By: Judy Davie, The Food Coach
 Even though fresh juice doesn't have the fibre of the whole veggies and fruit it works for me. A glass of fresh veggies with apple has kept me regular for years. I know it's the juice that keeps me regular because on days when I don't have one I don't go to the bathroom as successfully as on days where I do. Now that I have revealed my toilet habits to one and all I will get to the point.
I spend $2,007 a year on juice
It's a bit like the smoker being forced to add up how much they spend on cigarettes in a year; although it's certainly better paying good money for a product that promotes good health than one which will kill you. Last week I was invited to test the latest Phillips easy clean juicer. I've owned a few juicers in my time; one ended up in juicer heaven after its mesh basket became unbalanced and sprayed veggie pulp across the kitchen walls, my second was sent to land fill because the whole process from assembly to cleaning up was such a palaver I couldn't face getting up in the morning to deal with it, and my current one hasn't seen the light of day for at least 2 years since I got a long hard dose of the "can't be bothereds": A condition which has cost me the grand sum of around $4,000 a year.
With that figure in mind I said yes to the trial, made space on the bench top and fought off a sense of reluctance similar to the one you get when you sign up to a 12 months gym membership.
The assembly process was good fun - I love a puzzle - and the juicer looks good. The basket took a bit of fiddling with and appeared to be upside down but I think that's the key to its "easy clean" feature. Another bonus that I hadn't bargained on is that compared to other juicers I have tried, it is relatively quiet to operate.
I spent about 10 minutes cleaning the veggies for the next few days ahead. The celery is washed and in a large snap lock bag in the fridge and the carrots, beetroot, ginger and watercress are in a large Tupperware tub. Today it took less than 2 minutes to make the juice and about 4 minutes in total to wash the machine. That's compared to about 10 minutes to walk to the store, order and wait for it to be made.
Altogether over 3 days to make it myself it takes 28 minutes compared to 30 minutes if I buy it from the shop.
Financially over 3 days I'm slightly behind as the total investment in fruit and veg was $18.50. Tomorrow I'll be in profit and by the end of the week I'll have saved $20. That's $1,040 in a year.
I'm sold.
I don't want you to think that I am consumed by money although it has to be said that it was my primary motivation to conduct this exercise, but aside from that there are some other very compelling factors to home juicing.
Muffin making
You may not have the fibre in your juice but you can scoop the pulp out and use it in cakes and muffins. There's still enough moisture in the pulp to make delicious moist muffins that are loaded in better tasting fibre than plain old boring bran. I wouldn't suggest celery pulp in a sweet cake, but carrots and beetroot are both perfect. I'll follow up with a recipe on this at a later date but if anyone has one now we'd love to hear from you. There's definitely a raw beetroot and cacao recipe brewing.
The environment
When food rots in landfill, it gives off a greenhouse gas called methane. This methane is 25 times more potent a greenhouse gas than the carbon pollution that comes out of your car exhaust. Can you imagine how much methane is given off from the amount of waste pulp from juice bars? None of it will be going into muffins I'd wager.
Those of you with gardens would do well to compost your juice waste or give it to the worms in a worm farm. It's the best food either can get. Mixed with lawn clippings and other organic material combined, your juice pulp will soon be transformed into a nutrient rich formula to make your garden thrive.
My favourite juice
I've tried variations of this juice with other varieties of apples, and other added greens but this is my favourite. Don't forget the lemon. It makes such a difference to the overall flavour of the juice and contains limonin, a long acting and easily digested limonoid which can help fight cancers of the mouth, skin, lung, breast, stomach and colon.
½ beetroot bulb, peeled
3 sticks celery, washed and trimmed
2 carrots, washed and trimmed
A generous knob of ginger
½ Granny smith apple
¼ lemon, with skin
Put all ingredients through a juicer and drink immediately.
I will leave you with this thought. Juice pulp is used in compost to enrich the soil to grow the veggies you use to make your juice. That's the stuff that makes the world go round.
Do you have a favourite juice? Share your recipe & thoughts here:
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