An awesome juicing resource

One of the hardest things I've found as I started juicing is to have some good resources. I've found a bunch on Reddit but I stumbled on one recently and it gave me exactly what I was looking for. This site is called Juice Recipes(www.juicerecipes.com) and has a whole ton of recipes but the thing that really stood out for me is the nutritional database. You put in the info and out comes a breakdown of what exactly you've got in your juice.

This was one of those key elements for me because while i knew that the juices i was making were good for me but I'll be honest I didn't have a clue what they were doing and what was in them. I'm sure they have a disclaimer about the fact tht the info is an average or something like that but if you're interested in knowing what exactly is in your juices this is the site.

Check it out.

What does real grape juice look like?

We all know and love grape juice but ever wonder what it really looks like? And I don't mean the stuff that you pour out of a juice box but what the companies that make that stuff start with; real grape juice.

Since I have been  of experimenting with the juicer one of the I  things that popped into my head is what does real juice look like? orange juice is straightforward but what about grape juice? what does real real grape juice look like?

So that's today's experiment take some grapes throw them in the juicer and let's see what happens.

I used green seedless grapes that happened to be in the fridge (again using up what might have gone bad otherwise).

Green Seedless Grapes

Now what came out surprised me a little bit, mostly because of the intensity of the colour that came out. Overall I was expecting it to be a slightly greenish colour that was a bit more watery considering how juicy grapes tend to be.

Real Grape Juice

And how did it taste you ask? Well it was very sweet, I think if you were to drink this as regular grape juice you might want to cut it with water. But it would definitely serve very well in sweetening up other juices, sort of the way apples do. 

Fresh Berry Juice

Upon opening the fridge and looking in an idea hit me, we had blueberries, raspberries and strawberries that we've had for about a week. 

"Why not try a berry juice?" instantly hit me.

 I wasn't originally planning on juicing today but I knew if I waited too long that I might be out of luck to use these fruit. Upon a bit closer inspection they were all still good so they got washed. 

Here's the list of what we had: 

• 1 pint of blueberries
• 1 pint of raspberries
• approximately 1 pint of strawberries

The net result of the mixture was this very nice pink juice. There wasn't quite as much as I normally make but considering I'm usually the only one drinking it was a single portion which is good. 

A couple things I did notice when juicing these fruit, the raspberries, just like blackberries before juiced to an almost gelatinous consistency. When all was said and done the juice had a consistency closer to a smoothie than some of the other juices I've made.

I was expecting this to be a bit sweeter, but needless to say it was a nice sweet/tart juice. I'm sure this would change if we used some in season fresh organic fruit. Another way to make this sweeter would be add maybe a cup or half a cup of grapes.

Finally the remainders that were left over also had a distinctly gelatinous consistency, I think that we could probably take these and mix them back into the juice to make a full blown smoothie. I think you could also take these and freeze them for popsicles.

Why Juicing? - The Benefits of Juicing

You want to have a healthy diet? Why not introduce juicing? You can find dozens of reasons why you should or shouldn't introduce juicing (these are mostly excuses of the lazy). Some people will claim that it can cure cancer others say its the best thing you can do for your body and you should go on a juicing only diet. A bit extreme for me, but it can definitely be a good way to get extra nutrients and vitamins.

On the other hand most of the articles I've ready will say there are risks to juicing such as bacteria and calories. Really? don't those risks exist for most of our daily existence. To put it another way, do you avoid going outside because there's a risk you might get hit by a car? Of course not, the risk is small and can be virtually eliminated with caution. The same can be said for anything food related including juicing. 

Now to be fair about this here are a few pros and cons I've encountered in my research on juicing all taken with a dose of reality.

Health Benefits

You'll hear that juicing can do everything from curing cancer to reducing weight and probably a dozen things in between, I'm surprised it hasn't solved the mysteries of quantum physics based on some of the things I've read. I will agree that juicing can help you get concentrated doses of vitamins and nutrients for your body and depending on your existing diet this could be a huge help.

Juicing is only part of the equation and should only ever be considered that, I would go so far as saying it will probably only be a small part of your dietary equation; it is for me. It is merely a way for you to get nutrients which you can get by eating the whole fruits and veggies.

Juicing doesn't solve long standing problems, it can't cure cancer but it can be part of a healthy diet and help towards these ailments. But if it helps you cure something like cancer, then that's awesome. Its the diet that really helps people and not just the juicing. 

Health Risks

Both reading and now writing about the risks of juicing seems a bit ridiculous to me. Are there risks to juicing? Yeah probably, but there are risks to crossing the street and people do that safety every day, even the people who are plugged into their phones. The main issues these articles pointed out were around the preparation and bacterial risks. The only answer I have to this is: no shit! Use some common sense. 

The articles make references to the risks of bacteria and pesticides on the fruit - yet at the same time they suggest that maybe eating the whole fruit would be better. This just blows my mind; would you not wash the fruit or veggie either way? 

The calorie risk in drinking a juice - there seems to be some common sense missing reading all of this information as a collective. Does juicing concentrate sugar calories from the food? Yes of course it does but it also provides you with concentrated nutrients. Unless you use the juiced fruit to make smoothies there is no processed sugar going in so the sugars you're getting are probably reasonably good for you in moderation and your body can process them. But if you drink a gallon of juice every day it's going to have an impact; I would figure this is common sense. 

Finally many of these articles mention that juicing removes the fiber from the fruit and that you loose the benefits of this. I'm not sure who the target audiences are but this is pretty obvious! Some of them go on to mention that people don't get enough fibre in their diet. To this I have to say how? How can people not get enough fibre in their diet, the stuff is almost everywhere. 

Weight Loss

When investigating juicing in more detail, there were mentions to a weight loss diet involving juice but I didn't investigate further because I'm sure it would have sent my blood boiling. Any diet in the extreme will be bad for you over time even if it comes with short term gains. Can you use juicing as part of helping lower your weight, of course you can but as I've mentioned before its only part of the solution. If you're a fat slug that does nothing and takes in 10,000 calories a day it doesn't matter if it comes from juice or McDonald's.

Clean-up and Prep
To be perfectly fair, I'll be lazy if I can be. Efficiency of motion is ideal so for me the biggest drawback to juicing is the clean-up. Juicers will vary and some will be easier to clean than others but at the end of the day I would say that this is the biggest pain in the ass for me. But the benefits outweigh my laziness (most of the time). 

My Take - Juicing in the Norm

I like to think I look at most things from a place of moderation and normality so when I looked at juicing I  applied those same principles. I juice a few times a week primarily to add the benefits of the nutrients of the produce to my diet. 

I've mentioned I'm not a health nut but I also don't I eat badly. I noticed that I could probably get a few extra fruits and veggies into my diet and this seemed like a good  and relatively easy way to do it. I'm not replacing anything in my diet I'm just adding juices a few times a week. Juicing is just a supplement to make sure I do get a few extra fruits and veggies in that I wouldn't have otherwise. Nothing more, nothing less. .  

References

http://www.webmd.com/diet/features/juicing-health-risks-and-benefits 

http://fashion.telegraph.co.uk/article/TMG10162603/The-real-benefits-of-juicing.html

http://www.fitday.com/fitness-articles/nutrition/the-risks-and-benefits-of-juicing.html#b

http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/juicing/AN02107 

http://www.doctoroz.com/videos/healing-properties-juicing

http://www.builtlean.com/2013/07/30/juicing-benefits/

Holy Sweetness Batman - Fruit Juice Experiment

Today am trying out a series of completely random fruits together for a couple reasons: to see what it will taste like and the second is the fruit are going to start going to bad soon, they have to be used before they spoil.  My guess is it's going is pretty good because these fruit are typically sweet to start with. The blackberries and grapes were the pieces that were quite ripe, the apples and pear are fine and the peaches are are starting to get on the ripe side.

Fruit used

• 1 pint of blackberries
• 2 apple
• 1 pear
• 2 peach
• 1 bunch of grapes

The net result was this thing was crazy sweet! It made drinking a can of soda seem tame. The other thing that I wanted to comment on is that the blackberries juiced into a very thick consistency. When I threw them in the juicer it seemed like sludge but putting a spoon in and stirring proved otherwise, it was definitely one of the odder things I've juiced. 

Here's what this looked like

The cloudy look never really left, but it tasted pretty good, regardless of the sweetness. I'm kink of curious how this would have tasted in a smoothie or with some soda water. 

You can juice Kale?

Apparently you can juice kale! I read that you can juice leafy things and the greener the more stuff they have in them. I was definitely sceptical, juicing a leafy thing? I figured that it was going to be possible but I wouldn't get much out of them. Thought I'd check it out and here's the net result of what we ended up with:

Here's what are used for the juice

Recipe:

• 1 Peach
• 1 Apple (Royal Gala)
• 1 Pear (Bartlett)
• 1/2 a red pepper
• 2 leaves of Kale
• 2 sprigs of Cilantro

The result was I did not get an orange concoction like my grandma made it was GREEN! here's what it look like the glass

It actually tasted pretty good, I was worried when it came out this greenish color. I think the fruit definitely helped keep the green leafy things at bay. I've definitely got the cilantro after-taste, but overall not too bad. 

Purchased on a whim my juicer

I purchased my juicer on a whim a few months back and since I'm starting to write about juicing I wanted to show everyone what I was using. Nothing fancy just a simple juicer picked up at one of the local big box stores.

It cleans up pretty easily, seems to produce just fairly well but as I'm an accidental juicer I don't know any better at the moment.  The pulp area is big enough so you can stick a green bin bag to make the clean up even easier. The big mouth feeding area makes it easier to put produce in.

Nothing fancy but it works for me I hear is a link if you guys want to have more info on it (Amazon link):

Hamilton Beach - Big Mouth Juicer