Hand Juicers
Build your muscles with hand juicers.
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Hand juicers are a real treat. Rather than doing it the easy way, you get to juice in style. Think about it. You put your hand-operated juicer up on the bench top and begin pushing produce through it. Rather than silly electricity doing the job for you, you get to power the machine yourself. There really is nothing like a human-powered juicer. Mmmm.
Ok, maybe not. But hey, hand juicers are a blast from the past. If you juice regularly, trying using a manual juicer for a few days and you’ll realize how much we rely on our power.
There are two types of hand juicer:
- Citrus juicers.
- Wheatgrass juicers.
While you can make fresh juice with both of these, it’s actually not that convenient. Unless you live in the middle of nowhere with all the time in the world, manual juicing isn’t really going to suit you.
However, if you’re super excited about them (I know I am), read on for an overview of both.
Citrus Juicers
I bet that you could find a citrus juicer in any kitchen you walked into. They are so common. It would probably be surprising if you couldn’t find one. They easily win the competition of most common manual juicer.
These puppies are built to juice citrus (surprise!!). Lemon, lime, orange and grapefruit are all perfect choices to use with a citrus juicer. They are incredibly simple to use.
Grab your fruit and cut it in half across the middle. After cutting the fruit like this it should fit nicely on top of a citrus juicer. Apply some pressure with your weight and twist your hand back and forth. You should get a good amount of juice, though not as good as from something like a centrifugal juicer.
To maximize the amount of juice you get, use fruit which is at room temperature. Also, try rolling the fruit between your palm and the bench a few times.
Wheatgrass Juicers
Hand-operated wheatgrass juicers extract juice from wheatgrass in a similar way to wringing out a wet towel. This is a completely different process to the tearing and grinding that masticating and triturating juicers use.
You’ll need to use some energy here as the wheatgrass can be quite tough. Make sure you only use stainless steel or plastic as iron juicers will rust.
A much better option would be to invest in a masticating juicer such as the Omega 8005. On top of wheatgrass, it can juice all sorts of different fruits and vegetables.
What should you do?
In my opinion, hand juicers are a waste of time. I’m not saying that they don’t make good juice, just that there are far more effective and efficient options. If you’re just getting into juicing, I suggest beginning with a centrifugal juicer. If you’re a seasoned pro, go for a masticating or triturating juicer. If you’re super keen, grab yourself a Norwalk hydraulic juicer press.
Juicing should be a fun, exciting endeavor. If it takes too long, I know I’m going to get bored and probably won’t be juicing for long. But when it only takes a few minutes, juicing is a blast. Forget about manual juicers and use something more powerful.
