A Tale of Two Juicers

Ok, so it is more like A Tale of Three Juicers but that title just didn't have a ring to it. Anyways, if you've read any of my other posts this past month, you'd know that I'm in training to be the next Jack LaLanne (nickname given to me by Sister K). Coincidentally, Jack was also into doing Body Weight exercises like me, plus he loved to juice. So, you can say that he's like an older, manlier, Caucasian version of me..ok, maybe not. I'm going somewhere with this people.

This post is about juice and juicers and how I am now a lean, mean, juicing machine. This is a new hobby to add on to all my other hobbies. I have LOTS. If I were an octopus, I would be juicing with one arm, croheting with another, knitting with another, scrapbooking with another, baking with another, calligraphying with another and running with the two remaining legs. Can you picture that?

Anyways, on to the juicers. There are lots of juicers out there and I am not even going to attempt to talk about them all or how they all work differently in their own special ways. I am only going to mention I believe there are 3 types: fast juicers - centrifugal, slow juicers - auger, and the new slow-fast juicer - auger function with centrifugal styling. Obviously, I am not a juicer expert by any means and so far that is about all I really know. The important thing to note here is that the auger type juicers retains more nutrients...or at least that is what I read.

Due in part to some influencing from a couple of blogs out there, I got curious about juicing. My sister just happened to have a juicer sitting at her house unopened and before you know it, the family invited ourselves over to her house for a juicing party. That is mainly how this whole juicing escapade started. Juicing can be a lot of work especially when the juicer has a narrow opening and you have to crop everything up or all the washing of produce and the actual juicer. It's a pain in the butt. But I find it relaxing and green juice is like green coffee. It makes me feel so good when I drink it. Since I started drinking juice green, I just noticed that I feel more energized throughout the day and I've stopped drinking coffee around 3pm. I had a bad habit and I didn't know how to stop. Problem solved. Trust me, green juice is the stuff of life! I don't know if I want to live as long as Jack Lalanne but maybe this juicing thing will help keep me fit into my old age and I am ok with that.

Photo: So this is my sister's Sharper Image juicer, which juices pretty good for a fast juicer. It is probably similar to the Breville that more people may be familar with. I actually really liked it. It's very fast, has a large opening for stuffing with ingredients, but you have to clean it out often if you are making lots of juice. There I am, juicing away in my parents kitchen. Please excuse the fancy foil-covered wall, it's more for spatter protection than for channeling aliens...I promise.


Photo: This is my new Hurom juicer. It's Korean made and it is quite expensive...for a juicer. It is a slow-fast juicer so the juice comes out darker than with the centrifugal juicer and pulpier. I have to strain it to get it to the same consistency as with the fast juicer. But since it is an auger type juicer, it will juice just about anything...soybeans, wheat grass, mangos...limitless. You just have to cut your stuff up into smaller slim pieces because the opening is more narrow. I've only juiced romaine, carrots, apples, chard, lemons, celery and cucumbers so far. The pulp that comes out after juicing is very dry unlike with the centrifugal juicers. I'm going to continue to play around with it some more to see what else I can create with it. Maybe some Bloody Marys?



Photo: This is the juicer from Panasonic (fast juicer) that my parents let me borrow while I was waiting for my Hurom to arrive in the mail. It's pretty old. It also smelled funny because it had been in storage in my parents' garage. The smell went away after I let it sit out for a few days. But, it splatters like crazy at the spout area. It went all over my sink counter and on my clothes. I only used it once and quickly returned it to the box where it came from to be returned to my parents. But the juice was the same as with the Sharper Image juicer.


Photo: This is the stuff yummy juices are made of.