Juicing is a popular trend we have all heard of, but it’s also a common remedy for healing, rejuvenation, and providing the body with raw nutrients. Juicing is used in certain establishments like Hippocrates Health Institute, along with Gerson Institute where people go to heal themselves from all types of health concerns, even those with cancer. Not like typical or store-bought juices, fresh vegetable juices are packed with living enzymes, vitamins, minerals — they just make you feel good all over!

Is Juicing Really Worth It?

Fresh vegetable juice gives the body immediate sources of nutrients, which these establishments incorporate into patients’ regular routine. When the body is under attack through disease or seriously malnourished, it may not be able to efficiently digest and assimilate nutrients during a regular meal. Since we only benefit what our bodies can fully digest, juicing makes a smart, easy, and fast way to flood the body with nutrition — even for those of us that digest our food just fine and don’t suffer from a serious illness. They can help everything from a headache, stomachache, inflammation, low energy, and more. Think of it like a more natural liquid vitamin supplement! Not meant to be a juice fast or diet restriction, whole meals should still be consumed when a person juices. Juices can simply be consumed first thing during the day before the first meal, or even later throughout the day in between meals.

How to Make Juicing More Affordable, Easy, and Realistic for Your Lifestyle

But let’s face it … though juicing is trendy, and as we now know, incredibly healing … it’s also not cheap. And it’s also not the only way to get healthy. You can live a healthy diet free of juicing completely and be just fine. However, if you’re looking to start juicing, already do, and are wondering how you’ll afford it, you may want to incorporate some easy tips to make juicing more frugal for your lifestyle.

Here are some ideas:

1. Buy Lasting Ingredients

Romaine, carrots, lemons, ginger, green apples, celery, and zucchini all last a very long time in the fridge (2-3 weeks easily). These are all some of the best juicing ingredients you can use and also some of the tastier ones, believe it or not. This will prevent two things: one, you won’t have to worry with things spoiling before you use them and two, you won’t have to use a bunch of ingredients at one time because you need to use them before they go bad. It’s also nice to buy these in advance and not have to worry with having to go to the store to get more. Plus, they really do make delicious juices!

2. Use Mainly Veggies, Not Fruits

Fruits are great for you, but they’re also expensive when you juice them. It’s also much better for your body to eat fruit rather than drink fruit juice due to all the sugars found in fruit. The point of juicing is to nourish the body, which vegetables do abundantly and have no sugar. Some exceptions with this are lemons, red peppers, cucumber, tomatoes, and green apples. Green apples, though a little higher in sugar than these others, are one of the best low-glycemic fruits and offer the nutrient known as malic acid that has been shown to stop tumor growth. They also add a sweeter taste to juice, but try to use only 1/2 an apple per juice for not only sugar purposes, but also budget purposes. Carrots are also a great sweet ingredient to use for juice and is one of the most healing ingredients to reduce inflammation, improve immunity, and improve your skin.

3. Just Make a Little

One common misconception of juicing is that you have to make a large amount at one time. You don’t have to drink an 8 ounce glass of juice everyday. Sure, it’s easier if you’re going to juice to make use of your time, but it also costs more too and won’t necessarily give you more benefits. Just have 4 ounces per day; you’ll still feel great, guaranteed! This doubles the amount of ingredients in your supply and makes it much more simple and doable.

4. Just Have it Once Per Day

Instead of juicing FOR your meals, just have a small 4 ounce juice before breakfast. It really only takes 5-10 minutes and makes you feel great! No need to have juice several times a day. We all know that’s time-consuming, costly, and really just isn’t necessary unless you have a condition and physically can’t eat. For most of us, a small juice a day is just fine and so much better than those processed orange juices all of us grew up drinking in the morning.

5. Buy What’s on Sale

Just like you would do with your regular fruits and vegetables, buy your vegetables and juicing ingredients when they go on sale. It’s a great idea to learn when your produce department puts items on sale so you can buy not only the freshest ingredients but also be sure you’re able to catch the best sale items each week. On the flip side, you can also buy veggies that are typically just fine, but that grocery store produce managers need to get rid of for new inventory through the week … which equals major markdowns on perfectly awesome juicing ingredients!

6. Use Less Ingredients Per Juice

You don’t necessarily need 10 ingredients per juice. Just use three or four. It’s just as good, and remember — a little goes a long way. Be sure you use a nice ratio of sweet to green to acid, which will provide the best tasting juice.

Here are some examples:

• 1 carrot, /2 head romaine, 1 inch knob of ginger, 1/2 a lemon
• 1/2 a green apple, 3 stalks kale, 1/2 a cucumber, 1/2 a lemon or lime
• 1 head romaine, 1 knob of ginger, 1/2 a lemon or 1/2 a green apple

You can also try these five combinations that also make great juicing recipes if you have a sweet tooth you’re trying to curb!

7. Use Water-Rich Ingredients

Another helpful idea is to make the most of what you do use. You won’t get very much juice from a head of kale, hardly any, actually. Sure you can still use it, but be sure you pair it with a water-rich ingredient to get more juice. These are great ingredients that provide more juice per serving: cucumber, romaine, zucchini, lemon, and apple. Mix one or two of these with other ingredients that have a lower water content such as kale, carrot, parsley, cilantro, grape tomatoes, ginger, etc.

Juicing can be a simple, healthy part of anyone’s routine. See more Wellness Benefits of Having a Daily Green Juice and try some of our juice recipes to get started with, implementing these ideas as needed. We hope you’ll give it a try!

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