Adventures in Juicing

After overindulging during the Thanksgiving holidays, I felt like I needed to focus on doing something healthy for myself, especially with Christmas around the corner. Like most people, I probably don't eat enough fruits and vegetables on a daily basis. I had a juicer in the past and remembered how it was a great way to incorporate more fruits and vegetables into my diet, so I decided that I would look into getting one again.

I did a lot of searching and price comparisons and finally decided on the Breville Juice Fountain Compact. The Breville juicers had a lot of positive reviews on Amazon. There were more expensive models, but not knowing how much I would use it, I really didn't want something "top of the line." In addition to having a lower price than some of the other Breville's it also has a compact design and doesn't take up as much space.

Not wanting to turn myself off from the beginning with some yukky vegetable juice, I decided that the safest route to incorporating juice into my diet was to start out with mostly fruits.

The Breville has a powerful motor and does a good job of getting the juice out, as the pulp that is leftover is relatively dry. The juicer has a wide mouth, so it is easy to put large pieces of fruit in it. I did find that when I would drop the fruit in, I had to cover the top really quickly or bits of fruit would "spit out" the top.

The juicer comes with a pitcher that captures the juice. I find it to be of adequate size and didn't feel like I had to keep emptying it because it was getting too full. It has a nice lid that has a little lip to catch the foam off the top of the juice when you pour it. I like just a little foam and think this is a great feature. I did find that I had to hold the lid on when pouring the juice. I didn't do this the first time and ended up spilling the juice all over the counter.

Cleanup was pretty easy. I had filled my sink with hot sudsy water before I started juicing so that I could clean everything right away. All of the parts are dishwasher safe, so that is an option for people who aren't going to want to use the juicer again the same day.

I can say that juicing does take some time. It took about 30 minutes from start to finish which included washing and cutting up the fruit through cleanup. The juice was great and I am planning on moving into more varieties of fruit and adding more vegetables as well.

I saved some of the pulp for Leon and Riku. They gobbled it up, so that is an added bonus.

Overall, I would recommend this juicer to anyone who is interested in starting juicing. For the person who is already into juicing multiple times a day, you may want something a little larger and heavy duty.