22 Comments

  1. Jenny

    Gotta have my daily juice! I totally get what you are saying Kyle but my kids and I really love this stuff.

    What would you recommend as an alternative for a kid? Obviously they won’t be drinking coffee or tea and water might turn into a drawn out fight with them!

    • Kyle

      Kids are typically quite active and there is nothing wrong with giving them juice in the morning. It is a good start to their day. Obviously a juice like the one I have shown with the skins and partial peels (with some vegetables) would be a better and more healthy option, but if you are giving your kids not from concentrate OJ, that is perfectly fine.

      However as we grow older and our metabolism is not kicking along at such a high rate (plus we have a sit all day job), we don’t need these sugars in our diet and they can and should be avoided altogether. Let your kids do the OJ drinking and stick to your black coffee or tea (2-3 calories) or water (0 calories).

  2. Chris

    Hey kyle, awesome post man, was a good read.

    I was actually surprised that the average orange has less VC than the 7 other fruits you mentioned.

    I’ve been going for the more concentrated juice lately that is blended daily at the local shop and there is certainly a big difference (drinking apple and berries atm) even though it costs 3 times more than the non concentrated stuff in the supermarkets.

    My missus sees all the pulp in it and she is like ” I don’t know how you can drink that stuff ” but I’m like “you should try it and see the difference in taste and how much more filling it is, besides it’s much better for you as well”.

    anyhow, what i was going to say before I started to get long winded was

    I really need to start making my own like you do.

    • Kyle

      Exactly, the pulp is the “good” stuff and has a lot of fiber in it which makes you much more satisfied after drinking a cup of juice. You might as well drink sugar water if you are drinking no pulp juices…and even with pulp juices, you are still missing out on most of the nutrition within the skins and the pith.

  3. Christina

    Mmmm spinach…I love a good green smoothie! Just bought some wheatgrass yesterday and I like the feeling of mowing my breakfast. Is that weird? Lol. Anyway, I’m glad you wrote this because we severely underestimate the fat-inflating properties that most juices have. I’d pretty much stopped drinking the bottled stuff for a long time.

    • Kyle

      Spinach + Wheatgrass = Awesomeness.

      People don’t realize that when they are eating sugars, they might as well be eating straight fat if they are not burning off the calories. In fact, fat is much better for you (good fats) than sugar. I think if people really cut down on their sugars and understood the real problem with obesity comes down to too much sugar consumption, we would have a much healthier world.

  4. James W D

    That is really interesting. I had heard about this recently and it is good to see the why behind it.

    Is there a way to tell when to leave the entire skin on versus peeling it down to the white like the orange?

    • Kyle

      You should always try to leave some of the “white” on the orange, lots of nutrition in the “pith” (the real name for it). That is why I am an advocate of juicing and using a blender like a Vitamix that is powerful enough to liquify fruits and vegetables (skin on) with ease.

  5. Manie

    Although I hardly ever have a glass of juice in the morning I now know to avoid it even more!

    I do sometimes feel that I lack energy through out the day though which is why I’m going to give your fruit mix juice a go. I’m sure it will get me feeling lively. Thanks Kyle.

    • Kyle

      You will be glad you did, you get so much nutrition from a simple shake and you can throw vegetables in with the fruit in the morning and it still tastes awesome. I always put spinach or carrots in my morning shake and it still tastes like an awesome fruit shake.

  6. Gordi

    This was a real eye opener. Fortunately, I NEVER drink pop, it’s usually coffee, tea or water. However, I thought frozen juice was a healthy drink. Go figure.
    Good to know post.

    • Kyle

      I can’t blame you for the coffee part, but try moving closer to drinking your coffee black. I like you used to put sugar and creamer in my coffee, but now that I drink it black I cannot stand the taste of sugar coffee.

      I think a lot of the time if you have a good coffee maker and good beans, it will make all the difference in the world and entice you to drink your coffee in more of a raw, healthy form. If you cut out the sugar from your coffee, you would be saving yourself 1,000’s of calories per month…and lbs of fat.

  7. Andrea Roa

    This is so true! All juices that are sold in the supermarket or any other that comes already bottled is basically water and sugar. That’s why I always prefer and suggest everybody to make our own fruit juice at home.

    By its hand, fruit skins are actually the most important part because all nutrients are there, so next time you have a fruit really consider not to peel it. Great post! Thank you!

    • Kyle

      Excellent points Andrea. When I was going to look for a way to get the nutrients out of fruits and vegetables (through fruit juice), I was initially looking at an industrial juicer. The reality of it though is that all the fiber is still getting tossed with these high end juicers.

      That is why I think blending is a much better option than “juicing” because you are actually getting the fibers and a good deal more of the nutrition because of the skins.

    • Kyle

      For children, in particular ones that are active, having a cup of OJ is definitely not the end of the world. As we get older though, these sugars are a sure way to store extra fat on our bodies as most people have very sedentary lifestyles and don’t burn enough calories on a daily basis to use the sugar from juices and pops that they consume during the day.

      If you can stay away from store bought juice altogether, you will save yourself a good deal of calories throughout the year.

  8. Stephon Gittens

    I have to start juicing more often. Seeing this motivates me to make it habit. I use a lot of green tea though. Ginger, Bay Leaf and pepper mint are some of favorite teas.

    • Kyle

      All sounds like good options Stephon. I am not a huge tea drinker, but the benefits of tea are awesome and it is definitely a wonderful way to drink something without having all of the sugars in it like juices. Obviously tea without sugar is the best option.

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