A Glass of the Good Stuff

At the beginning of our challenge, I looked at my packaging waste from a single day and honed in on a large juice carton as one of the things bugging me most about my trash. Since then, I have bought other cartons of OJ, but continued to wonder if I could find a more sustainable option. After reading an article last fall about the orange juice industry and what really happens to juice that’s “not from concentrate” (stored in tanks for up to a year after processing and laden with preservatives and additives to give it the orangey flavor), I’ve also stared to rethink drinking the stuff period. But sometimes there is nothing so satisfying as a glass of OJ…so the search is on.


When I was a kid, we got juice in cans of concentrate and mixed them with water. In terms of packaging, this definitely trumps the big carton. My dad always insisted on slicing the metal cap off the bottom of the cardboard canister so both pieces could be recycled. Weirdly, I still prefer the taste even though I’ve discovered that it’s often considered inferior.


At this point, all signs are pointing toward fresh-squeezed. But what about cost? The price for a 32-ounce carton of organic orange juice at Trader Joe’s is $3.99. A can of organic OJ concentrate is $2.49. And a four-pound bag of organic oranges grown somewhere in the US is $4.69. After squeezing two oranges I got about two inches of juice in a glass, probably about four ounces. With approximately 10 oranges in a bag, at two ounces each, that’s only 20 ounces of juice for almost five bucks. What kind of wacko system offers a processed product cheaper than a fresh one requiring less labor to make?



The taste though! Just-squeezed orange juice is amazing—the tangy smell, the sugary taste, the full body, the immediate impact of complete orangey-ness. So delicious! I don’t know if I’ll become a fresh-squeezed convert (I’d probably need hardware beyond my little lemon juicer), but I may return to it now and then for special occasions…and possibly pass on the carton in favor of holding out for the good stuff.