As a house warming gift, my friend gave me a juicer. It took about seven months, but I finally started using it in February! And I love it!
Here are some things I've learned:
1. It's not fun to clean.
My friend actually gave it to me bc he had bought it for himself, but hated the cleanup. It is a pain, that's true. But I find the benefits outweigh the annoyance. My technique is to clean it immediately after I drink my juice.
2. Mostly clean is clean enough.
I make sure to clean the screen and blade well after every use. I dump the fruit and veggie pulp into the compost. I clean the rest of the pieces and the base of the machine. But I don't worry too hard about getting every scrap off the outer parts. Since I use the juicer every day, I feel it's ok to have a tiny bit of pulp hanging around as long as it's not in the screen. For times when I know I won't be using it for a few days, I make sure to do a deep clean so the machine won't to start to smell.
3. A little goes a long way.
Be it sweet, green, citrus, or ginger (or any other flavor you can think of), remember to balance it out. The first juice I made had a ton of citrus with the rinds included. It made my mouth numb, and killed my taste buds for about 8 hours. It was totally worth it, but I learned my lesson. I suggest tempering your favorite flavors with their balance.
4. Use your scraps.
I've found that the kale stalks are better than the leaves for juicing; they produce more juice! I love to use all my green bottoms or tops, fruit on the turn, wrinkly peppers, dry carrots, etc... they work great and don't get wasted! And don't forget to mix it up! The different fruit juices have different weights and will not mix on their own.
5. Limit your intake.
I know there are many people who drink almost nothing but juice (this controversial article was recently the topic of a lot conversation and ridicule). I recently started this juice quest, and I'm still eating my same intake of whole fruits and veggies. I've found one to two juices a day is plenty. Any more and I get a tummy ache.
So far, I've tried juicing just about every fruit or veggie in my kitchen. (Well, I have half a watermelon radish that I keep pulling out, but not being brave enough to throw in the mix). My favorite things to use are kale stalks, apples, ginger, whole lemons, whole tangerines/setsumas/clementines with their peels, oranges/grapefruit without the peels. I juiced an aging head of romaine that I did NOT enjoy. I tried to juice a banana. Turns out, you can't juice bananas.
I hope anyone who juices, or is thinking of juicing shares their experiences, recipes, and advice here!