Hi Friends! I got the sweetest email from a woman who was so giddy to start juicing and wanted to share her words with you because I know a lot of you experience the same thing.

This is a common scenario: she had watched all of my videos, happily purchased her new juicer and bought tons of fresh produce with excitement. And then….the big taste. Yuck! What the *&^% is this!?

Here’s what she wrote to me:

Hi Elizabeth! I am really enjoying your website/blog/Facebook/YouTube videos. I purchased a juicer this evening (Breville) and purchased all the ingredients to begin juicing. One problem…I hated the tasted!!! I am so disappointed and discouraged, please help. Here were my ingredients 6 Kale Leaves, 4 celery stalks, 2 green apples, 1 cucumber, 1/2 lemon, and small cube of ginger root […] Warm Regards, K Brown

Starting your adventure into juicing is super exciting–and super discouraging at the same time if you don’t like the taste and can barely choke it down.

I normally don’t give advice via email (because I’d be permanently chained to my computer) but I wanted to help her and share this advice with my blog readers too, so I gave her the following beginner green juice recipe to ease into the flavor. She loved it and can’t wait to drink more.

Beginner Green Juice Recipe

Serves 1, can easily be doubled
Use organic ingredients whenever possible & wash all produce.
Peel non-organic ingredients before juicing.

Ingredients:

• 4-5 large handfuls spinach
• 1 large or 2 small cucumbers
• 1/2 small lemon (peeled)
• 1 red apple or 1 pear
• 1 small carrot

Add:

• 1 celery rib (leave out if the flavor is too strong)
• 1 broccoli stem (if you have one)
• 1 small cube ginger (optional–if you like the flavor)
• Start adding 1 large kale leaf every 2-3 juices

Juicing is just like tasting any new cuisine with strong flavors for the first time–you have to ease into it. Start off with my beginner green juice recipe and every few times start increasing the amount of dark greens and stronger flavors. After a while, you’ll crave those dark greens and strong flavors, trust me.

If you have any questions about juicing or want to see how I make my juice check out my juicing videos on Youtube. Try to stick with at least a 3:1 ratio of greens/low-sugar veggies to fruit/higher sugar veggies (like beets and carrots) to keep your juice in the low-glycemic range.

Also, here’s a chart of what I personally find to be strong and mild flavors; this might help you work your way up to the stronger stuff, too. This list is by no means all-inclusive, these are just the things I juice most often.