Juiced Up

GOOD health has probably never tasted so good. Forget York's burgeoning coffee bar culture. If you want a really delicious - and healthy - drink to linger over while browsing through the daily paper, look no further than The Juice House. Tucked away at the south end of Shambles, it's got the feel of your traditional coffee bar. There's a main bar area, with the big metal juicer taking pride of place behind - and more bars around the walls where you can perch on high stools to sip your drink and read the paper.

But instead of jars of coffee beans and the fragrant aroma of fresh ground coffee, there are heaps of fresh fruits and vegetables ready for preparation - and the tangy scent of citrus and carrot.

On the menu, instead of lattes, cappucinos and americanos (though the bar does also serve coffee) are a range of delicious fruit and vegetable drinks, all prepared fresh while you wait.

Choose from pure carrot, apple or orange juice, or tasty 'combination' drinks such as carrot, apple and ginger; apple, pear and lime; apple and spinach; melon and apple; carrot and orange. Or if you really want to spoil yourself, try one of the bar's delicious range of 'smoothies' made from fresh frozen fruit, which come in wonderful combinations like banana, papaya, apple juice and lime juice - or banana, blueberry, apple juice and yoghurt. The really astonishing thing about these drinks is that, apart from tasting great, they're also good for you.

Nick Ledger, the 28-year-old who opened the bar in January with university friend and business partner Peter Kumar, also 28, is a real enthusiast about the benefits of juicing.

He and Peter opened the bar after both battling their way back to health - Nick from a bowel condition known as ulcerative colitis, Peter from a form of lymph cancer known as Hodgkins Disease.

Nick, from Acaster Malbis, believes it was regularly drinking fresh fruit and vegetable juices that helped him recover. He'd been dogged by ill health for years, feeling chronically tired and with a continuous ache in his abdomen.

He was facing the prospect of surgery when he heard about the benefits of juicing from a friend and bought himself a juicer. Within a couple of days, he was beginning to feel better.

"I couldn't believe it," he says. "There had been this constant, tremendous aching feeling and chronic fatigue. It was a kind of tiredness a bit like when you're just recovering from flu and have cotton wool in your head. The juice got rid of it straight away."

Within three months he was off medication altogether - something he thought would never happen - and now, he says, he's never felt better.

"I've had no symptoms of the illness for over a year and I am not on any medication," he says. "I amaze myself every morning with the amount of energy I've got."

Both Nick and Londoner Peter, who began juicing shortly after chemotherapy to treat his cancer, accept that drinking juice is not a cure-all. Neither of them would try to deter anyone with a serious illness from continuing with their medication - Peter frankly admits the chemotherapy and radiotherapy he had in 1997 saved his life.

But the health benefits of drinking pure, freshly-juiced fruit and vegetables are obvious, they say - particularly in this day and age of processed foods, when so many of us struggle to get our recommended daily intake of five portions of fruit or veg.

A single glass of carrot and orange juice probably contains at least half you daily requirements of fresh fruit and veg, Nick says - and it's delicious.

"People say that what worked for you won't necessarily work for anyone else," Nick admits. "But it's got to be good for you. And you don't have to be a health freak to enjoy them. They're such vibrant, tasty and gorgeous drinks. I've never had more energy in my life."

Peter agrees. "There's a lot of evidence to show there is a great benefit from eating fruit and veg," he says. "Juicing has got to be good for your health and we just really want to share that with other people."

Nick believes some juices are probably particularly effective for certain conditions. Apple and spinach, for example, is particularly good for digestive problems, he says - while the combination of apple, beetroot and cucumber is a good body cleanser.

But he doesn't want to limit people's enjoyment of what they drink. "I don't want people to think they can only have apple and spinach because it's the one that's good for digestive symptoms," he says.

"They're all good for you."