Cold-Pressed vs. HPP'ed Juice

We are starting to see the juice movement everywhere. Restaurants, farmers markets and even grocery stores. When you start looking closely you can see that even though the juices are the same, the way they are made is not. There are two ways a juice can be made. The first is through a high-pressure process (HPP). This is when you use high pressure to reduce microbial content in the juice, so it can travel and last longer on the shelves. The second is cold pressing. Basically, you grind up produce and squeeze out as much juice possible.

When you go into a grocery store and see the abundance of colorful juices, this most likely is made using high pressure process. When juices can sit on a grocery store shelf for longer than 7 days you know this has been HPP'ed.  HPP is a process where fresh juice is bottled, then put into a hyperbaric chamber and there it is exposed to roughly 80,000 lbs of pressure. That is almost 6 times more pressure than the deepest part of the ocean! This large amount of pressure is a form of pasteurization that doesn’t use heat. The bottles are set in cold water and pressure of the water pushes onto the bottles and any microbes present. It has been discovered that yeast, mold and microbes cannot survive is high pressure environments. So, the HPP juices have a longer shelf life and can be shipped far away from the original sources without worry. Unfortunately, there is a downside. While pressure is killing potential, harmful microbes, it is also killing the live enzymes present in the produce. The vitamin and mineral rich enzymes are what are in all vegetables and fruit in their natural form. When you take these away you are taking away the very thing that makes fruits and vegetables some of the healthiest foods on the planet. All fruits and veggies have enzymes that bring about a specific biochemical reaction; whether it be helping with digestion or removing toxins. These are what make fresh juices such a boost of health. When you remove the fiber and drink the juice of fruits and veggies you bypass the digestions and these nourishing enzymes go straight to the blood stream. A true burst of health.

The second method is my personal favorite, cold pressing. It can be found at certain juice bars. This is different then the juicers you can buy or typically see at a juice bar. Cold pressing juice does not involve any heat or fast movement. You start with grinding up fresh produce and place it between two plates. The plates use slow, strong pressure to squeeze the produce together, yielding as much juice as possible. This process takes a little more time and effort, but it is well worth it. Since there is not heat or fast movement you don’t lose any of the enzymes in the produce. This makes the juice a completely raw, living food. Not loosing out on any of the natural health properties of the produce.

The great thing about juicing is that you can easily get your recommended serving of produce daily. Whether it is cold pressed or HPP’ed you can appreciate the fact that the one bottle of juice has up to 4lbs of fresh produce in it. I am thankful for the fact that we do have the technology to make these nourishing juices available to people all around the globe with HPP. This technology is something that is great for places that don’t have access to cold pressers or juice bars. If given the opportunity, cold pressed is the way to go. It’s packed full of all living enzymes to optimize your health.

Chrissy Gentzel is an Integrative Nutrition Health Coach in training. She has a passion for yoga, a love for cooking and enjoys being out in nature on her free time. She was originally influenced by her mother throughout her childhood and has since started to pass those traits and characteristics to her daughter.  Sharing these ideals with her family and her friends, she promotes and believes in the power of healing through nutrition.