Do you juice??

Comments

• rawflamenca

  Just bringing this to the homepage where people can see :)
• rawflamenca

  Any comment, anyone?
• willmize Raw Newbie

  As someone who doesn't juice, but does the green smoothies daily, I guess my first question to you would be "How do you feel?"

  I understand about wanting to go to the 'next level' of health and fitness, but if you have a juicer, don't use it, hate the clean up, etc. are you creating more stress and aggravation, as opposed to peace, calm, health and vibrance?

  Right now I do my smoothies with the Oster 'beehive' blender, but I'm saving up for the Vitamix, which, as I understand it, can also juice to a degree because it's powerful enough to pulverize the heck out of anything you put in it :)

  Maybe you're where you need to be, right now, and that's perfect.

  As someone who is opposed to 'raw gurus'; I find that listening to my body, honoring it, and doing what naturally feels right outweighs and has better results than following a path recommended by someone else.

  My .02.

  - Bill
• Josephine

  Hi rawflamenca,

  It's a good idea to do both, if possible. Juicing provides highly concentrated nutrition while blending provides nutrition and fiber. I try to juice carrots and a green drink everyday and blend everything else. If I only juice, I tend to have problems with constipation, but blending takes care of that for me. :)

  If you don't have opportunities for using the pulp leftover from juicing, there are a couple of simple ideas that might help. You can blend the pulp with a little water and use it like a compost juice if you have a yard or flowers or a garden. Also, if you have pets you can mix some of the pulp in with their food. You can also use pulp to "beef-up" your blended soups by mixing in after blending.

  Here's an article from the internet that may help also.

  http://www.happyjuicer.com/juicing-information/juicer-pulp-uses.asp

  Here are my mainstay juicing recipes:

  Green Drink:

  1 cucumber peeled

  1 stalk of celery

  1 apple

  1 handful of the following mixed greens: baby spinach leaves, kale, green cabbage, parsley, mixed sprouts

  Juice, strain, drink. Yummy

  Carrot Juice:

  6-8 large carrots. Good just by itself. I like to peel the carrots first.

  You can also add in an apple and/or a bit of ginger

  Juice, strain, drink

  Here are a couple of my mainstay blending recipes:

  Chocolate Almond Mylkshake

  about 3 heaping tablespoons of almond paste

  or you could use almond mylk instead of paste and distilled water

  a couple of medjool dates, pitted

  a pinch or two of raw cacao nibs

  a pinch or two of gogi berries

  a pinch or two of hemp seeds

  about a tablespoon of grade b maple syrup. I like more.

  chilled, distilled water (or ice cubes) to desired consistency

  blend to desired consistency

  Garden Fresh Cocktail (from the Vita Mix recipe book)

  1 cup fresh tomatoes (I like using 2 medium tomatoes and add in extra cherry tomatoes)

  1/2 cup spinach

  1/4 cup carrots

  1 tablespoon onion (I find that a teaspoon is plenty)

  1 sprig parsley

  1/4 cup bell pepper

  ice cubes

  dash of salt optional

  Hope this helps!
• freepam

  I juice every day at lunch and the amount of greens that I put in the juice fills my biggest mixing bowl. There is no way I could chew all that. I love the juice and look forward to it. I don't add fruits to this, only carrots for sweetening.

  At night I have a fruit and lettuce smoothie and I don't like that as much. The lettuce kind of ruins the taste of the fruit for me.

  Then I have a small salad as well.

  So there is no way I would get a sufficient amount of greens without juicing.

  I have juicing and cleanup figured out now and it only takes about 6-7 minutes total.

  One trick is to be sure and juice the greens after the celery and carrot and harder stuff. If you do it the other way around the green juice can spit all over you.
• heloise

  Hi...I also just started drinking juices everyday and I love it! I had an old juicer lying around, but lately I have just been blending up vegetables in my blendtec and straining them through a fine mesh vegetable/spaghetti strainer. It works really well, and is a lot quicker...cleaner for me. I feel great with juices...they give me energy and improve my mood.
• freepam

  That reminds me, I saw on the juice feasting site that the woman there makes her juice in the blender and then squeezes it in a nutmilk bag. She thinks it's better and faster also. I'll have to try it.
• zinfandel Raw Newbie

  I used to do the blender thing then I got a masticating juicer. There is no comparison and I won't ever waste greens again by putting them in a blender to make juice. What comes out is more veggie flavored water than juice...

  just my opinion though.
• ajc Raw Newbie

  I have a samson and it does great juices.

  My tip would be to give the little cleaning brush the flick and buy a bigger one like a dishwashing size and clean under running water.This is much quicker.
• Raw Curls Raw Newbie

  I agree about the pulp being a waste (and then what to we do but eat fiber!). I don't juice much, with the exception of citrus juice (orange and grapefruit) and my DH makes a small amount of carrot-apple juice before working out. We save the pulp and mix it in our dog's raw meat so it doesn't go to waste. But I certainly don't have meals of juice, my breakfast consists of whole fruit or a smoothie with oj in it.

  I have some friends who gave us their juicer, they now use a Vitamix to make whole juices.

  It is probably therapeutic if you are needing to fast to heal and cannot fast only on water, like if you aren't able to totally rest and need to keep working. Or going on a "juice feast" for a period of time.
• rawflamenca

  Thank you all everyone, for your comments! I really appreciate it!

  Zinfandel, I have tried using Vitamix to make juice before, but it does taste like veggie flavored water and it also oxidizes really quickly.

  Josephine, thank you for all the ideas on using juicing pulp!

  ajc, that's a great tip on the brush. I juiced yesterday and used a bigger brush and it WAS a lot faster!

  Raw Curls, the therapeutic aspect of juicing is a good point you raised - juicing is like rest, nutrition and cleanse all at the same time.

  And, WillMize, being introspective is a great tip - now I am trying some juicing and see how it makes me feel.

  I welcome further comments from anyone who juice regularly or who have gone on juice fast/feast!
• bitt Raw Newbie

  i'm not sure if you've seen this website: www.juicefeasting.com

  i like juicing and have only lasted 24 hours on a juice feast, but i wasn't drinking enough juice that was why it didn't work for me.
• Parsley

  Today was my last day of a 3 day juice feast my partner and I undertook for the new year. The first day I slept more than 12 hours. Since then, I have been energized and unable to sleep (like right now). We've been using the pulp from our juice to make fruit leathers, crackers, and sweet breads in the dehydrator. The next two days we are planning on smoothies only, but after that we will have plenty of dehydrated breads for sandwiches and pizza!
• leahceleste Raw Newbie

  Over the last 2.5 years I have come and gone from juicing. I have a masticating juicer and I love it! At first I did juicing because so many people advocated its health benefits, plus I love they way it tastes. But I have to agree with rawflamenca that it seemed to take forever and the cleanup was always a problem. But over the years I keep coming back to doing it and right now I am on a huge juice kick. I think I finally have the juicing system down and cleanup has to be immediate and quick. I am making me and my boyfriend 2 16oz juices a piece everyday. We drink these on an empty stomach before eating. I think juices are great and really they make you feel great. If you don't stick with it right now you may come back to it later, so don't worry.

  I too love green smoothies and do those regularly too.

  Here is my favorite green juice:

  1 whole head of celery

  1 apple

  1 lemon, cut away the skin

  1 head of kale or collard greens

  Juice everything!

  My current favorite green smoothie:

  1 apple

  juice of 1 lemon

  1 head of romaine lettuce

  little bit of spinach

  bunch of fresh mint leaves

  1/2 - 1 avocado

  Blend and enjoy this sucka!
• ajc Raw Newbie

  4 sticks celery

  12 or so cherry tomatoes

  1 cucumber skin and all if you grow your own

  large slice lime

  juice and enjoy!
• AElise

  here's yet another variation (~32 oz.):

  1 apple

  1 beet

  1 big gorgeous green (organic) cucmber with skin

  1 organic lemon, unpeeled

  a few carrots

  a big knob of ginger

  half or whole bunch of kale

  half a head of celery
• bitt Raw Newbie

  I am trying to juice more with my veggie scraps. just blogged about it

  http://bittsblog.blogspot.com/2009/01/drink-your-veggie-juice.html