Every where I look, the supermarket, the deli, the coffee shop - cold-pressed juices are front and centre of the display, and they are expensive - $8 - $10 a bottle. Should you be buying them? The marketing spin is that the cold press crushes and squeezes rather than damaging the nutrients through the heat and oxygen used by a standard juicer. Sounds legit, right? However the marketing hype has rushed ahead of the science. Even if there are more nutrients, can our systems absorb them? The average Australian diet already contains more than enough Vitamin C, and any excess just ends up down the toilet. The way your gut absorbs nutrients depends on what else you are consuming. For example, the extra virgin olive oil that you dress your salad with helps your uptake of some of the vitamins in your salad.

Chewing your food, rather than drinking it signals to your brain that you are getting full, it's easy to miss the satiety cues when drinking your calories.

All that said, the typical Australian diet does fall really short on getting in at least 5 serves of veggies every day. Drink cold-pressed juices if you enjoy them and can afford them, but be sceptical about the claims on the bottle. So you don't end up with a meal's worth of calories make sure they contain no more than one fruit and the rest is vegetable content. Some of the juices for sale contain 88% fruit juice which is a significant source of sugar and calories.

I like to make my own green juice if I've not been getting enough veggies. I use the thermomix so I can retain the fibre - here's my recipe.