Is it safe to juice whole apples, including seeds?

thats your rebuttal lmao you just breathed in more deadly chemicals than you will ever get from a seed…this must be a joke

“vitamin b17 and it is very important to our diets to eliminate the possibility of cancer”…where do you see cancer treatment…yes your intelligence runs deep

Having been to a place in Watsonville that does this, you forgot 'strained", and from what I saw, the process would not get too much stuff from the seeds. Some, certainly.

In moderation, the Op’s process seems safe.

“It is believed that the active anticancer ingredient in laetrile is cyanide”

“The side effects of laetrile are like the symptoms of cyanide poisoning”

And yes, it is a cancer treatment. Just one with no clinical effectiveness and the side effect of “poisoning.”

People calm down. It’s just apple juice we are talking about here:rolleyes:

http://www.juicing-for-health.com/is-it-safe-to-juice-whole-apples-including-their-seeds.html

http://chemistry.about.com/b/2007/09/12/yes-apple-seeds-and-cherry-pits-are-poisonous.htm
There is my impartial evidence:rolleyes:

OK for fun I’ll do the math,

I read 20 apple seeds will kill a mouse. An average mouse weighs 6 grams

Let’s say an average man weighs 150 pounds or about 68 kilograms

68 kilograms is equal to 68,000 grams

So if 20 seeds is lethal to a 6 gram mammal, we set up a ratio

20 seeds

6 grams

x (number of seeds)

68000 grams

68,000 X 20 = 6X

1,360,000 = 6x

1,360,000/6 = x

226,666.67 = x

So if you assume the amount of apple seeds that is lethal in a mouse would be the same number in a 150 pound man, you can see you’d need about a quarter of a million to kill you.

But of course the lethality in an animal may be different from humans, but it shows it would take a LOT of seeds to kill you.

IIRC, there has been exactly one death from eating apple seeds. Some guy saved up all of the seeds from apples that he ate in a bowl, then one night he decided to eat all of the seeds in one sitting.

It’s quite a bit less than a quarter million seeds, but it’s still an ungodly number of seeds to eat at once.

Unless you are eating an entire bowl of seeds, there’s nothing to worry about. Your body can handle small amounts of cyanide without any harm to you.

Actually, no it’s not apple juice we’re talking about here - it’s cyanide. Your first link it to someone who doesn’t know what they’re talking about. She uses “could” and “maybe” and clearly is making stuff up (earlier links have shown that the body quickly detoxifies apple seeds, that link suggests the toxins build up in the body). The second link simply confirms what everyone in this thread has agreed on - that apple seeds contain cyanide.

Welcome to the SDMB.

No, it’s GQ we’re talking about here. A higher degree of rigor and correctness is aimed for here.

Technically, apple seeds contain amygdalin, which is a compound made of cyanide and sugar. When digested, it gets broken down into hydrogen cyanide, which the body can metabolize in small amounts.

But that’s kinda picking nits and I really don’t think anyone is going to argue with the “apple seeds contain cyanide” statements in this thread. But this is GQ and picking nits is a bit of a hobby here. :wink:

An adult laboratory mouse weighs 20 to 40 grams.

http://research.uiowa.edu/animal/?get=mouse

http://www.ratbehavior.org/RatsMice.htm#TellApart

http://www.afrma.org/rminfo1.htm

Because I actually went and did the tiniest bit of half-assed research on the interwebs, and saw where there’d been failed clinical trials as a cancer treatment.

I didn’t forget it. Straining is an integral part of the pressing process.

In traditional methods, the apple pulp is packed in folded cloths between wooden racks, stacked and pressed. In large scale modern industrial processes, it’s done with meshes and screens, but in either case, it’s just part of pressing, or else the process is called ‘extruding apple pulp’ or something.

Filtering the pressed juice to make it crystal clear is entirely optional.

I never heard of bitter almonds. Where does one get bitter almonds?

According to wikipedia at least, they are found on the same tree as regular almonds but are shaped differently. They also contain what’s technically known as a crapload of cyanogenic compounds. As in, eat a couple handfuls at once and it could kill you if you’re small or unlucky.

Just to clarify: the wild almond tree bears bitter almonds. These yield the chemical benzaldehyde, which is the classic “almond” flavour (and is absent from sweet almonds, given rise to the oddity that almonds don’t actually taste of “almond”). Bitter almonds are used in food such as amaretto biscuits, amaretto alcohol and marzipan.

It seems unlikely that you could unintentionally poison yourself with bitter almonds because they are intensely bitter. However I believe I have read that they can be made safe and eaten.

I suppose it is not surprising that some sweet almond trees occasionally bear bitter almonds, but it is a bit misleading to say that the two types grow on the same tree. They are (normally) the fruit of different trees, just like sweet cherries and sour cherries.

Juicing of the seeds of apples.

Heavens to betsy…thanks for all the responses. I’ve also just got a juicer and was wondering about the same thing. After reading all of the responses I have come to the conclusion that seeds should not be in the apple when juiced. I don’t buy the argument that the body can safely metabolize it. I know of no benefits of cyanide consumption so the seeds are gonna go.

By the way, many of these things build up steadily in the body, so the fact that the seeds do not make you sick doesn’t mean they do not have an impact.

I’ll be on the safe side.

And you’ll be wrong, but since there’s no danger in removing the seeds, knock yourself out.

Exhibit 364 of education being trounced by common sense.

You are all arguing about nothing. I guess no one looks in the waste bin of their juicer. If it is the most common variety, it spins. Most likely, all these killer seeds you guys are talking about are getting thrown out, and are not in your juicer…

That’s right. Most, if not all of the seeds will be sitting, whole, in the waste bin and not in your juice. But I know the Web is full of a bunch of over concerned souls, so please do this. Take an apple, cut the seeds out and count them. Mash them up together in your hand and toss the lot into a clean juicer.

Sort and count your seeds.
Drink your juice.

Look in a mirror lately? (hint: check the post dates)