Here's the one thing you should have in your kitchen, but probably don't
Kristen Griffin/INSIDERSydney Kramer in INSIDER's kitchen. We don't have an electric juicer yet, but I expect us to get one after this post.
When I moved back home after college, I noticed something new in my kitchen: an electric citrus juicer.
I didn't realize it would change my life.
For as long as I can remember, I've been in charge of making salads in my household. When my family scrambles to put together a meal, I'm the guy who chops up the vegetables and mixes the dressing.
I've long maintained that a mixture of one part freshly squeezed lime juice, two parts olive oil, and a dash of salt and pepper is a better salad dressing than all the mayonnaise-filled gunk you'll find in supermarkets in restaurants. By far, the hardest and most annoying part of that recipe is the lime juice. At first I depended on a cheap manual juicer, which was a hassle to use and clean. Simply squeezing lime halves is another alternative, but it's hard to get all the juice out unless the lime is perfectly ripe.
Enter an electric juicer. Now, I just take a few minutes to juice a few limes into a jar on Sundays and it lasts me the week. It's just incredibly easy to use, and gets more juice out than I'd be able to without it.
The model I have is going on Amazon right now for $37, and you can buy similar ones for as cheap as $13.
The mechanics are simple: slice the fruit in half, push one of the halves on top of the juicer, and it'll filter out the pulp and seeds and pour the juice into a jar or cup. That's it. If you're one of those weirdos who likes pulp, just put it back into the juice. The parts are simple and easy to clean, so it doesn't feel like a hassle at all.
And it works with all citrus fruits. Last week, I was sick. I juiced some oranges, grapefruits, and Persian sweet lemons. It tasted like bliss, and it was filled with the Vitamin C I needed. Tropicana is great, but fresh-squeezed juice tastes much better.
By juicing, you lose some of the nutritional benefits from fruit, like fiber. But whatever. I'm getting plenty of fiber from all the salad I'm eating because I have great salad dressing because I have a juicer.
There are other types of juicers. If I can ever afford one, I'd like to get the kind that can squeeze pomegranates. One summer, I interned at a news agency in Jerusalem. Once a week on my walk to work I paid ten shekels for an Israeli man at a corner store to juice three pomegranates in front of my face. It was amazing. It made POM taste like old candy. I'd get one myself, but they can cost more than $100.
That's perhaps the biggest benefit of fresh-squeezed juice: it just tastes better. If you own a juicer, it's incredibly easy to make. It doesn't always make sense to use in all situations, of course. In the morning, it's easier for me to grab my Tropicana grapefruit juice than to pull out the juicer. But when you have time to use it, you'll be glad you have it.