Cold-Pressed Juice Trend, Hotter Than Ever

Growing up, we’ve all heard “eat your fruits and vegetables.” Now it is easier than ever since entire daily servings can be replaced by a single drink: cold-pressed juice. While it’s not a new concept, the cold-pressed juice movement has escalated exponentially in the last couple of years, going from do-it-yourself at home juicing to trendy juice bars popping up everywhere. See for yourself.

What is cold-pressed juice?

Cold-pressed juice is made by using hydraulic pressure to squeeze out every ounce of juice from the selected fruits and vegetables. If you look for the best cold press juicer available on the market, it will let you get the most out of the fruit and veg you use. Pressing the fruits and vegetables instead of using high pressure processing, or HPP, (another popular method of juicing) has a many benefits like:

• The pressed juice loses holds onto more nutrients than other methods of juicing allow.

• Each juice is as “raw” as possible because the nutrients remain intact since they are not being heated.

• The freshness of the cold-press juice – no homogenization or pasteurization – sets it apart from store bought juice products.

Cold-pressed juice fits nicely within the local food, farm-to-table movement, emphasizing produce bought directly from local farmers that use sustainable and organic techniques. Plus, you can get nearly any combination of fruits and vegetables you desire like lemon, ginger and cayenne aka. “spicy lemonade” or kale, spinach and apple aka “green juice.” The top trending juice brands you can find online or on store shelves are BluePrint, Suja, and Viva Raw. For more on the best juices visit Food Babe.

What are the health benefits?

The biggest health benefit is the number of servings of fruits and vegetables with each juice drink– up to six pounds of produce in some cases. Someone who might not normally have the desire to eat the recommended servings can consume the same amount (if not more) in an easy, tasty, drink. Juice-lovers need to be careful. The process removes a lot of fiber, so the fruits and vegetables automatically have less digestive benefits than their non-pressed counterparts. Natural sugar also adds up to a lot of calories, quickly, and what was supposed to be a healthy addition could give you the opposite results if done in excess. But cold-pressed juice has shown to improve weight loss for regular juice drinkers.

What about a juice cleanse?

Some people turn to cold-pressed juice for a juice cleanse, to detox their body or to jump start a weight loss program. A juice cleanse can last as short as a day or as long as three weeks. They typically show quick results because the only thing going into your body is raw juice. However, juice cleanses lack the long term benefits of continual proper diet and exercise. Plus, cleansing for too long can deprive your body of the vitamins and nutrients you get from a well-rounded diet (we need fat and protein in addition to the complex carbohydrates the juice provides). Adding juice into your daily diet and workout routine is beneficial. But experts say juice, and only juice, as your complete diet with no exercise activity is a formula for poor nutrition.

Is it worth the price?

Cold-pressed juice can be pricey, also buying bottles for storing juice can add to the costs. A dollar an ounce is not unheard of—especially considering the amount of fruits and vegetables going into each bottle, making the ever-growing legions of devotees say it’s worth every penny. Is it a fad, like frozen tart yogurt, or a bona fide movement like espresso drinks? Either way, expect a cold-pressed bar coming soon to your neighborhood.

Sources – in order of appearance:

1. http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/17/dining/the-rush-toward-cold-pressedjuices.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0 . The Juice-Bar Brawl.
2. http://pressedjuicedirectory.com/. Where are You Getting Your Pressed Organic Juice Today?
3. http://blueprintcleanse.com/blueprintlemonade.html. Alkaline and Energize: BluePrint Lemonade.
4. http://blueprintcleanse.com/blueprintgreen.html. BluePrint, It’s What’s for Breakfast: BluePrint Green.
5. http://blueprintcleanse.com/. BluePrint, Homepage.
6. http://www.sujajuice.com/. Suja: Organic Non-GMO Cold-Pressured, Homepage.
7. http://viva-raw.com/. Viva Raw, Homepage.
8. http://foodbabe.com/2013/11/10/juice-labels/. Don’t Fall Victim to These Tricky Juice Labels.
9. http://blog.doctoroz.com/oz-experts/cold-pressed-juiced-should-it-be-your-new-main-squeeze. Cold-Pressed Juice: Should it be Your New Main Squeeze?
10. http://championjuicer.com/. The Champion Juicer.