How to Juice and Drink Fresh Noni

Fruit bowl with Noni fruit and carambola (star fruit)

How to Juice Noni Fruit

Recently my neighbor gave me some noni fruit and a couple of noni plants. He told me they would be ready for juicing in a couple of days. After a couple days, they still felt hard, and I wondered if they would ever ripen and be soft enough to put in my blender.

On the third morning, as I came downstairs, I knew they were ripe. The smell of the noni fruit is horrible. Some say it smells like stinky cheese and others say vomit. Although I didn't appreciate smelling this first thing in the morning, I was pleased they were ripe and that day I knew I'd be able to prepare the juice.

Although I had some at a friends house, I checked on the internet to find out exactly how to juice it and came up with nothing. Every site I found told me how to ferment it and then drink it. That isn't how they do it here in Brazil, and so today I would like to show you how I do it. This is drinking the juice as soon as the fruit is ripe.

How to Juice Noni in a Blender

1. Make sure your fruit is washed. I would do this before it fully ripens, as the skin is quite thin, thinner than that of a tomato. Depending on how many people are going to be drinking the juice, I have used one noni fruit for two people.
2. Simply place the fruit in the blender with 1/2 - 1 cup of cold water; some blenders won't process with only a small amount of water. Switch the blender on, and blend until you have a thickish consistency. Don't worry about the seeds, we are going to be passing it through a sieve.
3. Using a rubber spatula, scrape the juice into a sieve placed over a funnel. This should be over a jug with a pouring spout. Depending on the size of your sieve, you may have to do this procedure in batches.
4. Pour the contents of blender in your sieve, and gently move your spatula or spoon back and forth with gentle pressure. The thick mixture will slowly drip through the sieve, down the funnel, and into the jug or glass.
5. When you have finished, scrape the bottom of the sieve for any that didn't fall through and is clinging to the bottom.
6. You should have a thick liquid. Divide this between two glasses. The reason I use very little liquid is that the taste is as bad as the smell, and I don't want to drink more than I have to. Which would you rather drink, ¼ cup of something you don't like or a whole glass of it? Exactly!

To mask the taste slightly, most people here use a concentrated juice. I use grape juice because it is strongly flavored. I use just a small amount because it is a type that needs diluting with water. If I don't have any grape juice concentrate, I will just add a small amount of water, and down it. The less time it is in the mouth, the better.

Noni after blending with water

Pass Noni juice through a sieve to remove seeds

Removing seeds often will help the juice flow through the sieve more easily.

Start with this much noni juice and add a small amount of juice

Drink your Noni/grape juice combo

The Health Benefits and Dangers

Although many sites on the internet shout about the benefits, there is suspicion that the noni could cause problems to the liver and kidneys.

Morinda citrifolia, also known as the noni fruit or simply noni, is originally from Southeast Asia. The light colored fruit with a horrible smell, is sometimes called the cheese fruit or vomit fruit, due to the smell and the bad taste.The typical ways of using it are as a juice, but the seeds can be roasted, and the leaves can be made into tea.

It is claimed that there are 101 medicinal benefits some of these are listed below:

• Anti - inflammatory
• Improves the digestive system
• Cure for cancer
• Diet aid
• Diuretic
• Antioxidant

Although many sites on the internet claim the benefits of noni, it hasn't been approved as a food product so it will be typically be listed as a supplement. As a guideline, though, it is recommended no more than 30ml a day should be consumed.

Much of the information about the positive effects come from Asian countries where it has been used for a long time. This research is not accepted by many Western countries as proof of its effectiveness or safety.

Have you ever tried fresh noni 

fruit juice?

• Yes, I have tried it.
• No, and now I don't want to.
• Not yet, but I know it is healthy and will.
• Other, I'll explain in the comment section.

How to Ferment Noni Juice

Is The Noni Fruit a Cure-All?

Now, you know how to juice and drink fresh noni.
If you read the information from the growers, they tell you it is a cure-all for everything. If you read reports from medical research teams, they say there are no concrete facts. I believe the truth lies somewhere in the middle.

I take everything with a grain of salt with regards to something that claims to cure everything. However, I also know that unless the drug companies can see a way of profiting from it, they tend not to do research. They are after all a business and more interested in making money for their share holders than saving lives.

The fact of the matter is that many people for many years have used this foul smelling and tasting fruit all their lives and felt it improved their lives. There are many plants from tropical areas which are still being researched and studied.

If you can't find the noni fruit fresh there are bottled juices of it normally found in health food shops. Often there is powdered as well which you can reconstitute with water or juice and even in tablet form.