Juicing
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Juice is a Healer
Through shifting my diet to mostly juice for an extended period of time (a few months) in Fall 2010, I was able to let my body do some serious repair work, as well as create some great juicing recipes! Through juicing, smoothies and fruitmonstering, I fixed my long-lasting problems with acid reflux and ulcers! So, needless to say, I’m fully convinced that “Juice is a Healer”, and I say that for two reasons:
First, it gives your body access to a whole bunch of nutrients through the tastily-easy inclusion of fruits and veggies into your diet. From carrots to apples, leafy greens to wheatgrass, grapefruit to oranges and all the combinations in between, juicing allows you to ingest all sorts of disease fighting, cancer destroying antioxidants and phytonutrients, which benefit your body in ways that science hasn’t even discovered yet! So even if you don’t have any particular health problem, making some juice will still leave you feeling juice-tastic!
The second reason is that juice is calorie rich and very easy for your body to absorb. This allows your body to get the nutrition it needs, with only a fraction of the work that a ‘normal’ diet entails. By doing that, your body can detoxify and heal… two things that it cannot do when you are subjecting it to the standard american calorie load! These processes are vital for getting your body-machine back into optimal condition and for protecting you against cancer and disease!
So how do you even get started juicing?
Well the simple answer is that you first need a juicer! There are two main types of juicing machines.
Breville Makes Some of Best Centrifugal Juicers
The first is a centrifugal juicer
Centrifugal juicers are the more common type, and the one that you are probably familiar with. These juicers are generally less expensive and likely the only juicers you will see in your local stores. They operate by using rapidly spinning blades at the bottom of a wire mesh basket.
First, you drop a fruit or veggie into the top of the juicer, where it falls into the spinning basket where the blades obliterate them. They are then centrifuged to the outside of the basket, which is wire mesh, and the juice flies through the mesh while the pulp is flung out of a waste chute. This process is extremely noisy and typically quite messy.
Since these operate at high speeds, the juicers are also (in general) prone to breaking and less efficient at juicing. PLUS they are harder to use and clean. The most important of these three factors is the last one – if juicing isn’t easy and fun, then you aren’t going to do it are you? Plus, if you see wasted juice/wet pulp/small-amounts-of-juice coming out of your juicer, you are going to feel like you are wasting money! Finally, your neighbors, roommates/family will grow sick of a jet engine running in your kitchen. We don’t want any of that, so that is why I am a fan of the second type of juicer.
The Omega J8005, A Great Single Gear Masticating Juicer
The second type of juicer is a masticating juicer
Yes, you can say that word at church on Sunday. Masticating juicers use a low speed, high torque approach to juicing that is quiet and doesn’t generate a lot of heat or mess. A masticating juicer uses an internal auger bit to slowly and powerfully press fruits and veggies (dropped through a chute at the top) up against blades running laterally along the bit inside of a sealed chamber.
As the chamber narrows, pulp reaches a wire mesh where all the juice is squeezed out. Just past that wire mesh, a tight seal exists at the end of the auger bit, which only allows the pulp to squeeze through.
You can watch the videos above and below to see this in action! In general the biggest drawback to these juicers is that they take slightly longer to process the same number of fruits/veggies because the chutes are smaller, which means more food preparation is necessary. BUT you will save a lot of time and hassle when cleaning the machine – which is important for motivation! PLUS there is an added bonus – masticating juicers also operate as excellent food processors, making nut butters, noodles and grinding flour, for example. This makes your juicer two machines in one!
So I recommend that you save up and purchase a mid-range, single gear, masticating juicer… particularly an Omega series one if you live in the US or an Oscar series for those in Oz! If you feel that you cannot afford one of these, remember that an inefficient juicer will end up costing you a lot of money in the long run, due to wasted food! It may take you a few months to save enough cash, but the rewards of juicing will far outweigh the ‘agony’ of waiting!
So that you can see an Omega juicer in action AND see how easy it is to clean up afterwards, check out the following videos! Feel free to email me with any questions (unleashthemonster@live.com) or comment below!
Juicing is powerful! Try it out! You will feel ‘juice-tastic’ in no time!
