How to Use a Fruit Juicer

The other day, Dave sent me a note about a new method he had come up with to juice fruit. While I’m sure I said something nice about his idea in response, I told him that I didn’t know how it could possibly be better than using a good, store-bought fruit juicer (here’s our favorite fruit juicer – it’s the one pictured in this post). He then told me that he made a mess when he used his and didn’t get much juice out of it. So, I asked him if he was using it right – loading the the dome of the fruit against the press. Doh! He wasn’t. He was placing the fruit with the dome into what appears to be the matching shape in the juicer. When loaded this way, the press squishes the fruit directly making, well, a mess.

I’d like to say that I laughed at him all day, but I didn’t know this was how the device was used until about a year ago myself, and I only learned by reading reviews of juicers on Amazon. The device just works contrary (opposite, in fact) to how it looks like should work. If there were directions on the package on how to use the thing, I certainly threw them away without ever looking at them, just like everyone else. Never fear, Consumatorium is here to close this knowledge gap and show you how to productively and cleanly squeeze your own fresh fruit.

How to Juice Fruit

Slice your fruit in half and place the newly cut, flat side of the fruit facing down into the inverted dome of the juicer. The idea is that the metal (or plastic, if that’s how yours is equipped) press should make contact with the skin of the fruit, not the fruit itself. Bring the levers together and let the metal press do its work. It will, basically, invert the half, pressing the fruit against the walls of the juicer and making the fruit scream ‘uncle’ while it releases its juicy goodness. Make sure you have some container to catch the juice as it smoothly flows from the juicer. In our experience, most lemons will produce a little less than 2 oz of juice. A lime, a bit less of course.

The resulting remnants of fruit look a bit strange, but there’s not much left to hold any juice. If your fruit ends up looking like this, you know you’ve done a good job getting the most juice out of the it. The one downside to this method is that what remains of the skin doesn’t always work as a garnish. That said, it can look really cool finishing off a Tiki drink or as an addition to a Punch.