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

A Cruciferous Veggie/Ginger Juice

Who would think all of these ingredients are in this juice: Carrot, Cauliflower, Bok Choy, Kohlrabi, Brussels Sprouts (1/2 of a whole stalk with sprouts), Parsley, and Ginger? You could end up with a little spicy after-taste, but popping a Barhi Date in the mouth so nicely counteracts that!

Cheers,

Penny

My Answers to the Cons of Juicing

Donna McGee, studio manager at Life's Journey Yoga & Wellness, shared this article with me: The Pros and Cons of Juicing by Jo Cavallo.

Below, I've quoted some of the cons that the writer lists followed by "my answers" to them!

Here goes...

Article: "However, there are some drawbacks to juicing. For one, the process of juicing eliminates fiber."

My answer: Because we would typically balance juicing with eating whole foods or making smoothies (in blender) that retain fiber, it wouldn't be as if we are completely eliminating fiber from our overall diet. The chance to nourish the body while eliminating the process of heavy digesting...giving the digestive system a well-needed break...is invaluable, I think.

Article: "One of the health benefits of eating more fruits and vegetables is to increase your source of heart- and digestive-healthy fiber."

My answer: It's all about balance: eat some, blend some (the smoothie made in blender keeps the fiber). Then, juice, too, for that instant-dose-of-nutrition opportunity! I think the optimum word here is "balance." Juicing doesn't have to take over the whole diet, unless one is juice fasting or such for a certain period of time.

Article: "Also keep in mind that unless you drink your home-squeezed juice right away, you run the risk of contamination by exposing it to air and pathogens."

My answer: I think this juice-and-immediately-consume-it process is a beautiful thing! Fresh juicing, fresh drinking! Why wouldn't we want to get the nutrients from the juice into the body as soon as we can? Isn't that far better than drinking juice that has sat on a store shelf for weeks? Plus, we don't need a huge glass of fresh juice to receive the nutritional benefits, so it shouldn't be tough at all to get the fresh juice consumed soon after juicing the produce.

Article: "And then there is the expense of buying a juicer and the time investment needed to prepare the fruits and vegetables you're using and the cleanup afterward."

My answer: There are juicers to fit varying budgets. For anyone who is a regular consumer of store-brought juice, well, before long or over time, they'll eventually end up paying the cost of a juicer for juices they've been purchasing. Plus, with juicing, there are no bottles or containers to dispose of after juicing, so it's easy to see why juicing would be an eco-friendly choice when it comes to consuming juices.

Regarding the time investment element, is it really that bad to take a little bit of time out to push some produce through a juicer and clean the equipment when we're done? Many people spend far more time cooking a full-course meal in front of the stove/oven...which often requires far more prep and cleaning time than the overall juicing process? And, by the way, quite often, that one fresh juice is far healthier than the full-course cooked meal. I think the "time investment" is something that can be viewed differently with a little shift in perspective.

Happy Juicing! :-)

Penny

HoneyBell Oranges Galore

Heaven rained Honeybell Oranges down on my family!!! Thank you! Thank you! xoxo

"And God said, Behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed, which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in the which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for meat." Genesis 1:29 KJV

Five of the oranges in the above bin filled up this glass...with a little left over.

Learn about these tasty oranges at http://www.honeybelloranges.net/.

"...You can’t hear or go through something about FL citrus without noticing the phrase Honeybell oranges. They are the sweetest, juiciest, and merely the very best..." ~Honeybell Oranges

Juicing Fresh, Local Oranges from The Veggie Bin

Jan. 27, 2011

Cheers to week two of receiving my bin of local, seasonal, farm-fresh produce from The Veggie Bin in Jacksonville, FL. Now that I've picked up my bin that was delivered to Life's Journey Yoga & Wellness, well, all that's left to do is nourish myself and my family with the varied produce. One simple way to do that is to JUICE some of it, starting with the oranges tucked away in the bin of the day.

For this juicing adventure, all I have to do is peel the oranges...leaving as much as the white pith on them as possible...and then feed them through my juicer. In seconds, voilà, I'll have a glass of tasty orange juice up to my mouth!

"...By law, orange juice sold in cartons and bottles in the supermarket is pasteurized, a process that kills life-giving enzymes. .....because most of the vitamin C dissipates shortly after juice is made, many manufacturers add synthetic vitamin C to bolster the content. Still others add sugar for sweetening. None of this is necessary if you juice your own oranges.....What emerges is a thick, foamy drink with a heavenly creamy color." ~Jay Kordich in "The Juiceman's Power of Juicing"

By the way, if the orange juice doesn't turn out to be as sweet as you would like it to be, perhaps add the fresh juice of an apple or two to it (one of my son's favorites). Or, just stir in a little local honey or cinnamon in place of the apple. Smile at the life-giving enzymes you'll be feeding your body!

Happy Orange Juicin'...

Penny

Update: Jan. 28, 2011

To a friend of mine who also gets a bin from The Veggie Bin delivered to Life's Journey each week, I texted this note: "Just juiced oranges from bin. Only oranges....peel and juice...delicious! Wow! Took everything in me to share." LOL

Yes, the flavor of these juiced oranges was incredible. Seriously! Of course, the flavor can vary from orange to orange, but the orange juice from the oranges in my bin were certainly tasty.

In The Juiceman's Power of Juicing, Jay Kordich talks about how his mother used to squeeze fresh oranges, but he says it wasn't really juicing, because "she simply rotated the halved oranges on a reamer and pressed them in a squeezer." He explains that was simply "rubbing tissues against membranes and creating" what he calls "orange water. It may taste healthy," he says, "but has few of the health benefits of orange juice made in the juicer."

So just what is in orange juice other than the obvious vitamin C? Kordich's list also includes: "B complex, bioflavonoids, potassium, zinc and phosphorous. Orange juice "contains almost all of the oranges' food value," he writes. "Consumed pure, it is a perfect balance of nutrients."

Note: The orange juice I made (pictured above) was actually a little brighter in color than the picture shows.

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 Coconuts

See/listen to my coconut adventure at La Barefoot Studio & Market

Ahhh, indulge in the gift of coconut water while drinking it straight from its own natural cup! No glass needed, so there's nothing to wash apart from your cells with all of the vitamins and minerals found in coconut water. It's the perfect beverage for the sports enthusiast and anyone's health because of how loaded coconut water is with vitamins, minerals, calcium, and more!

Follow me along on my coconut adventure as I pierce one of the coconut's three eyes, insert a straw, drink up, and fall into coconut bliss! Want to "put de lime in the coconut?" I demonstrate that, too. After watching me do that, Rubi Jorgensen, a viewer of this tip clip on La Barefoot Studio & Market wrote: I'm "looking forward to having a coconut with some lime!!! Thanks for the great tips.....Keep them coming. Luv ya!"

Once you've pierced the coconut's eye and added lime or not, it's best to drink the beverage immediately, because when air mixes in with the coconut water, the quality of the water soon begins declining. So, for optimum taste and nutrition, don't let your coconut water sit for too long after you've pierced it. If desiring chilled coconut water, chill first and then pierce, drink up, and enjoy!

Cocotap.com has an extensive list of the benefits of coconut water.

Cheers to Coconuts!

Stay tuned to more adventures that Bottling Health and La Barefoot Studio & Market will be sharing!

Bottling Oranges

I was planning to wait until May 1 to start a freshly-squeezed Orange Juice and Water-Only journey, but there are still three days left before the start of the month, so that's three days sooner that my system can get more alkaline prior to the start of a new month. Although we tend to think of oranges making the body more acidic, they actually help make the body more alkaline

Follow along for the next two weeks for insight into my OJ and water diet and to learn about my inspiration behind it. And, if you don't already know, you'll be AMAZED by the VARIED nutrients in an orange.

On another note, as I type this I hear my son slurping the last drop of his banana/strawberry smoothie....a sound he makes with his straw and mason jar that is music to my ears. ;-)

Here's to Bottling Health!

Do you plan on bottling any new health before or during May?

Bottling a Fresh Juice Breakfast

From this:

To that:

For Today's Breakfast!

Ingredients: kale, parsley (a little), beet, lemon, apple, Mila (that little scoop on the side in the top picture)

I juiced the ingredients in the order above (I stirred the Mila in with the juice). I always juice apples last because the force of the juice extracted from them helps push through more of the juice from the greens, etc.

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."

Bottling Mandura -- Part 2

*While not juiced directly from my juicer (which I know is optimum), this is our best option (in our home) for regularly getting durian, mangosteen, and acai into our bodies. So, for Mandura -- and Mandura only --I've bent my must-be-from-the-juicer rule as to meet my son halfway on his health journey. In the meantime, I'm enjoying this "Royal Family of Fruits," too....



A little add-on from my earlier post.

I just felt inspired to have a 4 pm shot of Mandura (my son's drink of choice) and truly felt a certain vibe while simply holding the bottle.

Maybe it's just me, but I really do feel something quite special about this bottle that seems to exude "royalty!" It's just something about this nutritional supplement (right down to the packaging) that I resonate with! Before returning the opened bottle to the refrigerator, I held it close to my heart and thanked God! I know, I know...mushy me! ;-)

And, the healthy "family" that's in the bottle (durian, mangosteen, acai, and blueberries) is quite refreshing, too! Nothing like a dose of health this time of day. After my son had his 2 ounces before going to school this morning, he put his glass down on the table and exclaimed, "Now that's some good stuff."

We won't always just take the Mandura straight (even though it goes down well that way), but we'll mix it up a bit, too, by mixing it in into our fresh juices and smoothies! But outside of the other fruits and veggies we eat, a mere 1 to 2 ounces, 1 to 2 times a day is all that's needed from the Mandura bottle.

Afternoon Smiles,

Penny

Bottling Mandura & Dancing!

I'm doing the Mandura dance! "Mandura?" you ask! Oh yes, it's a health dance comprised of durian, mangosteen, acai, and blueberry moves -- I mean...juice. Today, we received our next bottle of this fruit-juice supplement that is created from some of the world's most nutrient-rich fruits...so, yes indeed, I'm doing the Mandura dance! Work it, Penny! :-)

I'm so excited that it was my 13-year-old son, Caleb, who turned me on to this fruit drink after he first tried it at his buddy Beau's house. Caleb was 12 at the time and came home that evening telling me all about this mystery juice that sounded so powerful. Then, when I saw the regal-looking bottle that this preservative-free beverage was stored in, I had a strong feeling Mandura was just as powerful as it sounded.

K.C., Beau's mom, one of the partners of the company that formulates and distributes Mandura, cleverly came up with the Mandura name -- "Man..." for mangosteen - "The Queen of Fruits" and "...dura" for durian - "The King of Fruits." Although "Man..." kicks off the name, durian is actually the first fruit on the ingredient list, but I'm sure you'll agree that Mandura sounds far more jazzy than Duraman. ;-) The folks at Mandura are calling this exotic four-fruit blend, "The Royal Family of Fruits." Because of the company's aseptic bottling process, Mandura is free of preservatives and the company's "state-of-the-art cold-filled technology" allows nutrient retention of the ingredients used to make Mandura.

There are varying opinions in the raw food community about adding supplements to an all-raw diet. However, if my family's diet was as rich as our friends Storm and Jinjee from TheGardenDiet.com, well, things might be different. But, as of this season in our lives, my husband and son don't exclusively eat a raw diet, and my all-raw percentage tends to vary, so I believe Mandura is a perfect fit for the Powells right now. While it is my philosophy that organic fruits (and veggies) freshly juiced and consumed within 15 minutes of juicing them are optimum, I am convinced that Mandura can nicely complement my family's health. And folks who are consuming this drink -- simply 1 to 2 ounces, 1 to 2 times per day -- are reaping some great health improvements. (Stay tuned for some testimonies!)

As I grow more deeply in health, love and my relationship with God, I've come to believe that when well-intentioned prayer and love go into a health product, prayer and love actually become the key ingredients, even though they are often not listed on the product. However, since Mandura's headquarters just happens (although I don't believe in coincidences) to be so close to my home, I have been able to spend time there, and I love the heart, energy, intention, and Godliness I see and feel behind this drink. My heart is saying, "Yes to Mandura," and I'm certainly not one to ignore that part of my body. Plus, since the skin, our largest organ, is a sign of the quality of one's internal health, I'd have to say that the shakers and movers that I personally know behind Mandura are definitely "walking" their "talk." They glow!

In fact, on the day of my extensive visit at Solstice International (the Mandura headquarters), I heard the voice of K.C.'s 6-year-old son echoing down the hallway: "I need three cups of Mandura." I assumed he was asking for one cup for himself and the others for his two brothers who were playing basketball. "Three cups?" his mom questioned. "Yes, I just took so many shots (referring to basketball), and I haven't made one yet." he explained. So, he turned to another shot of Mandura to turn his basketball statistics around. Too cute! Priceless!

Mandura is coming soon to BottlingHealth.com, so information about it will definitely be growing and glowing here. If you want to let your children find out, firsthand, why children are raving about this nutritional supplement, I'll put you in contact with just the right folks if you contact me at penny@BottlingHealth.com. There's really nothing to lose since you can get a 30-day risk-free trial period; a money-back guarantee.

I don't know about you, but I just can't regularly get my hands on fruits as potent as durian, mangosteen, and acai, so, thankfully, Mandura brings them into my home. And what makes Mandura even sweeter is that my son LOVES it and turned me on to it. Now, folks, that is health music to my mommy ears...

...So, off I go again to do the Mandura dance! Come join me! ;-)

Mandura Smiles,

Penny

***Stay tuned for Mandura on the Smoothies/Juices page of this site under a section called "Caleb's Choice!"***

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