When our family started juicing we were hell bent on doing it and benefiting from it, no matter the taste. That was BEFORE we tried it, of course.
As long as it's ice cold, I think I can drink any of the juices we've made, my husband not so much.
It wasn't until we tweaked our current recipes and added lemon that we actually began to see that you CAN like the juice you make, you don't always need to feel like you've got to gag it down.
This is our Green Juice recipe, aka "Green Lemonade".
Ingredients:
5 x 4.5oz Apples3 x 12 oz Cucumbers
2 x 3-4 oz Lemons
2 x large handfuls of Baby Spinach or Kale
Directions:
Cube the apples. No need to remove the stem, skin or seeds. Slice or cube the Cucumber. Use a potato peeler to get the yellow skin off the lemons until just white shows. The more yellow skin you leave the more bitter it will taste. Rinse spinach. *The lemon gives the juice a great lemonade flavor while masking the strong aftertaste from the use of Kale. So I would not recommend omitting the lemons...I prefer to juice the spinach between the apples and cucumbers so that the more watery fruits and veggies can wash all the green goodness through the juicer. We use a Jack Lalane Juicer.
When I'm done I will also use a small scoop (1/4 cup) to re-run some of the juice through, just to make sure all the good stuff gets through and into my bowl.
Calorie Count:
The above ingredients were weighed. You don't normally need to keep track of the weight, I only did so so that I could get an accurate calorie count.This yielded 42oz of juice and 283 calories total. Low in calories and delicious, your body will thank you!
So do you juice? What is your family's favorite recipe?
We don't juice yet but we're trying to psych ourselves up to start. We used to eat pretty healthy but a few years ago we had to move in with my mom because of the economy and she has horrendous eating habits. She got kinda crazy (okay, very crazy) if we didn't eat like her so most of the time we were stuck eating either boiled beans with nothing for flavor or Jack in the Box. She's an extreme type of person who will go from eating nothing but a massive plate of steamed broccoli with no seasoning whatsoever to bingeing on fast food by the end of the week. Occasionally she'll juice too. In fact, she gave me my juicer. It was insane but we had to do it if we didn't want to be homeless. We also started eating junk for comfort since we absolutely hate where we live. My silly husband also thinks we can't afford to eat healthy so that means hotdogs and ramen noodles. Blech! Thankfully he got a raise so he's recently stated he's willing to try juicing. He even went out and bought a ton of veggies for that purpose but it just didn't happen this week. We've both put on tons of weight and gotten really out of shape. Plus I had our last baby (four months old) by c-section and I don't recover well from those. I'm looking forward to juicing because I feel my body really needs some help. Thanks for the recipe. I have the same juicer. :) Wish me luck. I'm gonna need it.
ReplyDeleteWe thought the same thing. A good juicer is expensive, especially if you're not sure if you're going to like it or want to do it long term. We wasted $50 on a GE Juicer from Wal Mart and the whole kitchen vibrated when we used it. Then I found this Jack Lalane at Goodwill for $10! It's so quiet compared to the other one and yields much more juice which means you're not wasting money. Plus, the healthier you eat the less starving you feel all the time so you snack less and that of course saves money.
ReplyDeleteDefinitely know how you feel about junk food. It is a comfort and I especially loved to enjoy it after the kids go to bed. This juice recipe is pretty sweet because of the apples so it seems like more of a treat to me than just drinking water.
Good luck! :)
My personal favorite is a strawberry & spinach juice, but my husband hates it!
ReplyDeleteHere is one that he will drink though...
- 6 leaves of organic kale
- 4 cups packed organic spinach
- 2 organic green apples
- 1/2 cucumber
- ginger (cut in a 1/2 cube)
- 1 tsp or less of lemon juice
http://www.leettlebaby.com/2012/03/adventures-in-juicing-manic-monday-3.html
Well, we tried it. We used a recipe called Mean Green which has some of the same ingredients but it tasted almost chemically yesterday when we juiced it. I managed to drink a full glass despite the strong taste. There was more left and my husband had a bit of it but he made faces the whole time.lol. I even got my son- an extremely picky eater with food texture issues- to try it because I called it "Hulk Juice".lol. My five year old daughter tried it too but she's pretty adventurous with food so that wasn't as huge a deal. The leftover juice was stored in the fridge and I drank the rest this morning. The flavor had mellowed out and it tasted pretty good on an empty stomach on a busy morning. :)
ReplyDelete