The Best And Worst Foods To Put Into A Juicer

Juicing has taken the world by storm. While fruit and vegetable juices have existed on store shelves for eternity, the appeal of fresh-pressed juices and at-home juice makers has seen renewed popularity, in part for the potential health benefits you can get from the tasty beverages. 

A well-made fresh juice is a superb way to get a truckload of essential vitamins and minerals in one go, with vitamins A, C, K, folate, iron, potassium, and calcium making regular appearances in juicing combinations (per WebMD). Drinking freshly-squeezed vegetable or fruit juice may also boost your nitric oxide levels, which could have a positive impact on your blood pressure and heart health. 

But there's a big caveat, folks. While juicing might be a tasty way to get your nutrients, part of the reason why it's so tasty is due to the high sugar content that some juice combos can deliver, leading to spikes in blood sugar and increased calorie intake, and diminishing the healthiness of your juices. To add to this, not all fruits and vegetables are made equal texturally, and one incorrect addition could not only ruin your juice but might have you running to the store to buy a new juicer. 

We want to give you the lowdown on how to get the best, healthiest juices possible, with our top foods for juicing — while also letting you know which items you should definitely avoid. Let's take a look.

If we were to draw up a list of the things we're most thankful for, avocados would be up there. This next-level fruit is a nutritional kingpin, delivering a truckload of vitamins, minerals, fiber, healthy omega-3 fatty acids, and antioxidants with every bite of avocado toast (per Medical News Today). But when it comes to putting them in your juicer, they very quickly lose their charm. Unfortunately, avocados are a seriously bad choice for juicing, namely because of their consistency, as Good Nature states. Simply put, avocados just don't have much juice in them, and their creamy texture means that you get very little by way of liquid.

But that's no reason to leave them in the store entirely, with the unique texture of avocados making an incredible addition to smoothies. In a blender, blitz together half an avocado with one frozen banana, a scoop of protein powder, handful of spinach or kale, and some unsweetened plain almond milk to loosen it all up, to make a super-healthy smoothie that has all of the avo's nutritional benefits, says Minimalist Baker. You can even throw in some seeds of your choice to make it even more nutritious.

No fruit salad is complete without the addition of pineapples, and the super-sweet fruit is as good on its own as it is in combo with other foods. Regrettably, placing it in a juicer is not the best idea. While the pineapple, in its complete form, is an incredible source of fiber and vitamins, when you juice the fruit a lot of this goodness is separated, and the pineapple juice that's left is simply a rush of pure sugar, explains Neda Varbanova, holistic health coach and certified culinary nutritionist, to The Healthy. "This can cause your blood sugar and insulin levels to spike," Varbanova says — not exactly what you want from a healthy juice.

Keeping pineapple in your diet, however, is still a great idea. The high levels of fiber you get from eating pineapple in its whole form can work wonders for your digestion, improved further by the bromelain enzymes in the fruit (per BBC Good Food). Bromelain may also deliver an anti-inflammatory effect, which may reduce symptoms of chronic conditions like osteoarthritis or bowel conditions like ulcerative colitis, as well as having a positive impact on your immune system.

There are few fruits as refreshing as the coconut, and on a hot summer's day, biting into coconut flesh is what dreams are made of. But if you're thinking about transferring that goodness to your juicer, we'd heavily advise against it. In most forms, coconuts are largely unsuitable for juicing: They're just too hard to pull the liquid out of, and you risk doing serious damage to your machine, explains All About Juicing. You can get some use of them if your juicer has a homogenize function — to make a sorbet or a coconut blend — but, naturally, you'll need to separate the flesh from the shell, which can take a lot of time.

Certain varieties of coconut, however, might be better for juicing. As young Thai coconuts are softer, they may be better suited to be used in juice, primarily due to their soft flesh. Or, try adding some coconut water to your juices. Topping off your juice with a little coconut water is an excellent way to give your drink a potassium boost, and supply your drink (and your body) with some additional electrolytes, states the Cleveland Clinic. This can be especially useful if you're drinking your juice after a hard workout.

There's a lot to love about bananas. These fiber and potassium-rich fruits can not only keep your appetite at bay, but they support your gut, benefit your cardiovascular health, and may even make you happier thanks to their tryptophan content (per BBC Good Food). One thing that won't make you happy, though, is sticking them in your juicer. The soft, mushy texture of bananas means that while they might be satisfying to eat, they won't bear much juice at all, says Greatist. The only thing you'll be left with if you stick one in your juicer is a lot of slime, and a stressful clean-up operation.

Where bananas do shine, however, is in smoothies — and there's no reason at all why a smoothie can't be healthy. Take one chopped frozen banana, and throw it into a blender with some Greek yogurt, a little milk or nondairy milk substitute, and half a peeled orange. You can also include a little sweetness if you like, by adding honey. Blend it all up, pour it into a glass, and enjoy. Not only are you getting a bounty of health benefits from the fruit in the smoothie, but the milk and Greek yogurt will give you a boost of protein, making it more filling.

On the surface, pears seem like a natural choice to place into a juicer. Juicy, sweet, and full of health-giving vitamins and flavonoids (per BBC Good Food), you'd assume that they'd fit right in, right? Well, unfortunately, pears may be a bad choice to add to a juice — but not for the reason you might expect. "Pears contain sorbitol, a non-digestible form of sugar that can create a quick bowel movement," advises holistic health coach and certified culinary nutritionist Neda Varbanova to The Healthy. "That's why many people drink pear juice to treat constipation." However, if you're not seeking to usher in a bowel movement, adding pears into a juice can quickly create an unwanted trip to the bathroom.

It's also worth bearing in mind that juicing pears will extract a lot of the sugar in the fruit, leaving you with a drink that has, potentially, a high sugar content. If you don't have a sorbitol sensitivity, however, pears could be a healthy choice on their own, but we'd advise that you eat them whole to make the most of their fiber content. Containing both soluble and insoluble fiber, eating pears may promote better appetite management, lessen the risk of developing type 2 diabetes, and keep your gut microbiota healthy, says BBC Good Food.

We think rhubarb is a truly underrated fruit (okay, it is technically a vegetable, but when was the last time you had it in savory form?). But regrettably, one place it isn't underrated is in its ability to be juiced. If you've ever tried to prepare rhubarb from its raw form, you'll likely have an idea why, folks: It's tough. Rhubarb is incredibly high in fiber, and the density and hardness of the stalks mean that if you run it through your juicer, you may cause untold damage to your machine (per the Greatist).

Don't worry if you've already come home with an armful of rhubarb, though: You can still put it to good use, in smoothie form! Take a stalk of rhubarb and cut it into 1-inch pieces, and then pop it into your blender alongside half a pint of fresh strawberries and frozen banana (per The Adventure Bite). Pour in 8 ounces of milk, or coconut milk for a little extra creaminess, and half a cup of ice. Blend it all together, and pour into a glass! You can also add a little bee pollen on top, should you wish.

Honestly, who doesn't love mango? Often referred to as the "King of Fruits," according to The Mango Genome, it's a mineral-rich and delicious plant, high in antioxidants, that's as good on its own as it is in a dessert. When it comes to juicing, though, the mango loses it's crown. The problem with using mangoes in a juicer is not necessarily nutrition-based, but textural. (per the Greatist). Part of what makes mangoes so great is their soft flesh, but that very flesh won't give away a lot of juice if you try and run it through a machine. Instead, you'll just end up with a mango-y mash. It's worth noting that papayas, with a similar texture, have the same problem.

We implore you not to throw those mangoes out, though. Instead, make yourself a next-level mango smoothie, by combining a few fresh mangoes or some frozen mango with a frozen banana in a blender. Add half a cup of milk and yogurt each, and then blend.