I Love Juice

I love juice. 

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 According to google images, this guy does too...  :s

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What I don't love is paying $7+ for a plastic cup full of questionably fresh and/or clean fruit and vege, from a surly teenager with a hangover. Luckily, I no longer have to. Let me introduce you to my second-favourite kitchen appliance... my juicer!

I acquired (read: borrowed and never returned) my Breville juicer from my mum when I moved out of home. It has periods of intense use, followed by downtime, but it is worth ever dollar I didn't spend on it. Juicing is quick and easy, a great way to get a good dose of fruit and veges into you (remember, juice only counts as one of your five plus a day serves though), and juicers make the best, most potent lemon, ginger, honey drinks you will ever try. It's also a great way to use up any produce you have fading in your fridge before your next trip to the farmers market.

I don't have a favourite recipe really. I juice most things, and am generally happy with the result. Basic juicing guidelines recommend not to mix veges with fruit other than apples, but other than that I don't follow any rules (yeah, I'm a juicing bad ass). Today's juice consisted of green apples, kale and lemon. It's tart enough to make your sour muscle tweak a wee bit (you know, that one under your chin), but still pleasantly refreshing. It would be better with fresh ginger and a beetroot, but I'm not going to complain.

Step one

Step two

Step three

I often hear people complain about the post-juicing clean-up. To be honest, I don't really find it a problem. A quick rinse in hot water gets off the pulpy bits, and until I start whipping chicken breasts through my juicer, that will be the extent of the clean-up routine. Another juicing bonus is the wormies in my worm farm just love the excess pulp. If you use citrus, just pour a bit of hot water over the pulp and let it cool before you feed it to the hungry wee fellas.

Worm food

Juicers not liberated from your mum's pantry are a bit expensive, but there is always Trademe, or if you have something like Flybuys, you could probably find a good deal through them. An unofficial survey tells me that a lot of people have an unused and unloved juicer hiding in the depths of their kitchen anyway, so offer to take it off their hands. If you are a regular juice buyer, it doesn't take long to make back any investment from those $7 cups. And your day will be brighter from not having to deal with the surly teenager too.

Now if only I had one of these to drink my juice through...