The Juice Diaries

I hate salad. There. I said it. I’m sure I’ve stirred a few gasps of horror based on this confession. I love the idea of salads, but I can’t get passed the bitterness of leafy greens. I would always force myself to eat one every once in a while because I know the veggies are good for you, but I would find myself overusing dressing (that’s a big no, no!).  I’ve recently been enthralled with health-food related research and decided to try juicing a couple times a week.  Before I get into my favorite recipes, I want to kind of lay out some of pros and cons of juicing lifestyle.

Cons:

-When you juice, you separate the sugars from the fiber in the fruit.  The roughage bin on the back of the juicer will fill up with all of that fiber-goodness.  If you juice that day, make sure you are getting your 25-35 grams of fiber in other foods, because it won’t be in the juice! Some people opt for using a blender instead of a juicer so they reap all the benefits of their produce!

-For this reason, along with others, I also do not recommend an exclusive juice-based diet.

-It can get a little pricey in the produce department! (Sam’s club is a blessing!)

-Cleaning the juicer is a pain!  Some juicers may be better than others, but ours has tiny crevices where all the fibery-pulp likes to hide.

Pros (yay! The pros!):

-It’s delicious and filling!

-Our body is very smart and “detoxifies” a lot on its own, but let’s face it, we live in a culture of HIGHLY processed, chemically-enhanced foods (even in unsuspecting grocery items!), and our precious body could use all the extra help we can give it.  “Jesus-foods”, as I like to call them (plants, plants, plants!), are great at detoxifying a lot of chemicals we ingest other places.

-The nutritional benefits are stellar! When we cook veggies, they lose most of the vitamins and minerals our bodies need, so juicing allows us to JAM PACK all these nutrients into one delicious glass.

-You can get your greens without the dreaded salad (and dressing-free, too!)

-You also digest juice a lot more quickly than if you just ate the fruit or veggie itself.  Your body absorbs the liquid instead of having to break it down first.

-When you get all the nutrients from your fruits and veggies, your hair, skin, bones, etc. will all be in great shape! I’m kind of a hair snob and pregnancy took its toll on my locks-so I drink juice for vanity!

-When Ri starts drinking juice, I plan to make it for him instead of buying sugar-filled juice at the grocery store. I want a healthy, healthy boy!

There are plenty more pros and cons, those are just the big ones for me.  When I juice, I always try to add as many “detox” items as possible (kale, spinach, lemons, parsley, cucumber, cilantro, etc) I love trying new juicing recipes, but here are a few of my favorites!

Green juice: 

2 stalks celery
1/2 cucumber
1/2 apple
1/2 lemon
small piece ginger
1/2 green chard leaf
bunch cilantro
5 kale leaves
handful spinach

carrot and apple juice:

4-5 Carrots
2 Apples
2 Cups Spinach

The above recipes I found online.  When I make my juice, I generally just throw whatever produce is in the fridge into the juicer (crazy style!). A rough recipe for my favorite concoction is as follows:

1 bunch parsley
½ bunch cilantro (its quite over-powering)
1 lemon (1.5 if you like it more tart… I do!)
4-5 stalks of kale
½ cucumber
3-4 carrots
1 apple (usually fuji)
5 strawberries
2-3 stalks of celery
2-3 cups baby spring salad mix

viola! Delicious juice.  It makes about 4 cups, and I omit certain ingredients depending on if we have it in the fridge or not.  Take that, boring salad!

Do you have any favorite juice recipes? I’d love to try them!!