The Juiceman cometh.
By: John Dunphy
I’ve heard mixed opinions on mass produced fresh fruits and veggies.
Much of the produce is shipped across the country, across the world even. Last night, I reunited with my Juiceman Juicer. You know, the one once advertised by that 76-year-old fitness fanatic with the fantastically robust eyebrows, who had the beautiful trophy wife and spouted the praises of raw fruits and vegetables and how "live vegetables" mean "live bodies," while the opposite, cooked vegetables mean "dead bodies?"
No? Well, then, I guess you weren’t up at 2 a.m. a lot were you?
Winding down to the end of the month and the end of this vegetarian experiment, I’ve been looking for ways to change up my diet. Eggplant Parm is delicious, but it’s loaded with cheese. Mmm, cheese.
This weekend, I made a hearty bean soup, subbing the required chicken broth for water. On Saturday, I got on an Asian kick, stir-frying some delicious Chinese cabbage with onions, quick frying some bean sprouts on the side and rounding out the whole meal with whole wheat pasta seasoned with Teriyaki sauce.
And then last night, amidst the piles of oranges, apples and tomatoes recently acquired from ShopRite’s "bruised but still not bad" section, I juiced. I juiced, I juiced, I juiced. Like a man possessed, at 10:30 p.m., I made enough Orange Juice to enjoy that night and into the morning, and then emptied the crisper with a wicked combination of leftover cabbage, orange, tomato, carrot and apple juice. Sound disgusting? Don’t worry, the tomato and carrot were the flavors that most stood out in the mix. And that’s just V-8 right? We’ve all enjoyed V-8 before. Gotta run on all eight cylinders.
I’ve heard, though, that those mass produced produce products lose much, if not all, of their vitamins as they make the trek cross country. Some of the naval oranges I juiced last night had come all the way from South Africa! If that’s the case, just what am I putting in my body, anyway? Thank goodness for multi-vitamins?
So, this whole thing has gotten me thinking about what I’m going to do post Nov. 1. I’ve been hankering White Castle, friends are looking to have a Bernaise sauce cooking contest, and my father made turkey wings over the weekend that smelled so, so good. Plus, Thanksgiving is around the corner, and our family stuffing recipe has more meat in it than something with a lot of meat in it.
I don’t think I’ll go veggie for life, but these several weeks have shown me that I don’t need to be stuffing my gullet with the stuff every day. There’s plenty of opportunities to try new and tasty dishes, just so long as we’re creative about it. Stir fried veggies every day is enough to make just about anyone go stir crazy.
John Dunphy is the managing editor of The Lawrence Ledger. He can be reached at jdunphy@pacpub.com