by Liza Pepple, Manager of
Special Projects at Juice Plus+
In traditional juicing processes, especially for industrial (or large scale)
practices, fruit and vegetable juice is formed by squeezing the produce until the liquid is removed. That liquid is
often a clear fluid because most
processors cannot “juice” the solids. This leaves an almost clarified liquid that has a relatively high sugar content
and relatively low fiber content, and contains none of the micronutrients that would be found in the skin or peels of
the fruit, or the leaves and stems of the vegetables.
The "Juice Plus+ing" process is a bit more
rigorous, and results in what we feel is a much better finished product.
We
start with the whole fruits and vegetables. We leave the skin and seeds intact (unless the seeds are toxic, as is the
case with peaches) and process the whole produce.
We have a very large grinder that breaks the majority of the pieces into
small bits and then those small bits are further broken down into a fine slurry.
It is this slurry containing the
micronutrients from the skin and seeds or leaves and stems along with the flesh that is dried. This picture
(left) of the beginning of our process is the rough grinding of the fruits (click on the picture to enlarge).
This is a picture of our
cranberries on the drier (right). If you look closely you can see fibrous strings (click on the picture to enlarge).
What you can’t see in this picture, but I have seen consistently, are pieces of seeds
that are still relatively whole.
When we test our product against other “juiced” powders, we consistently see higher
values for things like vitamin e and c, as well as polyphenols and anthocyanins.
Additionally, we consistently see deeper, more vibrant colors in our products than in
competitive products.
Here is a picture of our cranberry compared to standard juiced cranberry powder
(click on the picture to enlarge).
You can see that our powder (on the right) is darker and has more natural variation
than the one on the left.
The good news is that this special way of
making the Juice Plus+ powders results in the most densely nutritious and effective whole-food based product in
history. This is proven by the impressive body of
research on Juice Plus+, published in
more than 30 medical and nutrition journals.
If
you are not already benefiting from Juice Plus+ we'll be happy to get you started.
Juice Plus+ is second to none in terms of quality, effectiveness and
affordability. It’s “the next best thing to fruits and vegetables” only
because it’s dehydrated fruits, vegetables, berries and grains – it’s not
exactly the same as “the real thing”.