18 Mar

Best Carrots For Carrot Juice And How To Choose Them

The best carrots for juicing are the Nantes types, which are cylindrical and have blunt tips, but are the sweetest of the carrots, with good texture. Nantes carrots absorb more water and are both more succulent and crisp than other varieties of carrots. They also have fewer terpenoids, which is a substance that can make the juice of other carrots taste soapy and turpentine-like after they’re put through the juicer.

Harvesting and Storing Carrots

If you choose to grow your carrots in the garden, you should gently pull them out by their green tops. Newer variety carrots shouldn’t be allowed to grow fatter than one and a half inches across, or they’ll become woody and not very good for juicing. Some older varieties are still fairly succulent when they’re large.

If the carrots are grown in the garden or bought with their green tops, the green tops should be removed. The carrots shouldn’t be washed before storing. Ideally, they should be stored in sawdust or sand before they’re used. Some people do add the greens to the juicer, however, for they’re perfectly edible and give the juice the tang of parsley.

best carrots for juicing

Choosing The Best Carrots For Juice

If the carrots are store bought, it’s best to buy organic, for they won’t have to be peeled to rid them of the pesticides in their skin. The greens should be fluffy, short and bright.

Some of the Best Carrot Varieties For Juicing

Some of the best carrots for juicing are the Bolero, a bright orange Nantes type. The Ingot is another good Nantes carrot with a good flavor and texture. One of the most popular carrots that people grow in their gardens is the Nantes Half-Long, also called the Coreless and Scarlet Nantes, which is very sweet, tender and has no fibrous core, which is another plus for juicing. The Touchon is a sweet, French Nantes type and is especially good for the juicer. The Nelson is an early carrot and many gardeners claim that it’s one of the sweetest.

08 Mar

Carrot Juice Side Effects – Can You Drink Too Much Of It?

While drinking carrot juice in moderation has significant health benefits, drinking too much can have side effects. Carrot juice is high in beta carotene, which converts to Vitamin A in the body. Consuming a lot of carrot juice can affect the color of the skin. Carrot juice is also high in sugar and calories, so people with diabetes should be mindful of this.

Carotenemia Is One Of The Carrot Juice Side Effects

A change in the color of the skin is one of the carrot juice side effects. Due to the high level of beta-carotene in carrot juice, drinking more than three glasses per day can result in an orange hue to the skin. The orange coloring is most likely to be seen on hands, feet and around the mouth. This condition is called carotenemia and is not dangerous. It disappears without treatment as soon as consumption is lowered or stopped.

Carrot juice side effects - too much beta-carotene

High glucose content

Carrots are naturally sweet (lots of sugar). This sweetness is the reason many people use carrots for their juice, but too much glucose can be dangerous to diabetics. Another of the carrot juice side effects applies to people with diabetes. Small amounts of carrot juice are okay and can even be good for a person with diabetes. The glycemic index of an eight ounce glass of carrot juice is about 45, with about 22 grams of carbohydrates.

High sodium content

Carrots are also quite rich with sodium. Too much sodium in your diet can lead to all sorts of problems. The main one is that lots of sodium (salt) can lead to Hypertension (HTN) or high blood pressure. Hypertension is then a cause of all sorts of heart and health related problems. But you would probably turn yellow from carotenemia and stop drinking carrot juice before this sodium carrot juice side effect would start to show. As with all the natural juice side effects juices are safe and very beneficial to our bodies as long as we don’t exaggerate when drinking them.

25 Jan

Carrot Nutrition Facts

Carrot Nutrition Facts

Betaine 0,1 mg
Calcium 32 mg
Calories 35 Calories
Carbohydrate 8,2 g
Carotene-a 3427 mcg
Carotene-ß 8285 mcg
Choline 7,5 mg
Copper 0,1 mg
Dietary Fiber 2,9 g
Fluoride 0 mcg
Folate 27 mcg
Iron 0,9 mg
Lutein-zeaxanthin 256 mcg
Lycopene  mcg
Magnesium 10 mg
Manganese 0,2 mg
Niacine 0,6 mg
Oxygen Radical Absorbance Capacity (ORAC) 697 µ mol TE
Pantothenic Acid 0,4 mg
Phosphorus 28 mg
Phytonutrients 11968 mcg
Potassium 237 mg
Protein 0,6 g
Pyridoxine Vit. B6 0,138 mg
Riboflavin Vit. B2 0 mg
Selenium 0,9 mcg
Sodium 78 mg
Sugar 4,8 g
Thiamine 0 mg
Total Fat 0,1 g
Vitamin A 13790 IU
Vitamin B6 0,1 mg
Vitamin C 2,6 mg
Vitamin E 0 mg
Vitamin K 9,4 mcg
Water 90,4 g
Zinc 0,2 mg

12 Jan

Which Fruit Has The Most Beta Carotene (Carotene-ß)?

What Is Beta Carotene (Carotene-ß)?

Carotenes (from the Latin word “carota”) are unsaturated hydrocarbons, which are synthesized by plants. Carotene is orange, and is a photosynthetic pigment that is important for photosynthesis in plants. The carotene is a means of protecting the plant’s cells from being damaged by ultraviolet light. But carotenes cannot be made by animals.

Why Is Beta Carotene Good For Our Health?

Beta carotene – ß-Carotene – is stored in body fat and in the liver. It is a form of vitamin A important to human health. The body is able to convert the beta carotene into retinal when it is needed. Interestingly, different animals have either an efficient or inefficient ability to convert carotenoids that contain retinal into usable vitamin A retinals – meat-eaters are particularly poor at converting carotenoids.

Not only orange foods contain beta carotene. There are fruits and vegetables ranging from green to red that have carotenes in them. Here are a few, which shows the wide range of colors where beta carotene can be found: goji berries, cantaloupe, mangoes, spinach, chard, cilantro, broccoli, rose hips, pumpkin, kale, mustard greens and cassava. It is generally true, however, that the more orange the color, the more beta carotene is present.

Beta carotene is an anti-oxidant. The function of an anti-oxidant is to inhibit the oxidation of molecules. This is beneficial because oxidation produces free radicals, which damage and destroy cells.

There are studies that a small amount of beta carotene may contribute to preventing cognitive decline, and it can also help people who are overly photosensitive. But there is considerable support for an increase in certain kinds of cancer with excessive amounts of beta carotene supplements. In particular, smokers are warned not to take β-carotene supplements, due to the increase in the risk of lung cancer.

But everyone needs their vitamin A, and eating carrots does indeed contribute to good eyesight and a healthy body.

Health benefits of carrot juice

Top Fruits For Beta Carotene Content

The amounts of Beta Carotene are given for 100g of each fruit.

1 Carrot 8.285,00 mcg
2 Pumpkin 3.100,00 mcg
3 Melon (Cantaloupe) 2.020,00 mcg
4 Apricot 1.094,00 mcg
5 Passion Fruit 743,00 mcg
6 Grapefruit 686,00 mcg
7 Tomato 449,00 mcg
8 Mango 445,00 mcg
9 Guava 374,00 mcg
10 Watermelon 303,00 mcg
11 Papaya 276,00 mcg
12 Plum 190,00 mcg
13 Peach 162,00 mcg
14 Tangerine 155,00 mcg
15 Blackberry 128,00 mcg
16 Fig 85,00 mcg
17 Orange 71,00 mcg
18 Jackfruit 61,00 mcg
19 Cucumber 46,00 mcg
20 Grape 39,00 mcg
21 Cherry (sweet) 38 mcg
22 Cranberry 36,00 mcg
23 Pineapple 35,00 mcg
24 Blueberry 32,00 mcg
25 Kiwi 31,00 mcg
26 Apple 27,00 mcg
27 Banana 26,00 mcg
28 Redcurrant 25,00 mcg
29 Durian 23,00 mcg
30 Mangosteen 16,00 mcg
31 Pear 12,00 mcg
32 Raspberry 12,00 mcg
33 Mulberry 9,00 mcg
34 Strawberry 7,00 mcg
35 Lemon 3,00 mcg
36 Lime 3,00 mcg
37 Lychee 0,00 mcg
38 Pomegranate 0,00 mcg
39 Elderberry 0,00 mcg
40 Gooseberry 0,00 mcg
41 Blackcurrant 0,00 mcg