Tag Archives: health

Raw Vegetable and Fruit Juicing At Home – Part 2

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In Part 1 I discussed pros and cons of different types of juicers. Now that I have mine, what am I doing with it?

Actually, the first thing I did was break it! My Omega arrived without a “pusher” (designed to safely push items through the somewhat narrow feed chute). The dealer immediately mailed me one, but I was impatient to start. I substituted using a plastic chopstick to push down the vegetables – but pushed too far. The result: pieces of the stick going through the auger before I could shut it off shattered the juice strainer (pictures here).

But now that I have all the necessary parts, here’s what I’m juicing:

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Raw Vegetable and Fruit Juicing At Home – Part 1

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“Juicing” (raw vegetables and fruit, not athletes on steroids!) has been a health tactic-verging-into-diet-fad for some years, and lately has gotten a lot of press. Many supermarkets now carry commercial brands of juices and smoothies, plus juice bars and shops sell everything from just-pressed juice to entire regimens of delivered juices and fasting support.

Personally I’m not big on “fasting” or “cleansing” to extremes – but I’m not great about eating enough vegetables. I also wasn’t interested in paying up to $10 for 16 ounces of juice!

About 7 years ago I bought a cheap juicer, but it was such a pain to use and clean that I put it on a shelf and eventually gave it away. Recently a Facebook friend posted about using her old but reliable Omega juicer, which got me interested in researching what machines were available and easier to use regularly. I was willing to spend more to get a better performing juicer after calculating the the cost savings if I were to have two 16-oz servings of juice per day:

2/day = 14/week – at a local juice business’ prices the cost is $133-140 per week.

vs

A $250 juicer plus $30/week in organic vegetables/fruit from Whole Foods and Trader Joe’s brings me out ahead of store-bought in just 3 weeks!

Yes, I could buy much cheaper juice products at the local grocery, but when you read the labels of those you will find they lean heavily on fruit juices and can have total sugar content the same as or higher than a can of Coke!

In this post I’ll describe the various types of juicers – a future post will cover how I’m using mine.

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Don’t Ignore Your Parents’ Analog Technology

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In many ways we are living in a version of the high-tech future that appeared in science fiction fifty years ago (though we are all still waiting for our jet packs and flying cars). But sometimes it pays to revisit some of the old style devices used by our parents and grandparents.

For instance: right now it is thundering and pouring rain outside, but despite having my windows open everything inside is dry. This is due to my recent purchase of window filter screens like my mother used to use to help keep pollen out of our allergy-ridden house:

These not only filter out pollen but keep rain from coming in. They come in several heights and widths (though only work in traditional double-hung windows) and may be found on sites selling allergy alleviating products, e.g., National Allergy, Allergy Control, Vitaire.

What old-school techniques might be useful in your 21st century life?

Friday Faves – How To Help Boston

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Last Friday got even weirder after I posted! Fortunately the Boston area can now focus on recovering from being shoved into a real-life “Die Hard” movie. Here are a number of links to resources and ways to help yourself and Boston:

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