Squeeze Plays: The (Not-So-Simple) World of Fresh Juices

Photos by Michael Piazza / Styled by Catrine Kelty

Fresh fruit and vegetable juices, the current “it” beverages, are not new but seem to be everywhere these days. You might have a juice bar near you or vendors at your neighborhood farmers market selling juices in all kinds of tantalizing flavors. How healthful the beverages are depends, of course, on what’s in (or not in) them. Some varieties are squeezed from as many as eight different vegetables and fruits.

There are multiple reasons why fresh juices, especially those produced using the cold-press method, have developed a loyal following. Many people choose them for their nutritional content, seeking maximum vitamins and minerals in a bottle. In that case, a person might grab the darkest green liquid on the shelf. Some appreciate the healthful properties of ginger and turmeric or enjoy a grapefruit-pineapple duo with a dash of cayenne.

“For my primary clients, it’s a lifestyle for them,” says Onur Ozkoc, founder and owner of COCOBEET, with locations in Boston and Wellesley. “People want to stay healthy. Juices are part of their diet.”

A bottle of juice affords busy folks a portable supply of drinkable nutrients. Ellen Fitzgerald, co-founder of MOTHER JUICE, which has four locations, says, “Our philosophy is that juice is an easy way to consume fruits and vegetables that you ordinarily wouldn’t. It’s a convenient way to get vitamins and nutrients and it tastes really good.”

For flavor seekers, cold-pressed juices are incredibly fresh-tasting, rich blends of sweet, tart, citrusy, earthy, herbal and occasionally spicy flavors. Their vibrant colors are hard to ignore, too.

Mostly, it’s health-conscious consumers leading the way, choosing these 100% juice, vitamin-rich beverages. COVID likely accelerated the appeal for immunity-boosting formulas. There’s also continued demand for single-serve, on-the-go beverages that provide nutrients sports drinks lack. Because few people sit down to a plate of three pounds of veggies and fruits, imbibing the juice extracted from them is something they can get their hands around.

Ozkoc says there are roughly six pounds of produce in a 16-ounce bottle of Cocobeet’s Green Genes juice. “There’s no way a person can eat this many fruits and vegetables at once,” he says. While the juice drinker isn’t enjoying all the benefits of whole produce, they are getting important vitamins and minerals.

For Nagelore Jean-Caidor, founder and owner of NATUREL JUICING, juices aren’t so much a lifestyle choice as they are a part of everyday life. “Fresh juices are a big thing in Haiti,” she says, remembering her childhood there. “Everything had to be made fresh; we didn’t have a fridge in the house.” Her favorite tropical fruits made tasty and refreshing beverages. Jean-Caidor’s interest in juicing evolved as a way to improve her health. She wanted more nutrition and natural foods in her diet and was “rebelling against processed foods,” she says.

Occasionally, it’s a single ingredient that drives a product. For Salimata Bangoura, founder-owner of YAMACU, it’s ginger. The Mali native makes a line of refreshing West African ginger drinks. “Ginger cools you down and quenches your thirst. It also helps with digestion and gives you energy,” she says. Bangoura’s drinks, which she differentiates from fresh juices, are balanced combinations of fruit and vegetable juices, ginger and a little water.

Juicing isn’t a complicated process, but adherence to food safety regulations is critical because most fresh (raw) juices aren’t pasteurized. Juice makers purchase fresh fruits and vegetables, meticulously clean them, prep and cut as needed, and feed the produce into a juicing machine. There are two primary types of juicers: Centrifugal juicers shred produce utilizing a high-speed spinning cutting blade. This method generates a bit of heat, which can cause some vitamin loss. The spinning separates the juice from the solids. Cold press, or masticating, juicers grind and press ingredients slowly, using hydraulic power to obtain juice without generating heat.

Either way, the extracted liquid contains nutrients from the produce. What is lost is the fiber, as the pulp, skin and seeds are removed in the juicing process. (Whole fruits and vegetables contain fiber, which is beneficial to the digestive system and associated with lower risks of obesity and Type 2 diabetes.) Smoothies and other blended drinks, when not strained, retain the fiber from the puréed ingredients.

Fresh juices can provide an array of nutrients you wouldn’t otherwise consume from vegetables and fruits you don’t eat regularly or have access to or simply don’t like. If, for example, you don’t typically eat kale or spinach, getting their nutritional benefits in a juice can make sense. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), only about 10% of adults meet the consumption recommendations for fruits and vegetables. A vitamin-packed juice can complement an otherwise healthy diet or substitute, on occasion, for certain produce missing from your meals. Depending on what fruits are used, though, juices may have high amounts of natural sugars, from four to 40 grams of sugar in eight to 16 ounces. The most healthful—with maximum nutrients and low natural sugars—contain mostly vegetables, particularly dark leafy greens.

The various flavor combinations of cold-pressed juices are very enticing. Mother Juice’s popular varieties include Kale Yeah (kale, spinach, celery, cucumber, apple, pineapple, mint, ginger) and OMG (watermelon, pineapple, lemon). Cocobeet customer favorites include Green Genes (kale, spinach, cucumber, celery, apple, parsley, lemon, ginger) and Forbidden Juice (grapefruit, pineapple, ginger, lemon, cayenne, turmeric). Yamacu fans like Ginger Pineapple and Ginger Orange Carrot, and Naturel Juicing’s most popular flavors are Burn Baby Burn (celery, lemon, cucumber, cayenne pepper, pineapple) and Glow-Go (pineapple, mango, carrot, orange, kale and turmeric).

Because of the strong demand for cold-pressed juice, producers are able to charge high enough prices to make the business model worthwhile. Over the past year, juicers experienced increased costs for raw material and labor, forcing many to raise prices. “Anyone who makes juice at home understands the value and cost of making juice,” says Mother Juice’s Fitzgerald. Juicing equipment is expensive, as are produce costs, bottling equipment and refrigeration. Fitzgerald says one of their current business strategies is expanding home and office deliveries to increase sales.

Cocobeet’s Ozkoc says he, too, had to raise prices slightly to reflect increased costs for produce, bottles, shipping and labor. The company juices and bottles three to four times a week in each of its two stores. “We make everything from scratch and we have to press each ingredient separately,” says Ozkoc. The process is labor intensive and takes time. Yamacu’s Bangoura says all her costs, including for fresh ginger, are higher than they were a year ago.

Jean-Caidor has made her Naturel Juicing juices in space rented in a catering kitchen in Woburn for the past two years. She’s currently renovating a storefront in downtown Lowell, which she’ll open as a juice bar and café in mid-April. She expects that selling more, varied beverages and foods will create some efficiencies to lower her unit costs.

In all cases, juicers plan their production and inventory carefully so they don’t have to discard a lot of expired finished product. Cold-pressed juices have short shelf-lives because they’re not pasteurized. Pasteurization is the process of heating liquids at high temperatures for a short time to kill pathogens that can make you sick or in rare cases be fatal. Juice producers believe fresh (raw) juices pack more vitamins, minerals and enzymes than pasteurized juices because they’re not heated. While this is mostly true, depending on a vitamin’s sensitivity to heat, unpasteurized juices can present a health risk, which increases when large batches of produce are combined to make juice.

“If you’re healthy, [unpasteurized juices] are not a huge risk,” says Eric Decker, professor of food science at University of Massachusetts, Amherst. “If you’re immunocompromised or pregnant, you should never consume these products.” (Same goes for children and older adults, per the FDA.)

Juice makers follow Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point (HACCP) plans for food safety and heed FDA requirements that unpasteurized juices be refrigerated (which slows the growth of bacteria), carry a short shelflife and have a warning statement on the label.

Some cold-pressed juices are treated by HPP (high pressure processing), a non-thermal process believed to be preferable to heat pasteurization for fresh beverages. Mother Juice recently started processing juice bottles at a local HPP operator. “It’s part of our evolution, to take on additional safety measures as we grow,” says Fitzgerald. According to the FDA, HPP treatment of juice is becoming increasingly popular.

In the age of grab-and-go and eating on the run, getting extra nutrients from juiced fruits and vegetables is easy and convenient. You can supplement what you eat or what’s not on your plate with what’s in the bottle.

Look for local and national juice products around the Boston area (or online):

cocobeet.com
evolutionfresh.com
fullyrooted.com
juiceonmain.com
juicepress.com
kwenchjuicecafe.com
lifealive.com
motherjuice.com
natureljuicing.com
pressed.com
coldpressed.com
purecoldpress.com
drinkyamacu.com

This story appeared in the Spring 2023 issue.