Juicing

While I was at a work conference recently, a group of us gathered around during one of the breaks making small talk. As with all small talk, it was bland – the obligatory weather-talk, a bit of griping and a few rounds of polite laughter every now and then. In a word: yawn. To my surprise, however, the energy level skyrocketed the moment that I casually mentioned that I had recently bought a juicer. One of the guys—generally quiet and not excitable—leaned forward and with a glean in his eyes, said: “You. Are. Juicing?” His voice was low, but had a passionate tone. It was almost as if he had found the only other Christian at a Satan-worshiping convention: “You. Are. Saved?”

And with that, a few other folks excitedly proclaimed that they, too, were juicing. Some of them quite seriously, in fact. More than one of them said that they to do periodic detox regimens, where they ingest nothing but juice for a week at a time. Some juiced once a day to get antioxidants into their system. Very quickly, the conversation became animated, passionate and nearly fanatical.

Yes, juicing has really struck a chord with many people. I am one of those folks who have become obsessed about its benefits. My new nightly ritual includes pulling an assortment of fresh vegetables and fruits from the fridge, firing up my Omega J8004 Nutrition Center Commercial Masticating Juicer and liquidizing it all into a finely-pulped brew.

My juicing obsession began after I watched "Fat, Sick and Nearly Dead" on Netflix. This documentary followed an over-weight and sickly Aussie as he drove across the U.S., ingesting nothing but raw veggie juice along the way. The plot was contrived, but I couldn't help but be inspired by the incredible transformation that the guy went through: he dropped more than a few waist sizes, his skin cleared up and his steps became more energetic.
 
While I generally don't prescribe to extreme forms of diet, I very much believe in the benefits of supplementing your diet with fresh juice. Although K is not as enthusiastic as I am, he plays along on a nightly basis, drinking the sometimes green, sometimes puce colored concoction.

K about to enjoy a midnight snack of apple, pear, collard green and pineapple juice



Looks like Guinness but has the goodness of kale, beet, cucumber and apple

I have only been juicing for a few weeks, but already have some "Do's & Don'ts" that I’d like to share.

(1) Don’t juice the peels of an orange. Orange rind essence is so strong that it makes your juice sharply bitter and taste exactly like what you would imagine that liquid from a potpourri warmer tastes like.

(2) Do not drink too much raw beet juice. You can get very sick. A coworker got sick within minutes of drinking the juice of an entire beet—nausea, chills and other unpleasant side effects that I don’t care to write about here. Apparently, beets are such a powerful diuretic that a very little goes a long way. If you want to juice beets, juice only a quarter of a beet and mix it up with other veggies and fruits.

(3) Do continue to eat whole veggies even if you are juicing. Juicing is great, but you will miss out on the roughage that intact veggies provide. Here is a picture of all the pulpy goodness that gets spun out of the juicing machine. If you know of a good use for this stuff, please let me know!