Juicing, are you for or against

[Greg1957]

I have been advised to buy a juicer, and start the day with a glass of the green stuff, been told to juice greens, a cucumber and an apple or pear. Before I go out and buy a juicer, I would love to hear your opinions,

I am trying to follow a low carb regime.

 

[Guzzler]

Juicing changes the rate of absorption, speeds it up so that carbs are absorbed even quicker than if eaten in their natural state. I am against it.

 

[bulkbiker]

I'd be another vote for no. All the sugar and none of the good stuff.... like bacon!

 

[Guzzler]

It also obliterates the fiber.

 

[Resurgam]

I bought a Nutribullet just before being diagnosed. I tried it out once I had a meter - it caused high and fast increases in blood glucose, far faster than eating the foods normally - but that is only to be expected really as the structure of the cells is disrupted. I did not add apple or pear high carb fruits to the mixture.

 

[Geordie_P]

Juicing changes the rate of absorption, speeds it up so that carbs are absorbed even quicker than if eaten in their natural state. I am against it.

Really succinct and good point from Guzzler there: that's the key issue with juice- the absorption is much faster with juice, and any fiber that would off-set the spike is gone, so you are basically always going to be better off eating the original food. Also juicing gives you deceptive portion sizes- you couldn't eat 10 apples in a day, for example, but you could easily drink that much juice.
Having said that, there could be some benefit to juice in some circumstances. Eating greens would be a lot better, but if you can't handle solid greens, then it could be the case that juiced greens are better than no greens. If the advice was along those lines, then that could be worth testing. I wouldn't overdo the apple and pear though; if you test your response and it's ok for you, then that might be OK, but generally apple juice would be one of the highest spiking foods I could imagine.

 

[MikeTurin]

Having said that, there could be some benefit to juice in some circumstances. Eating greens would be a lot better, but if you can't handle solid greens, then it could be the case that juiced greens are better than no greens.

In this case one could try a vegetable purée or "passato di verdure". You need a manual vegetable mill https://www.amazon.co.uk/Tefal-mouliware-vegetable-stainless-A45306/dp/B0000ARP21 or even a steel coulander will suffice.

I like them in the winter instead of a soup...

 

[nomoredonuts]

I bought a Nutribullet just before being diagnosed. I tried it out once I had a meter - it caused high and fast increases in blood glucose, far faster than eating the foods normally - but that is only to be expected really as the structure of the cells is disrupted. I did not add apple or pear high carb fruits to the mixture.

Yup, me too exactly. Wanted one of these things for ages, then since diagnosis it's been gathering dust. (I did use it to mill seeds for crackers though). BTW I tried a half banana this week for the first time in 18 months, as a test. Instant spike I'm afraid.