Juice It!: Energizing Blends for Today's Juicers

Abstract

Fifteen years ago, the only juice bars in town were in the little macrobiotic store and the raw restaurant. Juicing was something a few of us were doing at home, with our ancient Champion juicers, or maybe a Jack LaLanne ordered from a TV infomercial. I’m sure that juice was flourishing on the Coasts, but it takes a while for trends to travel to the Midwest. In the Coops and health food places where I worked, back in the day, there were always healthy juice people, buying 50 pound bags of organic carrots, and flats of wheat grass. It was also big in the cancer community, and we often got newly diagnosed cancer patients who were juicing daily as part of their treatment. Anecdotally, you would hear about people who had cured themselves by making carrot juice every day. It sounded like as good a plan as any. But then the smoothie became ubiquitous, and fresh juices came along with it. We started reading about juice cleanses, and how people were doing them in groups, at work, to clean up their inner landscapes. Little juice making businesses sprung up everywhere, packing and delivering assorted bottles of the juices prescribed for these cleanses. So what is really up with juice these days? Well, I hope that it’s not a passing fad. Most Americans don’t even get close the the minimum requirement of 2 1/2 cups of assorted veggies per day. Freshly pressed juices are a tasty and easy way to bridge that gap. Now that we have lots of evidence that vitamins in pill form are pretty much a waste of money, juices can fill the role of “nutritional insurance” that vitamins once held. Fresh vegetable juices are a better way to get a whole assortment of antioxidants and other plant chemicals that you would have to take handfuls of clunky pills to get. So, if you want to make a commitment to health, it may be time to get into juicing. Spring is on the way (in some parts of the country!) and a nice, light glass of juice makes a great antidote to all the heavy food we have been consuming all winter.