Reporters attempt homemade pressed juice

Nine dollars for a small bottle of juice is unreasonable. So after the new Pressed Juicery store opened in Santana Row about a year ago and hype about healthy juices took over social media, we decided to make some ourselves.

When spring break started, we met at Elizabeth’s house to begin our mission. At first, we did not think making a simple juice from vegetables and fruits could be so difficult, but of course, the task was easier said than done.  

After scrolling and scouring the Pressed Juicery website, we realized that there were some strange juices out there (such as chlorophyll and h2o) and we had the ingredients for two types of juice. But we were soon confused about what we would use to make these pulpless juices — a blender, a strainer or just our hands?

After Googling our options, we settled on blending the ingredients together and then straining the pulp and fiber so that the juices would resemble the ones sold. We chose to make two different juices — one with grapefruit and mint, called “citrus 3,” and the other a mix of apples, cucumbers, ginger and various greens like kale, spinach, lettuce and romaine, similar to the “greens” smoothies.

We set up paper plates as cutting boards. After spending 10 minutes trying to figure out how the blenders worked, we decided to eyeball the ingredients and throw them straight in the blender. The grapefruit juice smelled delightfully fresh and was a pretty pink color, while the “green juice” was an unappetizing sludge, reminding us of the filthy algae on the walls of the dirty fish tank in “Finding Nemo.”

We added cups and cups of water until the vegetables would blend. But, we were shocked when the vegetables only made about a cup of juice. So we frantically added in all of the vegetables we had left, throwing in some ginger and apple slices for taste.

Then we had to push the sludge through mesh strainers.  This was a tedious process that caused pieces of fiber to get everywhere, including our clothes, the counter and even a chair. After we diluted the thick smoothies with water, the liquid looked more like juice.

We felt good about the result, since the somewhat uniform pale color resembled the juices sold at Pressed Juicery, although ours had the strong, unpleasant odor of ginger.

We were both apprehensive to try these drinks: pressed juices are more about being healthy and taking photos for Instagram, and usually aren’t that delicious to begin with. Judging by the number of vegetables we threw into the blender without any sweetener, we hesitated to give it a taste.

To make our creations look more appealing, we poured the watered-down liquid into glass cups, decorating the grapefruit glasses with mint leaves. Of course, we had to Snapchat our creations to show our friends how amazingly talented we are at DIYs.

Reluctantly, we took a sip of the juices and immediately gagged at the bitter taste. The grapefruit and mint juice was extremely bitter and tangy, as we forgot to remove the pith from the grapefruit. The green juice was refreshing at first, but the grainy spinach particles that made it through the strainer and the strong aftertaste of spicy ginger lingered in our mouths.

Despite our efforts in trying to recreate these pressed juices, we were left with four glasses of juice that were basically inedible. Even Elizabeth’s younger sister politely told us that the juice was disgusting. We used about eight cups of fruits and veggies, but these materials all went to waste when we decided to pour our creations down the drain.

We decided that we might as well just go buy the $9 juices to save us the trouble of going through the clumsy process with a disappointing result. After all, who doesn’t want an Instagram-worthy and healthy juice in nice packaging?