Minty Fennel Green Juice

One thing I hate about juice recipes is that they always call for fruit and veg by the piece.  I find that this yields extremely inconsistent results.  I’m very plan oriented, and I need consistency to plan appropriately.  To combat this, I’ve started documenting the average weights of fruit and veg so that I can use weight in my recipes (or convert those I find to use weight instead).  That way I always get the same amount of juice from a recipe.  And no chaos ensues in my kitchen.  No, that never happens…   

When I buy all of my produce over the weekend, I’ll wash, cut, and bag all of the produce up individually so it’s ready to be weighed and juiced at any time, with limited prep required. I find this saves a lot of time and doesn’t change the quality of the juice or lessen the quantity.  And as much as I hate single use items and plastic bags, I do love using plastic zip top bags to store my produce.  It keeps it all very fresh, and the space they take up shrinks as I use up the produce.  I die a little inside every time I throw one away, but you choose your battles, I suppose. 

I find a lot of great recipes on the rebootwithjoe site, which is where I found this one (don’t ask me where, because I can’t find it now).  It called for handfuls and pieces and stalks, so I converted everything to ounces.  I made a couple substitutions.  I used orange instead of grapefruit, dandelion instead of kale, and I used all parts of my fennel (bulb, stems, and leaves). 

I found this to be extremely refreshing for a green juice.  Usually green juices are…uhh… well… pretty fucking nasty.  This was pleasantly sweet and minty.  I will definitely be adding this to my regular juice rotation. 

Here’s the recipe by weight and by piece, in case you’re a fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants kind of person. 

6.6 oz. orange (or 1 orange)

1 oz. mint (or 1 handful)
12 oz. celery stalks (or 6 stalks)
10 oz fennel bulb + 6 oz fennel stems/leaves (or 1 bulb fennel with all stalks and leaves)
1 lemon
16 oz. green apple (or 2-3 apples)
4 oz. dandelion greens (or ~1/2 bunch)

yields slightly more than 56 oz.

Cheers to good health!

Wondering about the nutritional value?  Here you go.  Want the TL;DR version?  This juice will give you super healthy blood, brain, bones, & skin, and might even help your vision. 

Dandelion greens give you a shit ton of vitamin K & A, a hefty amount of phosphorus, potassium, & calcium, and trace amounts of vitamin B & C, calcium, magnesium, manganese, and iron.  

Mint contains vitamin C, manganese, and copper.  Mint also aids in digestion and produces something called monoterpene which is said to slow tumor growth and prevent cancer formation in certain areas of the body. It also acts as an antioxidant and has antibacterial properties. 

Oranges, of course, contain vitamin C, but also vitamins A & B, potassium, and calcium. 

Celery contains vitamins A, B, C, K, and tons of minerals and antioxidants.  Celery also contains compounds which might help reduce nervousness and headaches. 

Fennel has quite a bit of potassium and vitamin C, and trace amounts of selenium and other minerals. The stems contain a solid mixture of B-complex vitamins. 

Apples contain B-complex vitamins, vitamin C, and trace amounts of minerals. They also contain quercetin, which acts as a powerful antioxidant. 

Raw Trail Mix Recipe

I love trail mix, don’t you?  Trouble is, I can never find a premade mix at the store that I’m 100% satisfied with.  Usually they contain at least one ingredient that I want nothing to do with. Like peanuts, m & m’s, or yogurt covered raisins.  No thank you.  I’ll make my own!

I’ve been making my own trail mix for a while now.  It’s a must-have on our kayaking trips and now it’s a standby in our lunches for work.  It satisfies on so many levels.  There are the salty-smoky pistachios, the bitter-crunchy cacao nibs, the sweet-chewy cherries, and the variation in texture with almonds, cashews, and sunflower & pumpkin seeds.  

This mix is sure to please every palate.  My boyfriend even likes it, and he used to swear he only liked peanuts.  If you have some picky kids, try adding more dried fruit to up the sweetness factor.  Try banana chips, raisins, strawberries, or apples.  They might find the cacao a little bitter, but I find that the cherries (and other fruit, if you’re adding more) balance out the bitter quite nicely and you end up with a nice jolt of chocolate flavor without most of the bitter edge.  Or maybe I’m just used to raw cacao.  Not sure.  I will say that the resident child requests this in her lunch quite often.

It's jam packed with all kinds of fun nutrients, like vitamin E, magnesium, manganese, potassium, B2, B6, phosphorus, zinc, iron, biotin, selenium, calcium, and even a little vitamin A.  And, of course, tons of healthy fats, fiber, and protein. In addition to some of the vitamins and minerals already mentioned, the cacao nibs also add a few other things, like chromium (which is said to help balance blood sugar), theobromine (antibacterial), and vitamin C. They also contain some fun amino acids and many people even claim they boost serotonin. I’m not quite sure how that works, but I’ll take all the serotonin boosting I can get! 

Anyhow… to make this awesome nutrient-dense trail mix, you’re going to need:

1 c. raw almonds

1 c. raw cashews

1 c. raw pumpkin seeds

1 c. raw sunflower seeds

¾ c. salted, shelled pistachios

¾ c. raw cacao nibs

½ c. dried cherries

½ c. brazil nuts (optional)

I like to add the brazil nuts…you know…to meet my selenium quota, but you can leave them out if you’re not a fan, or if you supplement selenium or whatever.  I don’t supplement selenium because it makes my BO smell like garlic, which I think is rather repulsive. 

Toss it all into a bowl, or a bag and shake it up.  Make sure your cherries aren’t sticking together in big globs, then store the mix in glass jars.  I like to store the mix in wide mouth mason jars and vacuum seal them with the food saver.  But that’s just me.  I seal everything.  

Using the measurements listed, this recipe makes two 32 oz. jars. I consider about ¼ - ½ cup to be a serving. 

Here are some rough nutrition facts.  They're not exact, but pretty close.  Don't pay any attention to the vitamin and mineral content or the servings.  That's not accurate at all.  

Juicing, and how to make it last

Yes, it’s been forever since I’ve last posted. No, I’m not going to bore you with how busy I was or what was keeping me from the blog.  What I am going to do is talk about juicing. 

As you might have guessed, I finally got that juicer which I’ve been coveting for some time now.  You know the one.  The Omega J8005.  She’s a beauty. 

You might be wondering why I chose this one over, say, one of the ever-popular Breville’s or the Green Star.  Or you might now be wondering what the heck the Green Star is. 

Okay, okay.  Let me start from the beginning. 

Centrifugal

I started off thinking I would, in fact, get a Breville centrifugal juicer.  The price seemed right, and hey, the Amazon ratings are pretty high, so how bad could it be?  Well, upon further research, I discovered that these centrifugal types are far more prone to oxidation than their masticating counterparts.  This is due to the way in which they work.  What they do, pretty much, is take the vegetables and spin them around and cut them up until the pulp is spun dry.  Then the pulp and juice are separated and ejected through their respective exits.  The problem with this is it’s not quite as efficient as most masticating juicers, which means waste.  If there’s anything in the world that I hate, it’s waste.  Immediately, my mind conjures up images of soggy pulp and wasted juice (and having to buy too much produce, and what that’s going to do to my grocery budget…and before I know it I’m in a full blown panic about going bankrupt.  All over soggy pulp.  My brain is a chaotic place…).  This is all extremely wasteful and I can’t really stomach that much waste (money, and food…and I guess nutrients, so TRIPLE NEGATIVE on these centrifugals), especially when I consider just how much I’m planning to juice.  The added expense over time of the wasted juice is simply not worth saving a few bucks right this second (the centrifugal juicers are typically much more “affordable” than the masticating juicers).  And apparently these suckers can be pur-itty loud.  I don’t know about you, but I have enough appliances trying to murder my ear drums.  I don’t think I need another. 

Masticating

My next logical step, of course, was to begin looking into masticating juicers.  This is where I found the Omega line of juicers.  Also in this category is a brand called Champion.  Some people like them, but in my research I determined the Omega to be better (for my uses), for reasons I am now unable to recall.  Go figure.  The masticating juicers work slower, but juice much more efficiently than the centrifugal types.  I can handle throwing in a few extra minutes of my time if it means higher quality juice, and more of it.  The pulp coming out of my machine (the Omega J8005) is dry as a bone.  The only time it’s at all wet is if I’m pushing too much food through the chute, which means I’m not giving the machine enough time to work its magic on the pulp already in the auger.  If I’m patient, I can’t squeeze a single extra drop of juice from the ejected pulp.  That auger thing I mentioned, that’s the other difference between the two types if juicers.  The masticating juicers work with an auger, which rotates to push and squeeze the juice from the veggies, working the ever-dryer pulp toward the spout, while excreting the (almost) pulp-free juice out the bottom of the compartment.

Others

There are also a few other models to choose from.  The Green Star, mentioned above, is basically the top of the line.  It can’t be beat as far as efficiency and juicing grasses and greens.  It also comes with a $500 price tag, so you get what you pay for here in the juicing realm.  Omega also makes an upright masticating juicer, which is sort of new technology on the juicing scene (or so I was to understand while doing my research).  I don’t really know too much about them, as I didn’t dig too deep into them.  The one I found was almost $400, so when I realized I could get everything I wanted for ~$250, I decided to quit while I was ahead and go with the Omega J8005 before I convinced myself that I did, indeed, need to spend $500 on a juicer. 

Juicing in Action

When I started talking to people about juicing, most people seem to share the opinion that juicing is too expensive.  So far, I beg to differ.  Let me give you a cost example for my most recent batch of juice.  I like a nice combo of cucumber, tomato, carrot, apple, parsley, and ginger.  I made a triple batch over the weekend to last me throughout the week.  Here’s what I used and what I estimate to be the cost of each:

(Keep in mind, it’s currently the dead of winter here in PA, so prices are a little higher than usual)

15 carrots:                           $0.90

4 green apples:                     $2.00

6 tomatoes:                          $5.50

3 large cucumbers:               $3.00

1 handful of parsley:             $0.15

2-3” chunk of ginger:            $0.25

TOTAL                              $11.80

This batch yielded 6 pint sized jars of juice.  For me, that equals 6 days’ worth of juice.  So that is less than $2 per pint of fresh vegetable juice.  I used to spend more than twice that amount on a 12 oz. mocha latte every day, so I count juicing as a bargain, both for my wallet and for my health. 

So it’s official.  I’m a juice convert, for sure.  I love having a fresh glass of juice every morning, ready and waiting in the fridge.  In case you’re wondering how I keep my juice for the entire week, I use my foodsaver with the widemouth jar attachment to “preserve” the juice.  I put preserve in quotes because it’s not technically preserving, since it still requires refrigeration, but this method will keep your juice fresh for at least a week.  A week is the longest I’ve let sealed containers of juice hang around, so I can’t yet speak to the quality of juice contained for longer periods of time.  I will bet that the juice will last longer, though, because I didn’t notice any degradation of flavor at the 6 day mark.  I do highly recommend sealing your juice in mason jars, as it saves a lot of time to prep, juice, and can a weeks’ worth of juice at once, instead of chopping and cleaning 7 days a week. 

Have any juicing know-how of your own to share?

Green (and Blue) Smoothies

I've been wanting to try parsley in a green drink for a while now, but haven't been brave enough to try it yet. Until today. I don't usually care much for parsley as a culinary herb, but I know it's super healthy and detoxifying, which is why it's so alluring as a green drink ingredient for me. I'm not alone here. Lots of people juice and make smoothies with it.

I wanted to go light on the parsley, just to test the waters. Here's roughly what I used today.




Parsley Cucumber Smoothie

1 kale leaf
2 sprigs of parsley
1/2 lemon, juiced
1 apple
1/2 cucumber, peeled
1" pc of ginger
2-4 tbsp flax seeds
Water to taste


Blend until smooth.  Serve over ice.




Although this is going to take some tweaking, I do think this combination has potential. It's a very bright, refreshing flavor. I definitely see this growing on me as a morning pick-me-up. The parsley, ginger, and lemon compliment one another really well. I might, however, add some mint and banana next time, and maybe use less lemon.

Overall, definitely not the worst thing I've created in my blender so far!


This delight pictured below does NOT contain parsley (or any green, for that matter).  But I made it today, too, and thought I'd share!






Blueberry Banana Smoothie

1 c. blueberries
1 banana
1 container vanilla yogurt
coconut milk to desired consistency
cinnamon to taste


Blend until smooth.  Serve over ice.






Yes, if you're wondering, I do practically live on smoothies! :D

Corn & Black Bean Salsa (and a raw update)

I'm not sure if I've discussed this previously, but a secondary reason for me to try a raw diet was indigestion. Before I tried going raw, I was experiencing terrible indigestion in the morning. I was throwing up clear puddles of acidic liquid each morning. It got so bad that I thought i was pregnant (morning sickness), and eventually I had blood work done. It turned out I was not pregnant, so the doctor recommended I take an antacid. Long story short, the antacids didn't work, but the raw diet did.

I tell you this because today, approximately 1.5 months back on a non-raw diet (I've been eating non-raw since about thanksgiving), and its happening again. Granted, I did have spaghetti for dinner last night, which isn't helping.  I usually try to avoid tomato based sauces.  Either way, this is motivation for me to get back on track. My finances are pretty much back to normal, so I thought there is no better time than the present to bring raw back into my life.

Last time I started sliding into a raw diet, I started off by drinking green smoothies. But last time, I quickly got overwhelmed by all the fun gadgets and recipes, and started trying to make tons of "gourmet" dishes. This is where I went wrong financially. For me, it was just too expensive and too time consuming to buy so many different fruits and vegetables and prep them for the recipes I had planned for the week. For one, fruits and vegetables are more expensive than other groceries; second, I found I was wasting a lot of produce at the end of the week. This was either because I had more on hand than I needed for my recipe, or simply because I ended up not using it.  Plain and simple, it was poor menu planning on my part.

This time around, I'm taking a more laid back approach. I'm still doing a green smoothie each day, but I'm not going to obsess over making a ton of recipes. I also realized that I like to have a salsa available which includes avocado. If nothing else, I will be sure to make a salsa each week.  I made this really tasty corn & black bean salsa recipe this week.  I was inspired by a picture I saw somewhere.  Probably on Pinterest...  The picture was a huge bowl of corn, tomato, and red peppers with cilantro.  I took that a step farther and added avocado, onion, and beans.  It's heartier and far more satisfying this way.  

Corn & Black Bean Salsa

2 tomatoes, dices

1/2 red bell pepper, diced

1/2 cucumber, diced

3 thick slices of red onion, diced

1 avocado, diced

cilantro to taste

couple splashes of vinegar

1 can of corn (use fresh if in season!)

1 can of black beans

1. Toss together all of the diced veggies.
2. Rinse canned ingredients well, and add to veggies. 
3. Add cilantro and a couple splashes of vinegar.  (The recipe I found called for lime juice, but I didn't have lime juice, so I used vinegar.  Feel free to use lime juice if you have it.  It would probably be better.)  I used garlic flavored rice wine vinegar.  It's just what I had on hand. I'm sure any mild vinegar would be fine.  
4. Scoop into bibb lettuce for veggie tacos (pictured above), or eat it with tortilla chips.  

I'm sure this would be really great with garlic and jalapeno, if you care for a more intense flavor.  If this is a little bland for you, you could easily dress it up with a little bit of greek dressing, or even your favorite homemade dressing!    

Other than eating salsa and green smoothies, I'm going to try to include more whole foods in general into my diet. Easy on-the-go stuff like apples, bananas, grapes, and cherries.  At least at first.  

And speaking of smoothies, I just made an awesome smoothie this morning.  Kale, strawberries, bananas, coconut oil, and hemp seeds.  The coconut oil and hemp seeds really leveled it out and kept me full all morning!  If your smoothies haven't been keeping you full, try adding some seeds and/or oil! 

Oh, and I also think I'm going to start juicing. I've been doing a lot of research on the topic lately, and I'm starting to think it may be the only way to be really successful long term with a raw diet. See, I've also realized that there are a lot of vegetables that I don't care for in their raw form. Sure, I could cook them instead, but wheres the fun in that? I'm a  little off put by the potential strong flavor, but many people claim fresh veg juice doesn't taste at all like what you expect it to. I know that's vague, but I kinda see what they probably mean. So I plan to save up for a juicer over the near future. I'm leaning toward a masticating juicer, but well talk more about that another day! 

Berries and Kale Smoothie, and a healthy new year

I've been lethargic and foggy-headed lately.  I can only blame the food I've been eating lately.  My body is sad and it misses fruits and veggies.  I haven’t really been sticking to a raw diet lately, and my body is rebelling.  A bunch of things sort of came to a head over the holidays which prevented me from sticking to the raw food, but now that the holidays are over and my finances are getting back on track, I’m looking forward to a getting back to a healthy lifestyle.  The two main things that prevented me from maintaining a raw lifestyle are finances and time.  

Let’s face it, raw food is expensive and it can be time consuming to prepare.  Between everything that life throws our way, it can be really easy to let our health take a back-burner to some of the seemingly more pressing issues we face daily.  Life is full of enough stresses as it is; food shouldn't be one of them.  

I’m not a person who makes resolutions when the new year rolls around, but this year I am determined to find a way to make healthier decisions without breaking the bank or dedicating all of my spare time to cutting fruit.  I am determined to find an affordable way to maintain a whole-foods, plant-based diet.  I plan to explore juicing, among other things.  But for now, I may just have to stick to daily green smoothies.  

Speaking of green smoothies, here’s one that I really like.  

Berries and Kale Smoothie

1/2 c. grapes

6 strawberries

3/4 c. pineapple

1/4 c. citrus

1/4 c. blueberries

2 large kale leaves

Water to desired consistency

Combine in the blender and blend until smooth.  Enjoy!  

Amazing Grass Chocolate Shake

The resident child has been sick for the past few days with a fluctuating fever.  We've been dosing her up with the usual meds (cough syrup, motrin, etc.), but the damn fever just won't quit.  I decided today to try giving her a smoothie with some Amazing Grass GREENsuperfood powder mixed in to help give her body an extra germ-fighting boost.  I didn't think she'd be too keen on the idea of consuming something with the word "grass" in the title, so I kept that ingredient a secret.  I just told her it was a chocolate milkshake.  She was none the wiser, and she loved every bite!

The best part about it is that this is almost raw, and can easily be converted to be entirely so, and is packed with antioxidants and vitamins!  To make this entirely raw, just use raw peanuts (or whatever nuts) instead of peanut butter, and raw nut milk, or even water, instead of  the milk.  The GREENsuperfood powder is labeled as raw, so you're already good to go there!

Amazing Grass Chocolate Shake

1 banana, chopped and frozen (~1 c.)

1/4 c. peanut butter

2 tbsp. cocoa powder

1 scoop Amazing Grass GREENsuperfood powder

milk, to desired consistency

1. Combine all ingredients in a blender and blend until creamy.  Serve immediately with a spoon or a fat straw.  
2. Sit back and enjoy kicking some serious germ ass!  Or just enjoy...

This recipe is totally flexible and will stand up well to almost any substitution.  If you want to mask the chlorophyll ("green") flavor, just make sure you don't skimp on the cocoa powder!  Otherwise, you could use 1 cup of almost any frozen fruit, 1/4 cup of any nuts or nut butter, and whatever liquid you like!  I think coconut water (or milk) would be a nice addition.  I might try that next time...

Avocado-Melon Salsa

I've been craving avocado's like nobodies business lately.  One of my favorite ways to get my avocado fix is to make a fruity salsa.  Today I made what might very well be my favorite salsa to date!  It's a combination of avocado and melon, which might sound strange, but trust me when I say that this is totally delish!

Another reason I love salsa is because it is so versatile.  There's really no way to screw it up.  Just chop up a bunch of stuff and toss it together.  Wabash, you have salsa!  I think I will increase the amount of jalapenos next time, though.  I really like a lot of zing.  As it is right now, the jalapenos just sorta balance everything out without adding much heat at all.

Avocado-Melon Salsa

1 avocado, chopped into small chunks

Melon, chopped, equal parts as avocado

1 handful of chopped red onion 

1 tsp minced garlic

6 jalapeno rings, diced

juice of 1/2 lime

Combine all chopped ingredients in a bowl and mix well.  Serve over jerk chicken or fish, or eat with tortilla chips.  Personally, I take the chip route.

I have no idea how long this will keep.  Fresh salsa doesn't usually last more than a day or two in my fridge!

Fresh sqeezed orange juice, where have you been all of my life?

Oh. My. God.  Fresh squeezed orange juice.  Can anyone say best thing I've ever tasted in my life?  Seriously.  I don't know what the hell those damn frauds at the orange juice companies have been selling us all these years, because what comes in those bottles at the grocery store labeled as Orange Juice sure as hell tastes nothing like what just came out of my oranges!  Well, technically they are tangerines, but whatever.  Fresh squeezed orange juice is one of the best things I've discovered this year, I do think.  

Due to the whole raw-transition thing, I've been trying to diversify my nutrient sources as much as possible.  I've been reading Becoming Raw: The Essential Guide to Raw Vegan Diets, which goes into a lot of great detail about nutrition and some of the issues raw vegans have in obtaining some of these nutrients.  It explains how some nutrients work together to create other nutrients, and how being deficient in even one vitamin can, at times, be enough to halt the entire process of conversion.

Now, I'm sure we all know how important Vitamin-C is to our health, but I was shocked by some of what I learned in this book.  I was inspired to start consuming more citrus.  Only one problem.  I hate eating citrus.  I hate everything about it.  Either you peel it and eat the wedges, which is gross in so many ways.  I don't know how anyone eats those gross little peely things.  Blech.  Then there's cutting the fruit in half and spooning out the meat.  My grandfather used to eat his grapefruit like this, and I don't know how he did it, to be honest!  I can't manage it without squirting the whole house with juices!  And apparently they make "no-squirt" grapefruit knives, but do these things really work??  Even if they do, I don't really have time to do that every morning!  Not to mention, you can't prepare citrus ahead of time because of all that darn oxidation.  Damn you nature!

I decided the only way I could get my raw citrus vitamins was through juicing.  So I clicked on over to Amazon and ordered myself a handy dandy little juicer.  I got the Chef'n Juicester Citrus Juicer and Reamer for less than $15!  

The clear reamer piece is detachable so you can juice lemons and limes, too.  The carafe holds just about enough for one serving.  Since this thing arrived, I just can't get enough of fresh juice!  My favorite so far has been combining the juices each of one grapefruit and one tangerine.  So delish!