I don't know about other families, but I am certain it would not be possible to get my family to eat this much produce in one day. It might seem like a deceptively small amount in the the above picture, so I added a dinner plate in the mix to give a little perspective.
It's possible that we might eat a dinner plate worth of carrots, but we would be pretty sick of them by the end of the day.
What about a big bunch of purple kale? There is zero chance that I am going to get my kids to eat that, especially raw.
About the only thing that would be no problem to have disappear in the course of the day would be this plate of apples, minus the lemon and lime.
We were doing well with making green smoothies, but when I attempted to improve the veggie to fruit ratio, the taste of greens such as kale, swiss chard and celery required too much fruit to allow for a truly power packed option. When I finally broke down and bought a juicer, I was shocked by how "sweet" the greens are all on their own. A little lemon and lime will cover a multitude of greens! Because I am juicing for the kids, I also add a minimum amount of green apple and carrot to add some sweetness. Adults juicing to loose weight or for health reasons will want to consider the sugar and carbs that juicing fruit adds.
I don't follow any recipes for our juice. I make about 1 gallon of juice a few times a week. I wish that I had time to make it daily, but making that much requires at least an hour. If I were just making a single batch for myself, it would be a much faster process.
A batch of juice typically contains curly kale, purple or green, lacinato kale, cilantro, celery, cucumber, swiss chard, carrots, lemon, lime, zucchini, apple, and romaine lettuce. If I can't find any good kale, I will sometimes use spinach, but of all the greens, I find that my juicer handles it poorly. In the above pictured batch, I also included a beet and the greens from a few beets. I also like to sneak in parsley.
I was thrilled to make a batch this weekend that contained cilantro, swiss chard, lettuce and kale all from my garden! If the evil rabbits would leave my kale alone, I would have plenty right now, but sadly, there were only a few small pieces that I could add. Thankfully, it seems the more we harvest the swiss chard, the more it grows like crazy! This time I got brave and even added in the stems. I was really afraid that the flavor would be too strong to overcome, but the whole family drank it with no complaints.
I cannot begin to describe the amount of energy I have or how great I feel on the days that we have fresh green juice. If I go for more than a few days without it, I seriously start to crave it! I held out on buying a juicer for a long time because I just didn't think I would stick with it. We have been juicing since August and I can't imagine giving it up!
A half gallon jar of the above pictured veggies. This is what was left after the family each had a glass and the remainder of the other half gallon was stored in another container. Usually the carrot is mixed in with everything else, but the carrot juice is so pretty, I wanted to be able to take a picture of it. A gallon lasts no more than 24-48 hours at our house.
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