Juice Up

I'm going to stay on the holiday gift theme today. This past August I bought a juicer. I realized I wasn't eating enough vegetables in my diet and figured using a juicer would solve that problem. I tried eating raw veggies and stayed with that for about 2 weeks. I tried preparing a tons of veggies on the weekend and putting them in containers for use that week and that didn't work either. Those options were just too boring. But with the juicer it is a piece of cake getting my 6 - 8 servings of vegetables per day. I bought a Jack Lalanne juicer. I honestly have no idea if it's a good one since I have nothing to compare it to. Here is a site with consumer reviews of juicers. I use mine 1 - 2 times per day and have been hooked since buying it. The great thing is you can put anything in it in any combination you like. You are only limited by your own creativity. For the first week or so I make some pretty nasty tasting juices but it doesn't take long to learn what is a palatable combination and what isn't. It takes about 5 minutes to clean after each use. The only down side is you lose the fiber in the pulp. So it's a tremendous tool to use to get all the vitamins and minerals you need but you must be aware of getting your fiber from other sources throughout the day. I eat tons of berries (along with other fruit, seeds, and oats) for my first two meals of the day so I think I have my fiber needs covered. The great thing is you can just throw in any vegetable, no cutting or peeling required. Broccoli, carrots, ginger, apples, pears, celery, cuccumbers, tomatoes, beets, grapefruit, asparagus, parsnips are all common in my juices. So if you have a hard time getting the necessary vegetables every single day in your diet give a juicer a try.