Check out these excerpts from, I Hate Counting Calories! Smoothies, Fruit Juices and other drinks!  for a list of great smoothie and fruit juice recipes to help on your weight loss journey.

HOW TO MAKE HOMEMADE FRUIT AND VEGETABLE JUICES

1. You’ll need an inexpensive juice machine.

2. All fruits and vegetables should be juiced raw.

3. Small seeded fruit, such as watermelon and pears, may be juiced with their seeds with the exception of papaya and apple seeds. Orange and grapefruit seeds might impart a bitter taste to your juice. Remove the large pits from fruits like peaches and nectarines, etc.

4. Peel all fruits and vegetables that are not organically grown because the peel is where most of the chemical residues can be found. While most skins of organically grown fruits and vegetables may be left on, with the exception of waxed produce, the skins of pineapples, kiwis, oranges, grapefruits and papaya should be removed.

5. Choose fresh ripe produce. Rubbery vegetables, bruised fruit, wilted greens and over or under-ripe fruits will produce juices that are neither tasty nor healthful.

6. Cut the fruits or vegetables into pieces that will fit into the mouth of your juice machine. Turn the juice machine on and push the pieces through the mouth of the juicer. As you juice, pulp will collect in a large receptacle. If you don’t clean the pulp out right away, it will develop a sour odor and tiny gnats and fruit flies may appear after 8 to 10 hours.

7. It is best to drink freshly made juices within one day.
http://www.healthrecipes.com/juicer_ebook.htm

FRUIT JUICE RECIPES

Lemon~Lime Ginger Ale

• 1 apple, cored and sliced
• ½ inch fresh ginger (less if you find the taste too strong)
• handful of grapes
• 1/4 lemon
• 1/2 lime
• sparkling mineral water

Remove the grapes from the stem.

Juice the apple and ginger together, then juice the rest of the fruit. Pour the juice in a large glass and fill to the top with sparkling water and serve with ice.

Fruit Punch

•  1 apple, cored and sliced
• 6 strawberries, fresh or thawed from frozen
• 1/2 orange, peeled and sectioned
• Process the fruit in a juicer and serve.

Sparkling Tropical Juice

• 1/2 mango, peeled and sliced
• 1 orange, peeled and sectioned

Process through a juicer and serve

Peach-Pear-Apple Juice

• 2 peaches, remove seed
• 1 pear, sliced
• 1 apple, cored and sliced

Process through a juicer and serve.

5 STEPS TO MAKING THE PERFECT SMOOTHIE

A smoothie is basically a blended fruit drink. The best-tasting smoothies are made from fruit that is fresh or frozen, and not canned.  All smoothies begin with a liquid base. This can be orange juice, milk or another liquid.

You can make a frostier drink by freezing fresh fruit before making a smoothie. Smoothies are best when they’re fresh out of the blender, but they can be frozen the night before, as well – just remove the smoothie from the freezer about an hour before drinking.  You can replace a meal with a smoothie or shake by adding a scoop of high-quality protein powder and a tbsp. of high-quality olive or flax oil.

1. Put the fruit in the blender first. Make sure that the items are smaller than a golf ball so they will blend completely. Add the liquid ingredients next.
2. Fasten the lid and press the start button. Use high speed for about 2030 seconds.
3. Stop the blender and check to see if the ingredients are well blended. Sometimes the frozen fruit will jam under the blade. If there is jammed fruit, use a spatula to unjam the fruit, and blend again.
4. Once the mixture is evenly blended, slowly add two ice cubes through the opening of the blender lid. Keep adding one or two ice cubes at a time until the blender sounds smooth instead of gravelly. If your blender is not strong enough to blend ice cubes, omit the ice and substitute just enough ice cold water so that the shake will have a milkshake consistency.
5. If the shake/smoothie is too thin, add more fruit or ice. If it’s too thick, add more liquid.

FRUIT SMOOTHIES

All the recipes serve one. You can double or triple the recipes to serve more people.

Apricot~Pineapple~Strawberry Shake

• 1/4 cup crushed pineapple, canned or fresh
• 1 fresh apricot, diced, seed removed
• 6 strawberries, frozen
• 1/2 banana, cut in chunks, frozen
• 1 1/2 cup water 1 tbsp. skim milk powder
• 1 heaping tbsp. high-quality protein powder (optional)

In a blender, process fruit with the rest of the ingredients. Blend until thoroughly mixed and serve.

Banana~Strawberry Shake

• 1 banana, cut in chunks, frozen
• 6 strawberries, frozen
• 1 1/4 cup water
• 1 tbsp. skim milk powder
• 1 heaping tbsp. high-quality protein powder (optional)

In a blender, process all the ingredients until thoroughly mixed and serve.

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