What Parts of Fruits and Vegetables Are Best For Juicing?

The easiest rule to follow when juicing is to stick to juicing what you would normally eat. But there are always exceptions and the best thing about having a juicer is that you can very often juice parts of fruits and vegetables that you normally wouldn’t be able to eat. It’s important to know not just what fruits and vegetables are best for juicing, but also, what parts of them.

So, here are a few parts of various fruits and vegetables that you can very well juice!

Juice It!: Pineapple Cores

It pains me – like actually really pains me – to think of all the pineapple cores that are tossed out every day in every part of the world. These cores are actually really edible and nutritious!

Sure, they might be too hard to eat but your juicer machine can probably handle it and by adding a bit of pineapple core into your juices, you’ll get that tasty sweetness of pineapple along with ample vitamin C and bromelain, an enzyme that helps your digestive system by breaking down food and dead human tissues in the stomach. Pineapples fruit has bromelain, too, but the core has twice as much. Make sure you juice these!

The cores contain twice the bromelain concentration of the actual pineapple fruit – throw these in your juicer whenever you can!

Note: As much as we love pineapples, getting them out of their skin is a real pain in the butt – if you’re juicing pineapples often enough for this to be a bother, we highly recommend you get a pineapple corer.

Juice It!: Grape Stems

Grapes – and their various parts – have a long, celebrated history of medicinal uses and have been recommended for everything from high blood pressure, varicose veins, high cholesterol, skin rashes, urinary problems, and even menopause. They were also popularly promoted at various times in the twentieth century as a natural detox to flush toxins from the body and maintain internal health.

The popularity of grapes hasn’t changed much. Studies show that the proanthocyanidins found in grape seed extract are powerful antioxidants and who hasn’t heard of resveratrol – a compound found in the skins of red grapes and heralded as an anti-aging miracle.

Well, you can gain all the benefits of grapes simply by juicing them, since you can basically toss the whole thing into your juicer machine – fruits, seeds, stems and all – and consume a lot of parts you normally wouldn’t eat!

Juice It!: Edible Leaves

Don’t you love how some vegetables come with leafy greens? It’s like getting two veggies for the price of one. You can juice most of the stems and leaves that come with your vegetables.

For example, I always juice the whole beet. But removes the ones from carrots and rhubarbs – those are toxic. Same with the leaves and flowers from eggplant.

Juice It!: Stalks

Of course you already juice celery stalks but are you juicing broccoli stalks as well? How about beet stalks? Make sure you’re using these valuable parts as the stalks are often where much of the nutrition resides.

Broccoli stalks are higher in both calcium and vitamin C than the florets and beet stalks are pretty much an extension of the root veggie itself so there’s just no sense in not juicing then! Plus, they help dilute any vegetable juice that might be a bit strong and make a wonderful base.

Juice It!: Edible Seeds

Seeds are mostly fine – I usually juice my melons whole, seeds and all. Same with pumpkin seeds (warning: not all juicers can handle pumpkin seeds). Apple seeds contain small amounts of cyanide, which your body can handle if it’s in low quantities but can be toxic in higher doses – so if you’re juicing one apple a day, it’s okay but if you’re planning on chugging several glasses of apple juice daily – remove the seeds! Same thing with pits – get rid of those, they will damage your juicer.

Juice It! *Some* Peels and Rinds

Some fruits and vegetables have peels and rinds that are even more beneficial than the actual produce itself…while some are best for your health when not ingested.  Get the full list of fruits and vegetables that should be eaten with peels on!