Carrot juice

English: Glass of juice and carrots Français : Verre de jus et carottes (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I bought a juicer machine about a year ago. A friend had been singing the praises of “juicing” and how it was beneficial for health and weight loss.

Of course, like so many things, I liked the concept more than the reality and the machine has been sitting in a corner in its original box for the last year.

A couple of days ago, however, I was having breakfast in a Dublin hotel. One of the options on offer was freshly made carrot juice. They had a juicer and piles of chopped carrots sitting beside it with basic instructions on how to make your own.

That got me thinking. I like carrots – I like grating some carrot into sauces to add flavour and carrot juice is delicious. Why couldn’t I make my own?

So this weekend instead of buying one bag of carrots from the local supermarket I bought three.

I unboxed the machine this morning, rinsed the bits that needed a cleaning before use and set about making my own fresh carrot juice.

It wasn’t hard – it was actually incredibly easy!

4 or 5 carrots yielded a good sized glass or so of fresh carrot juice and it was absolutely delicious!

So what are the benefits of fresh carrot juice?

According to Wikipedia:

Carrot juice has a particularly high content of β-carotene, a source of vitamin A, but it is also high in B complex vitamins like folate, and many minerals including calcium, copper, magnesium, potassium, phosphorus, and iron. A pound (454 g) of carrots will yield about a cup of juice, which is a low yield compared to fruits like apples and oranges. However, carrot pulp is very tough; the main difficulty in juicing carrots is in separating the pulp from the juice.

So it’s absolutely packed with nutrients!

Whether I’ll have “plain” carrot juice or start experimenting with combinations remains to be seen, but I love fresh juices, so my juicer might start getting some use from now on .. at least that’s the plan!