What Does Turmeric Do For You?

Turmeric is one of the worlds most popular spices. If you have ever gone to an Indian Restaurant, then you will have had turmeric.

However, turmeric is not just confined to Indian cuisine. If you’ve ever had spicy brown mustard, such as the famous Guldens mustard, then you’ve had Turmeric. It’s used for both the flavor, as well as the taste. The spice is also used to dye clothing such as the Buddhist robes.

However, most people are interested in the what turmeric can do for you with regards to your health. There are dozens and dozens of peer reviewed studies that point to the enormous health benefits of turmeric. A quick overview of what turmeric can do for you:

• Improve Memory
• Protect Against Alzheimer’s
• Protect Against Cancer
• Reduces Risk of Heart Disease

I have previously covered this in depth  when discussing the health benefits of turmeric, so we won’t spend too much on this here. I suggest you read that article if you’re interested.

The Problem Of Lead in Turmeric

The big problem with turmeric is that much of it has become contaminated with lead. This has been a problem in India for years. The problem dates back to a poor harvest years ago in India. There was too much rain, and the resulting turmeric turned out to be pale in color. This was an issue as most people expect turmeric to have a bright, deep golden orange color.

So, what some unscrupulous people did was to add a dye to the turmeric to artificially make it deep in color. This chemical, in many cases, was lead. Which is poison to people.

The unfortunate sate of affairs is that people saw how effective adding lead to turmeric was. People saw a deep, rich orange yellow color, and were attracted to it over other paler options. So, it was continued to be used even after the original event where the crops were damaged.

Unfortunately, if you’re planning on consuming turmeric, you need to be aware of the problem of lead. It’s simply an undeniable problem that needs to be understood. As recent studies have shown, turmeric as a source of lead is a problem that modern consumers need to be aware of (even if they’re in USA and not India).

Lead Free Turmeric Options

There are two ways to avoid lead in turmeric. You can either buy fresh turmeric or you can make sure to buy turmeric powder from a reputable source.

Fresh turmeric, which is sold in groceries stores and resembles ginger, is lead free.

Turmeric powder (be it in a spice jar for cooking, or in vitamin supplements) are the ones where there is a danger in with lead. The best approach when you are searching for lead free turmeric supplements or powder, is to choose a brand that says “organic”. Also, you are best advised to choose something that is manufactured in the United States, or Europe. At the very least, you want to choose something that has been inspected to make sure it confirms to Organic standards.

But the focus of this article is going to be freshly juiced turmeric. If you are really looking for organic turmeric powder, then I suggest buying a USDA organic brand turmeric powder.

 

Do You Have To Peel Turmeric Before Juicing?

No. The simple answer is that you do not have to peel turmeric before juicing. However, I would recommend that you do peel the turmeric because it will result in a cleaner and better tasting juice. The simple reason is that turmeric is grown underground. It’s similar to carrots, potatoes, and beets.  If you decide to not peel the turmeric, them I’d certainly recommend that you wash it thoroughly just like you would if you were cooking a potato with the skin on.

Personally, I think that it would be best to peel it. You can use a spoon to scrape off the skin. It’s the same method that you would use if you were going to peel ginger. It is simpler than using a knife. Just take a spoon and scrape.

I wrote an entire article that covers this question (you can read it here). It’s actually pretty straight forward once you get the hang of it.

 

How To Peel Turmeric Before Juicing

If you are planning on juicing turmeric, then as I’ve said, I do recommend you peel it. You can peel turmeric with either a spoon, a knife, of a vegetable peeler. Honestly, I think that the spoon method is the best. If you use a dull knife, something like a butter knife, then it’s also a good method.

I would not recommend using a vegetable peeler, because  turmeric like ginger is a bit slipperly and oddly shaped. It’s best to peel turmeric using the back of a spoon.

 

Turmeric Juice Benefits

One of the reasons that juicing turmeric is so popular is that you are getting fresh turmeric, which contains fresh curcumin. This is the chemical compound in turmeric that has all of the health benefits. As a rule, anytime you get something fresh, it will have more health benefits than something powdered.

We briefly covered the health benefits of turmeric above, but now let’s take a deeper dive:

 

Turmeric Juice Is Anti-Inflammatory

The reason that turmeric juice is so healthy due to curcuminoids. These are powerful antioxidants but also have the benefit of being an anti-inflammatory.

When you are making fresh turmeric juice, remember that you are not going to want to drink it straight. It’s very pungent and unpleasant tasting. However, you can easily mask the earthy flavor by adding in a fruit such as pineapple or lemon. I would suggest combining both pineapple and lemon.

The lemon adds a nice tartness, which is better than a too sweet pineapple only drink. I cover how to juice lemons properly and how best to use a lemon juicer in this article.

 

Turmeric Juice Is Great For After You Work Out

Because it’s a great anti-inflammatory, it works well as a post workout juice. Turmeric can be combined with pineapple or tart cherries, which are two fruits that have abundant ant-inflammatory powers.

If you are more of a fan of smoothies, then what you might want to do is keep some cold pressed turmeric juice in your fridge to add to your smoothies. Turmeric juices better than it blends, so id’ recommend against making a smoothie with it.

Turmeric Can be A Cancer Preventative

I’m careful whenever I touch on such a sensitive topic as this, but there is quite a bit of evidence that turmeric can be a cancer preventative.

Honestly, this is such a huge topic that I suggest reading up on it in more detail if it’s something that will actually be of significant interest in your life. For serious study, always start with the peer reviewed medical journals: example 1, 2 and 3.

 

How To Juice Turmeric: Slow and Cold Pressed Is Best

The first step is to wash the turmeric. Scrub it with a sponge or brush and use a vegetable friendly soap.

The nest step is to cut the turmeric into smaller pieces.

When you are juicing turmeric, you don’t want to put one large piece. That can jam up the auger press. And even if the auger doesn’t get jammed, which it probably won’t if you’re using a good brand, then you are not going to get as much of the juice extracted.  Smaller bits work better, so dice up the turmeric a bit.

Feed it into the juicing feed chute.

Add cut up pineapple chunks, lemon, and whatever else you are thinking of juicing.

 

 

Mixing Turmeric with Beetroot and Carrots

Perhaps my favorite way to use turmeric is with either lemon or pineapple and then combine it with beetroot and carrots.

This will make a perfect anti-inflammatory juice. And turmeric and carrots are a perfect combo. That’s why so many recipes use it in regular cooking.

What I like to do is take a sour (organic lemon) or sour/sweet (for instance a not overripe pineapple) and juice this along with turmeric. In order to make it a large juice and not a lemon and turmeric “shot” I add carrot and beetroot. This is a super powerful anti-inflammatory and detoxing juice.

In order to do this, it’s important to make sure you use a good carrot and beetroot juicer machine as regular juicers simply won’t extract any real amounts of juice from the turmeric , lemon or beetroot and carrots.