Friday, December 28, 2012

Juice Me?

I try not to fall prey to trends, especially because living and working in Los Angeles, you find trends around every corner. For a while now I've heard people rave about juicing. There are plenty of popular juice cleanse establishments out here - namely Press Juicery and Moon Juice.

Their basic principles state that it takes approximately 18 hours before your body eliminates one meal. Being that our digestive system is working nearly all the time, we need to detoxify it somehow. That's where juice cleanses come in. Per Pressed Juicery, "Cleansing is an optimal way to give our adult bodies the break they deserve while also keeping ourselves energized and nutritionally satisfied." They recommend beginning with a 3-day cleanse, where you drink only a specified amount of juice per day and no food. These aren't your typical Tropicana juices - there is no added sugar or preservatives so each bottle only lasts a few days. After your body gets used to it, you can increase the duration of your cleanses. You can cleanse as often as once a month, or with each change of season. You are also encouraged to incorporate juices into your everyday diet. With this, you should still maintain a healthy diet and juices are added to give you extra nutrients. Keep in mind that if you are not cleansing, juices should not be meal replacements.

When people in Hollywood started this juice trend, I rebelled against it. Then everyone in my office joined the bandwagon. Again, I rebelled. While I'm not sure about the health claims (I mean, it is good for you to incorporate this into your everyday life just for the fruit and veggie nutrients), it can get SO expensive. For a day's worth of juice you can expect a charge of $75. For juice. Really? I just could not justify it. Recently, though, especially after feeling the lethargy of holiday meals I was keen to try a cleanse to restart my system. What is one to do? I went out and bought myself a juicer in the post-Christmas sales.

I got the Dash Premium Juicer and started straight away. Since I still have family visiting through the New Year, I thought it would be a good idea to start incorporating juices into my diet before I go for the all out 3-day cleanse. This juicer is amazing. I hadn't used one in years so I wasn't sure what to expect. It is powerful, extracts every last bit of juice from fruits and veggies, and is extremely easy to clean. Everything I could ask for!

My first juice was something called the Blood of Life and was recommended to me by a friend. It is quite a bright taste and definitely gives your taste buds a wake up. I absolutely loved it. I'm experimenting with different combinations and adding more greens into every juice. I actually think it is a great replacement for coffee in the mornings as it is obviously more nutritionally beneficial, and depending on the ingredients, definitely wakes you up. I got a great deal on the juicer and buy my fruits and veggies in bulk (thanks, Costco!) so my price per juice ends up being substantially less than these trendy juice bars.



Blood of Life Juice
2-3 beets
3 lemons
8 carrots
1 inch piece of ginger









I definitely suggest going for it if you are curious! Let me know what your favorite combinations are!

xoxo
Kiki



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