Bottling Strawberry/Aloe Juice

Today, I picked some Aloe while outside mowing the lawn and then made a lovely Strawberry/Aloe Juice!!! It wasn't sweet but still refreshing! Of course I could have added honey but preferred the red juice in its most natural state!

The plump, juicy strawberries I used were local and farm fresh from The Veggie Bin.

In "The Juiceman's Power of Juicing," Jay Kordich says: "Strawberries are high in potassium and iron, which is good for strengthening the blood. The sodium content makes them a valuable tonic for nerves and for keeping glands healthy, which explains why they are considered 'youth' food."

Strawberries are also know for their wonderful vitamin C content and "natural sugars that cleanse the system," Kordich explains.

What a perfect food for spring cleansing!

Why not sip on some Strawberry Juice?

Strawberry/Aloe Hugs,

Penny

Bottling the Power of Juicing

"Drinking freshly made juices and eating enough whole foods to provide adequate fiber is a sensible approach to a healthful diet. But incorporating juice into your life does so much more. The abundance of live, uncooked foods flushes your body of toxins, leaving you feeling refreshed, energized, and relaxed all at the same time." ~Jay Kordich, The Juiceman's Power of Juicing

I ran into a dear friend today who had seen my juicing Tip Clip on LaBarefootStudio.com. She inquired about a good juicer that she could purchase and mentioned that since the juice is extracted from the fiber when juicing, perhaps it would be a good idea to add Mila to the juice.

While the body definitely needs fiber and I'm a huge fan of Mila, juicing allows the body to immediately get to the business of assimilating nutrients by bypassing the process of digestion. "Ahh," the body must say. "You're fueling me without me having to digest all that food first. Yay!" :-)

Foods with fiber must undergo digestion. Juicing pushes digestion out of the equation. So, with fresh juices, nutrients immediately go where they need to go within the body. This is the reason why juicing is often the emphasis at healing retreats and such, as this process allows the body to, like I said, get right to the business of healing!

To help you better understand the science of why fiber is extracted from the juice during juicing, I'll quote Juicing Expert Jay Kordich, author of "The Juicemans' Power of Juicing" -- which has been my juicing reference book for many years.

Kordich explains:

"When we eat fresh fruits and vegetables, our bodies extract as liquid what they need from the fiber, which passes on to the lower digestive tract. For all intents and purposes, the extracted liquid is juice, containing the same elements as the juice you make in your kitchen with the juicer. By drinking juice, you are eliminating a digestive process -- extracting the liquid from the fiber -- and efficiently supplying the body with nutrients. The juicer separates the juice from the fiber so that what you drink is pulp-free and your body receives the maximum amount of nutrients in minutes."

Since "nutrients lose a lot of value soon after juicing," you get fresher juice by juicing yourself rather than getting juice from the store. Also, what you juice will not be pasteurized, therefore, you'll be consuming liquid bursting with life.

Plus, you won't add any additives or preservatives, right? :-) Of course we need fiber, so one must balance juicing with fiber-rich foods (and the whole food Mila certainly helps with that). That's why juicing and blending (fiber retained) go hand in hand for me!

Kordich says:

"I get my fiber by eating around the juicer. The juice always comes first when I am planning what I will eat."

Bottling Grapefruit/Apple Juice

My friend, Charo, gave me some yummy grapefruits yesterday from which I just finished sipping on a grapefruit/apple juice I made in my juicer. The recipe:

~ 1 large grapefruit, cut and peeled

Grapefruits are a great source of vitamin C, calcium, phosphorus, and potassium.

~ 4 apples

Apples are also a source of potassium and phosphorus (which helps flush the kidneys), as well as a wonderful source of pectin (which helps remove toxins from the intestines).

Juice grapefruit and then apples! Stir and Enjoy!

Well, now having provided this refreshing information above, I feel I must share this info below.......the words of Jay Kordich, author of The Juiceman's Power of Juicing.

"I try to eat only organic apples. Often as many as eleven chemicals are used by apple growers who then wax the fruit to preserve it further. If I have to eat a waxed apple, I always peel it. Some growers use a chemical spray called Daminozide which penetrates the fruit and cannot be gotten rid of by any amount of washing. Another dangerous chemical is Alar, which may be carcinogenic but is being used in lesser amounts or eliminated altogether since the well-publicized outcry a few years ago.

"When you buy organic apples, check them for worms. The won't harm you but you probably don't want one going through the juicer. The government allows commercial canners to use a certain percentage of wormy apples in every batch of juice they make. This is only one reason I do not recommend bottled or canned apple juice. The canneries also use old, disfigured, rotten fruit. Why should they care? They filter the juice and then boil it so that the consumer never actually knows what goes into the juice. It is also difficult to know how much juice is in a can of apple juice. Regulations controlling what is printed on labels are becoming stricter but are still not enforced, according to the Center for Science in the Public Interest. That watchdog organization did a survey a few years ago on more than a dozen commercial juices and discovered that in many, the amount of juice was only about 10 percent. The rest was sugar and water.

"If you must buy apple juice, never buy it if you can see through it. This means it is pasteurized, or cooked, and then filtered so that all the helpful enzymes are removed. Buy, instead, cloudy-looking juice with sediment on the bottom, which indicates the juice is unfiltered and so probably contains more nutrients."