Day 297- Recipe Friday: Juice Recipes

I want a juicer... but the one that has come highly recommended is unavailable till possibly May (back ordered) so until then (or i can find something on ebay) here are some juicing basics.

Got all this great info from this site-http://www.juicingforweightloss.com/

Key ingredients that you can use as a guide when creating your slimming juices:

Carrot: This delicious juice will help add sweetness but still let you benefit from the incredible benefits of this amazing vegetable such as digestion stimulant, liver cleanser, and high levels of beta-carotene.
Cucumber: a base of choice for most recipes since they are water dense and relatively low calorie.
Celery: Is often recommended in weight-loss programs as it is low calorie and water dense. Juice the entire celery stick including the chlorophyll rich green leaves.
Lettuce: dark-green lettuce types are nutrient dense and darker the lettuce the more alkalizing and mineral rich.
Cabbage: Powerful body-cleansing vegetable recommend often for weight loss.  I'm sure you've heard of the "cabbage diet"
Beetroot: This is great vegetable that will add sweetness to your juice.  Use sparingly.
Spinach: Rich in chlorophyll and minerals such as calcium, spinach is alkalizing and has numerous weight loss benefits.
Tomato: Helps reduce acid in body, and is beneficial for stimulating blood circulation, liver cleansing and blood purifying.
Watercress: Considered a powerful intestinal cleanser and toxin neutralizer and is good  for the kidneys, bladder, blood circulation, cleansing the skin and said to stimulate fat burning.
Apple: This low glycemic fruit is known for a wide range of health benefits including supporting healthy blood-sugar levels.
Citrus Fruits: Grapefruits and Lemons in particular have gotten a lot of attention for it's role in weight loss support.

The first tip is to try to focus on fruits and vegetable that have a longer shelf life so you do not have to prepare too far ahead of time so if you get the juicing urge. It’s best to be prepared to act without thinking about having to go out to the store and get the necessary ingredients. Otherwise your motivation will quickly diminish.
The second tip is to try to focus on fruits or vegetables that have high juice yields.  If you have every tried juicing spinach or raspberries I think you know exactly what I mean. Fruits like apple are relatively easy to juice and have a high yield.  Veggies like carrots, cucumber and celery likewise have high yields.

So the key is combining these high yield fruits and veggies in a manner that are easy to prepare, efficient in juicing, and off course taste great!
I like to use cucumber as the base of most of my recipes since it’s not too strong of a flavor and easy to prepare.  I just quickly chop it according the opening of my juicer, and include skin and all.  The skin adds a bit more flavor that you may or may not enjoy, but for nutrition purposes and ease of use, I go for it skin and all.
Carrots and apples can be used separately or in combination to add sweetness to your recipe and does a great job of masking unpleasant flavors you might feel the skin of the cucumber might add.  I don’t even bother peeling the carrot for sake of being efficient.  Just do a good scrub down of the carrot being using it.  Same with apple, skin and all is the way to go.
Celery is another great high yield vegetable that is super easy to implement into your juicing recipes. Like the other fruits and vegetables mentioned above, celery also has a relatively long life in your refrigerator if stored correctly. Needless to say if you are not using a juicer there is more work involved in peeling and de-seeding for fruits and vegetables to get a good consistency.

Here are a few examples of easy juicing recipes you can follow:

3 medium carrots
1 medium apple
**
2 medium carrots
1 medium apple
½ medium cucumber
**
4 medium carrots
4 celery stalks
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3 medium carrots
½ cucumber
1 celery stalk

 Kelly