A child of the sixties, I grew up in a world of music and aircraft mechanics. I now work as an IT C...
A child of the sixties, I grew up in a world of music and aircraft mechanics. I now work as an IT Consultant and play jazz and classical music on several saxes, clarinet and violin. I also run a big band, mybigband.com in the North of England.
Member since:23.08.2004
Reviews:12
A colleague of mine came into my office the other day and one of the guys in the office said something you would typically expect from a woman (no offence to women); "You look well mate". My colleague hadn't previously looked unwell so I thought maybe the bloke who said it was a after something. Curious, I looked up and my colleague got to telling me that he had bought a new gadget that was helping him eat more vegetables. Let's face it, we need to eat veggies but there is the hassle of cooking them, wondering what to cook with them with and so on. As a consequence he said he feels healthier, is less tired and has lost weight from his gut and put it on his muscles. Sounds like a rubbish until you realise that this is exactly what vegetables do for you if you eat properly.
Seeing my obvious interest (I am on a health kick), he told me about this gadget he bought. It is a Jack La Lanne juicer. At first you think all it does is makes juice but it most definitely is more than that. This thing has a 'blade' which is actually a flat steel disc with raised points on it, making it very safe to clean. As you drop food through the chute above, it presses on the blade which grinds it until it is small enough to be flung aside against a conical mesh rotating at the same high speed as the blade. The centrifugal force caused by the high speed rotation, caused the juice to be forced outwards from the fruit and the few remaining pips and bits of skin are flung into a bucket for re-use. You don't need to peel or chop the fruit or vegetables (except oranges and grapefruit because they have sour flavours and are a little tough). You can juice almost anything including the less obvious like celery and ginger which you use in recipes in the books that are included.
Obviously I went and bought one of these things. I was initially shocked at the price ranging from £70 to £120 (January 2006)
and found that they only seem to be available by mail order, I eventually purchased mine from an ebay seller at £47.99 plus £12.99 delivery. When it arrived, I couldn't wait to get cracking so I pieced it together. The instructions are clear and simple. Assembly is really easy as follows:
1 - place the motor unit on the table top 2 - set the juice tray on top 3 - place the conical filter on the motor inside the juice tray 4 - screw the blade onto the motor using the specially designed ergonomic tool 5 - set the lid on top with the pulp guard attached at the back 6 - position the pulp bucket at the back under the pulp guard (it is useful to put a plastic back in the bucket to ease or negate cleaning) 7 - Push up the locking bar to clamp the assembled component together. Only when locked in place will the motor start.
Now fully assembled (takes about 2 minutes), the next thing to is to juice some fruit or veg. It is amazing what actually can be juiced and what you can do with the resulting juice and pulp. Most items which can be juiced with no preparation except washing.
You should remove stalks from apples and pears (you don't want to eat these with the pulp). You should also remove the peel from apples and oranges as they have a bitter taste.
Now here was my first amazing revelation.
I simply cut off the skin of two oranges so as to leave as much of the pith as possible and turned the machine on. After leaving it run for a few seconds, I inserted the oranges into the loading chute. The chute is about three inches wide so the oranges fitted perfectly and didn't need cutting. Items only need to be cut if they don't fit. After inserting the fruit, I simply pushed down gently. The oranges were gently and quickly ground down and seconds later, pure creamy juice poured from the spout into a glass I had positioned underneath. What immediately struck me was the cloudy appearance of the juice and the fact that two oranges had made a whole half pint of juice - twice as much as squeezing the oranges in a press.
Then there was the taste. The juice was thick and creamy and exceptionally good tasting - far better than squeezed juice. This is because it contains the entire orange, nut just the natural juice and as such as more vitamins and nutrients. The difference really is amazing and quite addictive. OK, there are no bits. If you want bits, just in some of the pulp!
I then moved on to other items and discovered that you can juice almost any fruit or veg with little or no preparation at all. For example, remove the stalk from apples, drop them in whole and get instant, gorgeous tasting apple juice.
You can juice things you would never imagine such as celery, ginger, garlic, cabbage, lettuce, spinach.
The pulp is not wasted. It can be used to thicken and add flavour to drinks, soups and can be used in cakes, muffins, breads and other things. It can also be frozen if not needed immediately and used later. In fact the pulp is also very good for you as it helps the digestive system.
Here is a very quick, simple and healthy way to eat in the evening:
First, make some orange juice with four oranges - this makes a pint and you will want it all. Next put a saucepan under the spout and juice four or five carrots, the same amount of celery (with leaves on) and optionally an onion (whole or half, peel of the dry skin if you prefer), a garlic clove, and a half inch of root ginger. Stick on the hob, stir in some of the pulp, heat and eat - Fantastic!! This is how easy it should be to eat healthily.
Now.... Cleaning.
Mmmm, alright, it isn't as easy as they would make out. The instructions say all parts are machine washable except the base. This should be obvious as it has a big electric motor and a mains lead with a three pin plug on the end. The unit is American and they do say not to use European import or commercial dishwashers. Not sure what they mean by this but it makes me use the dishwasher with caution. The items are all made of thick plastic and should withstand anything most dishwashers can throw at them. However, the lid and juice tray take up a lot of room and the chrome rim on the juice tray is actually coated plastic. After one wash, my chrome rim fell off and I now have to be careful when assembling the unit. I also recommend thoroughly removing all the pulp with a plastic spatula from all parts before washing as it is dry and concentrated and will clog the sink or the dishwasher waste. The blade is very easy to clean and the plastic parts are also easy. But due to their shape, they will collect water in parts and should be dried after washing. The hardest and most important item is the mesh filter. My unit came with accessories which included a brush for cleaning the mesh. It is a relatively simple job to use this or any washing up brush to clean the mesh and to be honest, the effort of cleaning it is nothing compared to the value you will get from this device.
Included items.
There are two recipe books and full instructions with the juicer. The recipes are interesting and simple, sometimes they are so simple that you feel embarrassed to read them. For example:
Fresh Orange Juice 5 large oranges (peeled)
As you can imagine, the recipe book for drinks is really a list of suggested ingredients. Get the stuff, juice it, drink it. The only limit to the things you can do with this juicer is your imagination but there recipes for sorbet, ice cream, smoothies, hummus, dressings, cakes etc..
The accessory kit that came with my juicer included a platform to raise the juicer by an inch or so for using taller jugs or glasses. The spout is already quite high anyway so this is not much benefit. It also includes a useful overflow platform with grate so you don't drip mess on the kitchen surfaces when you remove the jug or glass. There is also a measuring jug and a filter brush for cleaning. These items came inside the same box as though they are a standard accessory pack but don't bank on getting this with every purchase.
Summary.
All in all I am supremely pleased with this purchase and look forward to many months or years of good use before I get bored with it and stick it in the cupboard. However, the nutritional value of the food prepared this way will incentivise me into using this for many years to come.
I have two small quibbles.
1 - the plastic chrome rim as mentioned earlier comes off the juice tray and mine left pretend chrome slithers for me to tidy up. Reassembly onto the juice tray is difficult and can leave further shrapnel. I will have to get this replaced under warranty
2 - the spout seems a little too horizontal. You have to tip the unit to get the last significant drops as the juice doesn't flow freely.
Neither of these points detract too much fro the usefulness, good design and good build and overall this is a fantastic addition to the kitchen.
Get one of these and if you do nothing else you will get the best orange or grapefruit juice you have ever tasted - compete with pith (juiced).
How helpful would this review be to a person making a buying decision? Rating guidelines
great review - including everything that I could possibly want to know. Tend to just buy fruit juices so don't think I'll be buying this though. Belinda
jayne30165 10.02.2006 00:57
A very good review - lots of useful information for the buyer - I'm almost sold on one, but not sure I have enough kitchen workspace!
mints4merlin 10.02.2006 00:04
nice tux! Also very good review - we could do with one of these in our house - it's usually all fizzy drinks and milk in our fridge :0) m4m xxx
Feb 9th, 2006
exceptional by (5%):
very helpful by (89%):
helpful by (5%):
