Juicing For Health – Fifty Fascinating Facts

1. If you are juicing for health, it is useful to remember that fresh juice starts to lose nutrients as soon as it is made. If you want to retain the full benefit of your effort, drink the juice immediately or as soon as possible.
2. Some juice extractors, such as the centrifugal-ejection type, generate enough heat during operation to do some damage to the delicate structure of the juice. The resultant oxidation destroys nutrients.
3. Masticating juicers use a more gentle process, preserving more of the valuable nutrients. This also enables you to store the juice for a longer period.
4. If you have to store the juice for a while, make sure that the container is airtight, add a few drops of lemon juice, and keep it refrigerated.
5. When juicing for health, a clever gadget named PumpNseal can be used to vacuum seal juice in any jar. Removing the air enables you to store the juice for longer periods without nutrient loss.
6. In general, masticating juicers offer extra features, such as accessories you can use to mill, grind, puree, to make pasta, and to come up with the most delectable frozen desserts. When juicing for health, these extras will give you a fairly varied repertoire in the kitchen. A raw food diet will become more feasible in the process.
7. If you are concerned about a high noise level, rather choose one of the masticating models.
8. Remember to remove hard pits from fruit such as peaches. You won’t eat these and neither will your juicer! Don’t ruin the blades! Apple seeds contain small amounts of cyanide. Be sure to remove these before juicing.
9. Most body-building, leafy greens have strong flavors. Cucumber is a terrific disguise for this, and has the added advantage of containing important nutrients. Maximise the benefit by using one that doesn’t need peeling.
10. If you are juicing for health, use organic produce as far as possible. Otherwise wash everything thoroughly.
11. Often the greatest concentration of nutrients lie just beneath the rind or skin.
12. Don’t peel carrots, but do remove their greens. Rhubarb greens also need to be removed. There may be a problem with toxicity if you juice these.
13. Do peel citrus, mango and papaya. These peels are not usable and may even be harmful to you. The skins of oranges and grapefruits contain toxic substances. However, the white, pithy part just below the skin, contains valuable bioflavonoids. Aim to retain as much of this as possible.
14. Soft fruits such as peaches, melons and strawberries will produce a much thicker juice than harder textured fruit such as apples. Combine the two to improve the results.
15. Rather blend banana and papaya. They don’t juice well. If you have one of the masticating juicers with added features, you can try these as a frozen dessert. Juicing for health isn’t suppose to be a punishment, after all! Enjoy something sweet regularly.
16. Follow soft fruits with harder textured produce, to facilitate clearing the pulp.
17. Juicing leafy greens becomes much easier if you roll the leaves into a little ball, before feeding it into the machine.
18. Wheat-grass is exceptionally nutrient-rich, and has a taste strong enough to equal its value! If your juicer can manage it, start with tiny amounts and increase the quantity slowly.
19. It is claimed that the benefits of drinking wheat grass juice includes cleansing the lymph system, building the red blood cells, removing toxic metals from the cells, nourishing the liver and kidneys, and restoring vitality.
20. Wheat-grass needs to be consumed in juice form, as the body cannot process the plant fibres.
21. Wheat-grass is gluten-free, in spite of its name. Gluten is found only in the seed kernel, and not in the stem and grass leaves of the young plant. It should therefore be safe for individuals with a gluten intolerance.
22. Drink freshly made juice daily and concentrate on using as wide a variety of produce as possible, to ensure that your body receives a bit of all the most beneficial micronutrients.
23. Your need for expensive supplements in the form of vitamin and mineral tablets, will diminish significantly, if you are juicing for health on a daily basis.
24. Many ailments will improve if juice forms a regular part of your diet. For example, cabbage juice is one of the most healing juices in case of ulcers. In this case, use under medical supervision.
25. If you experience water retention, juices such as celery, cucumber, cranberry, and watermelon are extremely helpful.
26. A general rule is that a pound of produce will give you about a cup of juice.
27. One cup of carrot juice is equal to about four cups diced, raw carrots. Carrots are much easier to consume in liquid form. Your body is also able to assimilate them better.
28. Vegetable juice is a low-calorie snack and contains no fat. Use it as part of a sensible eating plan, and experience the wonderful results.
29. Fresh juices act as a healthy, harmless appetite suppressant, and craving curber.
30. Vegetable juice can also help to stabilize blood sugar levels. It has much less sugar than fruit juices and about 50% less calories, yet it will satisfy that sweet tooth every time. Try carrot or a combination of carrot and parsley juice when a craving hits you, and the juice jolt will give it a knock-out before you know it!
31. A water fast may leave you feeling drained, while a vegetable juice fast will give you an energy surge. Fasting should always be done under supervision.
32. If you really don’t like the taste of certain vegetables, try juicing these and adding them to some of your favorites. You probably won’t even notice the difference in taste, but your body will certainly notice the difference in nutritional value!
33. Your skin may become slightly yellow if you consume large quantities of carrot juice. This effect is harmless and will disappear once you reduce your consumption.
34. Juicing for health is more beneficial if you consume juice that is at room temperature.
35. Ginger gives a bit of a bite to juice. Try it! It has anti-inflammatory properties. Stomach irritations, nausea and motion sickness can be relieved by taking ginger.
36. The nutrients in the juice you drink, is taken up immediately by all the cells in your body. Your juicer magically transfers the produce into pre-digested food. This means that your body is able to make maximum use of all the enzymes, vitamins and minerals.
37. Juices help you to maintain the proper PH in your body, which is important in preventing diseases like cancer.
38. The phytochemicals in the juice also helps to remove carcinogens from your body.
39. The properties in many vegetables, such as cucumber and carrots, will improve your skin, hair, and nails. If you up your intake of fresh juice, expensive beauty treatments may become a thing of the past.
40. Juicing for health is anti-ageing and puts the spring back in your step.
41. Children love the sweet taste of carrot juice. It is easy to add other, perhaps detested veggies to the juice, without them noticing it.
42. Remember that, it you have kids, they may be more willing to try the juice at first if you turn it into a smoothie. Try apple, carrot and grapes or strawberry. Put ice-cubes in a blender, and pour in your juice mixture. Add some frozen yoghurt or sherbert if you want, and blend to the desired thickness.
43. A good way to add extra flavor and sweetness to juice, is to use fresh or shredded coconut.
44. You can also add some cranberries if you like the taste. Cranberries have an extremely high antioxidant content. In addition, they may help you to avoid urinary tract infections.
45. Scientists recommend 8 to 9 servings of fruits and vegetables to be consumed per day. A substantial portion of the population don’t even reach 20% of the ideal. Juicing for health is the easiest way to bring you closer to this goal.
46. Although juicing removes some of the fibre, the process allows you to ingest a much more concentrated, easily assimmilated form of enzymes, minerals and vitamins. Just be sure to boost your fibre intake, by eating fibre-rich foods such as cereals and whole grains.
47. It is believed that sugar cane juice has properties that help to prevent tooth decay. In contrast, eating sugar cane often, will result in frequent visits to the dentist.
48. There is also evidence that there may be some wound healing and immune strengthening properties in sugar cane. In addition, the juice has a soothing effect on the digestive system, especially when combined with fresh ginger.
49. Juicing for health isn’t a cure-all! If your lifestyle is unhealthy in general, don’t expect juicing to magically wipe out the negative effects of all the things you know you probably shouldn’t do!
50. If you are pregnant, planning to get pregnant, nursing or have any illness, you need to get medical advice before starting a juicing for health program. The same rule applies to small children. Some juices are quite potent and may do more than good under certain circumstances.

For more information visit Best-Juicing.com. Rika Susan of http://www.Article-Alert.com researches, writes, and publishes full-time on the Web. Copyright of this article: 2006 Rika Susan. This article may be reprinted if the resource box and hyperlinks are left intact. Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Rika_Susan

Juicing – A Beginners’ Guide

You can spot a juicer a mile off at the supermarket or greengrocer. Apart from the huge number of carrots and apples they are loading into their trolley, they also have that slightly smug, see-how-healthy-I-am look about them. Or is that just me?! Actually, I don’t buy a lot of carrots and apples any more, because (other than my indiscretion with a packet of shortbread this week) I’ve radically reduced the amount of sugar I take in. My juice of choice is a vegetable one, a green one – but more about that later, first let’s ask…

Why is juicing so good?

In my article Enzymes and Raw Food, I explained why eating enzyme-rich food is so important. If you are buying cartons (or bottles) of juice, even many of those labelled ‘freshly squeezed’ you are almost certainly missing out on the enzymes. Why? Because they are likely to be pasteurised. There are different methods of pasteurisation, but all of them involve heating to temperatures a lot greater than 118F – which is the point at which enzymes are killed.

Fresh juices, on the other hand, are packed with enzymes, vitamins, minerals etc. and they taste a zillion times yummier too. Plus if you invest in a good juicing book, you can select your ingredients based on your immediate health needs too. I recommend Superjuice: Juicing for Healing and Health by Michael van Straten.

Do I need a juicer to juice?

Well, yes and no. There are so many juicers on the market and the prices vary radically. I always recommend that you start with a mid-priced model that is easy to clean. This is important. If cleaning it is a right old pain, you will be put off using it which is no good at all.

The US market is probably quite different, but for UK readers, I use the Breville AWT JE3 which retails at just under a £100. It’s by no means the best juicer on the market, but it is very good for the price and a doddle to clean. Plus the new model features two speeds, one for hard produce and one for soft fruits.

There is also the Magimix Le Duo which I understand to be better than the Breville AWT and is the same price.

If you are reluctant to invest in a juicer at the moment but you already have a blender, you could just stick to smoothies. Or for around £5, you could buy yourself a nylon sprout/nutmilk bag and simply strain the juice from the pulp to create your healthy drink. Make sure you chop up the produce and add some bottled water too.

What should I juice?

If you have acid reflux/heartburn problems, candidiasis, thrush, diabetes, IBS or an IBD, then you should avoid going overboard with fruit and sweet veg juices eg. carrots. (Actually this strategy will benefit anyone with any health issue!)

The irony is that the sweet juices may be the ones you are most drawn to, but sugar feeds microforms (like yeasts, fungus, molds, bacteria and viruses) which thank us by excreting acidic, toxins into our blood stream when they ‘digest’ the food we give them!

Your best bet is to stick to green juices which aklalise the body. I really struggled with this to start with as the flavour is a bit of an acquired taste but then I discovered lemons! My favourite juice now is…

Claire’s Green Goddess
100g of curly kale
2-3 sticks of celery
4-5 inches of cucumber
5-6 Green beans
A quarter of an unwaxed lemon (with peel)

The lemon really does do something special to the flavour. For those who are concerned about the acidity of lemon, here’s an interesting thing; lemon is only acid outside the body. Once it goes in, it alkalises. Same is true of white grapefruit and lime. But not oranges or ruby grapefruit whose higher sugar content makes them more acid inside the body.

If you have a sweet tooth and the lemon isn’t working for you, you could try adding an apple instead, but aim to reduce the quantity over time.

Should I peel?

Obviously, you will want to peel some fruits and veg, eg. a pineapple. But using organic produce means you need only give the produce a good scrub rather than peeling it which is recommended for non-organic produce.

And one final tip…

If you want to add ginger to a juice and your juicer tends to spit the chunk of ginger out without really juicing it, put it through your garlic press and stir in to the finished juice! Happy juicing.

Claire Raikes is a Wellbeing Coach, Speaker and Writer who ‘cured’ herself of a chronic, disabling and potentially life-threatening bowel condition without the use of steroids, surgery or any other traditional medical intervention. She now shares her passion for natural and vibrant health through coaching, speaking and writing about the importance and power of a truly healthy diet. She publishes a free weekly eZine, In Essence and is compiling an eBook of Healthy Fast Food with 25% of the proceeds going to The Cancer Project, a charity set up by the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine(PCRM) and nutritionists to educate the public on the benefits of a healthy diet for cancer prevention and survival. If you have a recipe you would like to submit, visit http://www.LiveInEssence.com for further details. To book Claire to speak at your event, email her at Cla...@LiveInEssence.com. Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Claire_Raikes