anything in the Himalayas. Therefore, beware of manufactures and marketers of the substance who imply that their products originate from these areas of the world. The products are named in such a way to be marketed more effectively, if not to mislead people.

Before interest has developed in the West for goji juice, the countries that saw a use for this fruit include Japan and Korea.

The traditional used for goji in natural medicine include the strengthening of the immune system, improving eye sight, helping with circulation, protecting the liver and boosting sperm production in males. Read more on the health benefits of the goji juice here.

Goji berry contains dozens of essential nutrients, 53 to be exact. This has been determined by scientific means. Here is our post on the detailed information breakdown of the nutritional contents of the fruit: Goji Juice Ingredients – Detailed Nutrient Content Breakdown.

Testimonials of people who have taken this substance most often report an increased level of energy and vitality, better mood, better ability to sleep at night and sometimes weight loss. Read goji juice testimonials here.

Medical Goji Juice Information: Modern medical science has not so far proved or disproved almost any of these claims. The vast majority of the studies that have been done on the effects of this product by the companies that make a living by selling it.

The primary manufacturer of goji juice is FreeLife. You can find the Wikipedia page on FreeLife here. They use a multi-level-marketing approach to promoting their product.

The only side effect that we know of so far is that if ingested while on blood thinners, it may help increase that effect that may lead to excessive bleeding. We have an in-depth article on the subject: Goji Juice Side Effects – Separating Facts form Rumors.

If you have goji juice information that you want to share with our community of users, please use the comment section below.

Goji Juice Testimonials – Both Sides of the StoryGoji Juice Testimonials – Testimonials of the good and the bad.

Testimonials are a great way to get a feel for whether or not a product is for real. In that respect goji juice is no different. We have this category reserved for testimonials submitted by users, but we decided to kick things off with a summary of what people are saying about the product. These are their subjective opinions we do not agree nor disagree with them. They are just here for your information.

If you feel like leaving your own testimonial please feel free to do so. All you have to do is to leave a comment at the bottom of this page. The only thing we ask is to keep it clean, but we will only moderate for profanity, hateful content and not opinions.

Here is a crude overview of what people are saying about goji on the Internet.

One user says that he took goji juice on a regular basis for a year and lost two inches off his waist and had an increased level of energy.

A female user claims that the juice fixed her digestive problems literarily overnight. She also said that she was sleeping better as well and her hair and nails started to grow faster.

One woman is convinced that her diabetes got cured after taking the substance regularly. The comment actually came from her doctor.

A lot of people have reported in their goji juice testimonials that their energy levels and vitality had increased.

A woman said that she has had problems with her joints for a long time. It became so intolerable that she had a hard time walking. After taking goji for some time (it is not specified how long), she has not only regained her ability to walk from one point to another, but now she is running on a regular basis.

A middle-aged woman reported that because she was going thorough menopause, she had a hard time getting out of bed. After she had started taking goji juice, she felt an increase in her energy levels and in just four months she lost twenty some pounds.

A man with prostate problems reports on his goji juice testimonial that his problem is not entirely gone but went through some major improvements. As with a lot of other people, he also claims that he slept better as a result of the juice.

Himilayan Goji Juice - Is It a Cure-for-All? HardlyHimilayan goji juice facts and fiction separated.

The goji berry, which is the ingredient in the now-famous goji juice, has been a corner stone of Chinese folk medicine.

The stuff that you might be able to get your hands on is coming from China. This is important, because that makes the name ‘Himilayan goji juice’ a misnomer. The climate in that region of the world is less than ideal for cultivating this plant especially for commercial purposes. There are some related species that grow in the Himilayan mountain range, but they have nothing to do with the variety that is being produced into the goji juice that is available for purchase in the West. In all likelihood, it is but a clever – if you can call it that – marketing technique to catch the attention of a society that goes crazy over anything that comes from that part of the world.

Some of the other countries that are also a firm believer are Japan and Korea, but it is China that has the capacity to fuel the Western goji juice craze that seemed to have overcome us in the past few years.

The uses of the Himilayan goji juice in the West are primarily for anti aging, or at least that’s how they have positioned it as far as the marketing is concerned. There is scientific basis to that, since most berries contain antioxidants that have been proven to slow aging by lowering the levels of free radicals in one’s system. However the claim that this is the reason why some people in the East might live over one hundred years of age is simply hard to believe. It is more reasonable to believe that even if Himilayan goji juice is a major part of their anti ageing process, it is but one part of the equation.

The primary company that manufactures and distributes goji juice is called FreeLife whose front man is Earl Mindell. He has been around for a while and has built a name for himself as nutritionist and health guru.

If you go to their website and make the mistake of reading more and more of what they have up there, it may leave you with not wanting to buy any goji juice. It is not only the hype that seems a little too desperate at times, but also the fact that they call their product ‘Himilayan goji juice’ which is basically a lie. This is a real shame, though, because this plant may be something really special after all.

Goji Juices and Better HealthGoji juices can help with 5 major areas when it comes to your health.

 

The goji berry, a sweet fruit, has been around for at least two thousand years, but some legends suggest that it may date back to China’s first emperor who lived over four thousand years ago. He was said to be an avid herbalist and a big fan of the goji berry because of its healing properties. As with most legends, one cannot be one hundred percent sure about how much truth there is to these stories.

 

One thing is for sure, the herb has been part of traditional Chinese medicine for a long time, and perhaps there is a reason. There are a lot of claims out there about all the good things that goji juices may be good for. Some have claimed that the substance has cured them of diabetes. This comes from a doctor whose patient’s blood sugar level dropped dramatically after she started to take the juice. Traditionally, there are at least five different areas where it is believed to be beneficial including sperm production and circulation. Read more about the health benefits of goji juices here.

 

As far as the medical community if concerned, though, very few, if any of these claims have been confirmed in clinical trials and other methods that would constitute proof.

 

It may be prudent to consider, though, that doctors have never been a big fan of natural remedies. Some consider anything that wasn’t produced in a lab a hoax, but nothing could be further from the truth. The problem is the overzealous users of natural remedies and snake oil salesmen how are hoping to make more money from stating things that have not been proven yet, or are simply made up. If you are a person of reason, you may just dismiss any and all claims regarding a certain substance after a certain point. There is also the fact that whatever you can find in nature cannot be patented, so pharmaceutical companies may intentionally try to undermine the spread of these cures.

 

Goji juices are readily available for purchase in the United States, however it can be quite pricey and you may have to join a multi level marketing company if you want to get a discount.

 

It is also probably a good idea to research a good place to get the goji juices, because quality can vary greatly depending where the plant was cultivated.

Goji Juice Side Effects – Separating Facts form RumorsGoji juice side effects: one area of major concern.

Like many natural substances, there are not a lot of things we need to look out for when it comes to goji juice. This is at least as far as the fruit itself is concerned. (We will go into detail some other factors that have to do with the way it is cultivated.) This is because it has been used for at least several centuries - if not a few millennia - and if it had any major toxic properties, or if it could cause a variety of side effects, we would know about it by now. By the way, this is not something you can say about modern medications as they take about ten years to get approved by the FDA. When it comes to herbal remedies, nature’s approval process had about 2,000 years to work the kinks out.

The one major goji juice side effect that ought be mentioned for sure is that it has anti-coagulant properties. This doesn’t necessarily mean that you will be bound to bleed profusely, if you do decide to take the juice. However, if you are taking blood-thinner medication, you may have to be careful. It is always best to consult a doctor on the issue. Hopefully, you have a physician who maintains an open mind when it comes to alternative medicine.

Unfortunately, some problems may arise form the way the fruit is cultivated that is later turned into juice. You see, China where the majority of the goji berry comes from, is a third-world country. This is not to look down on them in any way, but to point out that their standards when it comes to chemicals is different from what we might be used to in the West. The stuff you may buy straight from China may be loaded with pesticides and herbicides that can cause a problem in the long run for sure and especially if you are taking the juice in a large quantities on a regular basis. Therefore, this can be considered a goji juice side effect.

Lastly, those of us who like natural ways of taking care of ourselves, tend to go overboard with consuming the latest and greatest in hopes that it will magically make all of our problems go away and/or make us impervious to disease. First of all this is NEVER true folks. So prudence is always in order.

Goji Juice Ingredients – Detailed Nutrient Content BreakdownGoji Juice Ingredients: contains 53 essential nutrients for the human well being.

Wolfberry, the sole ingredient in goji juice contains a large percentage of a person’s daily macronutrient needs. They include protein, carbohydrates, fat and dietary fiber. Sixty eight percent of the mass of dried goji berries is carbohydrates, hence its sweet taste. It contains about twelve percent of protein, about ten percent in fat and fiber.

Here is the run-down of some of the other compounds that have been found in the goji berry:

  • Eleven essential and twenty-two trace minerals (dietary)
  • Eighteenamino acids
  • Six essential vitamins
  • Eight polysaccharides and six monosaccharides
  • Five unsaturated fatty acids, including linoleic acid and alpha-linolenic acid (essential)
  • Beta-sitosterol among other phytosterols
  • Zeaxanthin lutein , beta-carotene, cryptoxanthin, lycopene,
  • Phenolic pigments often associated with antioxidant properties

    The goji juice ingredients listed below are meant for 100 grams of the dried berry:

    • 112 mg per of Calcium
    • 1,132 mg of Potassium
    • 9 mg of Iron.
    • 0.2 mg of Zinc
    • 100 grams of Selenium.
    • Riboflavin (vitamin B2). At 1.3 mg
    • 29 mg to 148 mg of Vitamin C. The amount of Vitamin C will depend on the source you are getting your goji juice from.

    Here is list of some of the other ingredients the goji juice may contain:

    Beta-carotene: 7 mg; The Zeaxanthin will vary greatly from source to source and crop to crop. The range can be expected between 25 mg per 100 grams to 200.

    It is important that we carefully choose the source of our natural remedies including goji. The natural food business is huge already and it is still growing. That attracts people who may not be one hundred percent honorable. First of all, your health is at stake. At last but not at least, goji juice is expensive so you better make sure that you get your money’s worth by being on the lookout for all the goji juice ingredients that make this substance worth paying for.

    Himalyan Goji Juice – A Shameless Marketing Ploy?Himalyan goji juice, is a misnomer and may be used by some marketers to sell their products to less knowledgeable consumers.

    First of all, goji juice is real. This article isn’t disputing that. This berry has been cultivated for human consumption for thousands of years. Its health benefits are believed to be extensive.

    The problem here is that some people refer to the plant as Himalyan goji juice which is a misnomer at best. The truth is that the goji fruit is grown in certain parts of China for the most part. (Traditional medicine in both Korea and Japan adopted this versatile fruit.)

    The fact is that climate is not favorable at all to growing pretty much anything, due to the low quality of the soil in the Himalyan mountain ranges. Matters are only made worse by the fact that the climate is too cold to grow fruits in that region.

    So, how come that some people refer to goji juice as Himalyan goji juice? The only thing that comes to mind is that we in the West usually fall head over heals anything form the East and marketers know that. Some one, somewhere, some time ago must have decided to pitch the herb as if it were from the Himalyan mountains to make it sound more appealing.

    The unfortunate thing here is that a lot of people swear by the beneficial effects of the so called Himalyan goji juice, and there is a good chance that there is a good reason for it. There has been a lot of allegations of fraud regarding this herb, and it is in large part of the practices of this types of marketing practices and the shady business people who are willing to do anything to make a buck.

    It is the opinion of the author of this article that it is absolutely paramount that we speak out about these practices. It is hard enough to go up against the well-established pharmaceutical industry with an all-natural solution, simply they have a motive to discredit and kill anything that they can’t own. This is even if the herb could provide a lot of people with an alternative way of getting better and staying healthy.

    On this blog, you can read about the real benefits of goji, and we are encouraging our reader to leave any and all recounts of their experiences with the herb, so others may benefit from it.

    Benefits of Goji JuiceBenefits of Goji Juice: Improve 5 major health areas.

    The history of the goji berry (also known as wolfberry, Himalayan goji berry, Tibetan goji berry among other things.) dates back at least 1,900 years. However, according to folk stories, China’s first emperor may have also used this fruit and he lived circa 2,300 BC.

     

    Benefits of Goji Juice: Health

    This plant has been used for almost two millennia by traditional Chinese medicine. There are five major areas that the goji berry is believed to be effective.

    1. It is supposed to be effective in straightening the immune system,
    2. It can improve eye sight,
    3. It is said to be able to protect the liver,
    4. It can aid with fertility by boosting sperm production
    5. It is said to be helpful with improving circulation

    To gain the full benefit of the goji berry, one does not need to prepare it in any special way. It can be consumed fresh (however, outside of its native cultivating area it is rarely available in this form) and any which way you can get your hands on it: dried, ground up, as juice or wine, brewed into tea, etc.

    However, the Chinese aren’t the only ones who are convinced of the beneficial effects of goji juice. It is also used extensively in Japanese and Tibetan natural medicine. As far as modern western medicine is concerned, however, none of these properties have been shown to be true in a clinical trial. This is at least what the article on wolfberry on Wikipedia says. On some of the other pages on the Internet, people stated that there have been tests on animals that seem to support the claim the Goji Juice Diabetes connection. The claims that goji may help with cancer have not at all been confirmed at the time of writing of this article.

     

    Benefits of Goji Juice: Food

    When consumed as food, goji berry is usually cooked. It has been known to be mixed in with rice, and cooked into the broth of soups. You can also make wine out of the berry, since it is sweet in nature, therefore readily lending itself to fermentation. The consumption of the fruit as food is also designed to reap the natural healing benefits of it, no doubt.

    Some people also make beer out of it, a Belgian company makes ale out of it.

    One must be careful about getting his or her goji berries form a trusted source. The standards for food safety in China are vastly different from that in the United States and other western countries. They can contain chemicals such as pesticides and fungicides and other harmful chemicals.

    Goji Juice Reviews – Find Out the Pros and ConsGoji Juice Reviews in the form critical reviews and testimonials.

    You might have heard a great deal about the health benefits of goji juice (also known as Himalayan goji berry, wolfberry etc.) The fact is that it has been used in traditional Eastern medicine for several millennia for a variety of reasons both medicinal and culinary. However it is only a recent arrival in the West. The problem with this is that we in the West are impulsive people and tend to jump on anything that comes form the East with medicinal properties alleged or real. As with everything, it is only prudent to take a closer look at the facts before we invest both emotionally and financially in this product that no doubt developed a reputation for a reason.

    Therefore, below you will find a list of websites that offer goji juice reviews both for and against the herb. Read the opinions of both the medical professionals and the good people who have used this substance to various effects.

    We also have a section where you can leave your own reviews and testimonials. In order to contribute, you will have to create an account with us. We promise not to share your information with anyone. If you do not want to sign up, you can also leave a comment under each post.

    EnjoyGojiJuice.com – This is the website of the premiere manufacturer and distributor of goji juice in the U.S, FreeLife. While they have an incentive to blow their own horn, so to speak, the website contains a lot of useful information, and we have no reason to believe that the information is false in any way, at least at this point.

    Chetday.com – This site offers a critical but friendly goji juice review that may be use to all interested. The page contains a lot of information. It must be noted though, that every time you visit the page there is a different pop-up window try to get the user to sign up for a newsletter.

    ABC News – This is a news article goji juice review form a well-known and reputable news organization. The article is not very positive, which is largely due to the price of the product per bottle.

    Wikipedia – Wikipedia has been an excellent source of all kinds of information. It provides an in-depth look into the history of goji, its uses and the way it is being cultivated. It seems to be very thorough and impartial at the same time.

     

    If you have any other sources for goji juice reviews that you think might be useful, please leave a comment below, and we will take a closer look at it.

    Himalayan Gogi JuiceHimalayan Gogi Juice: Used by the Chinese for thousands of years. This plant has been a staple of traditional Chinese medicine for 600 years. The name for this plant in English is wolfberry, but it has also been known by many other names that include Himalayan gogi juice.

    The truth is that while relatives of the wolfberry live in the Himalayas the ones that are made available for purchase are almost exclusively grown in China. There are entire regions dedicated to growing this berry as the demand from the West has increased immensely in recent years.

    There are numerous uses of the Himalayan Gogi Juice in traditional medicine both for the purposes of prevention and curing diseases. Some of them include diabetes and cancer but these claims have not been conclusively proven in humans. The trials look very promising for diabetes when used on animals. The Chinese have been using this produce to help with a variety of other ailments, most of which have to do with strengthening the immune system. It stands to reason that they kept the Himalayan gogi juice around for a reason. A stronger immune system can also mean the ability to stay free of cancer as well.

    The only thing that modern science has been able to uncover so far that as with many other plants of its kind such as cranberry, Himalayan gogi juice has anti oxidant properties, that have been shown to prevent illnesses.

    One thing that needs to be pointed out about this crop that is often overlooked when promoting it that since it is grown in China, it may be loaded with pesticides, herbicides and other chemicals. It is because China laws regarding these substances are a lot more relaxed than that of the United States, for instance. If these chemicals are present in high doses in this fruit, it may be that the positive effects that Himalayan gogi juice may have, can be hugely counteracted. It may be wise to purchase this product form sources that are organic certified. This will ensure that you are not putting anything into your body that you didn’t intend to.

    The use of the Himalayan gogi juice extends beyond pure medicinal use. It is also consumed for sustenance. It is most often cooked, but dried wolfberries have been known to be mixed with rice as well as chicken, pork and beef. Basically anything one can think of.