There is a stretch of autumn when fennel looks better than anything else in the shop, and this is the glass I make with it. Fennel and orange is an old southern Italian pairing, the sort of thing that turns up sliced into a salad with a bit of olive oil, and it works in a juicer for the same reason: the orange softens the aniseed without burying it. What you end up with is a clear golden juice that tastes far more of sweet celery than of liquorice. If you have ever eaten fennel and thought it tasted like toothpaste, this is a different drink altogether.
Why these ingredients work
Fennel is mostly water with very little sugar for a vegetable, and its faint aniseed note comes from anethole, the same compound behind aniseed and star anise. Nearly everything written about fennel and the gut is really about the seeds and the tea rather than the bulb, and I have said so plainly in the recipe notes, but the fresh bulb is a gentle vegetable and it is one of the few Monash lists as low FODMAP at a normal serve, which is more than can be said for the onion and garlic most of us reach for.
The orange is doing the carrying. A sweet orange is roughly 53 mg of vitamin C per 100 g, so two of them push this glass past 100 mg, more than a day’s worth in one drink. The apple brings a soft sweetness so the fennel never reads as sharp, and the lemon lifts it at the end. Fennel and orange together also give you a serious amount of potassium, around 1,000 mg a glass, and 140 mg of calcium, which is high for a juice and comes mostly from the fennel.
FAQ
Does fennel juice actually help with bloating?
Not in the way most of the internet suggests. The evidence for fennel and a calmer gut is real, but it comes from fennel seed oil and fennel tea rather than the fresh bulb, and the best known trial gave a fennel seed oil emulsion to babies with colic rather than to adults with bloating. The bulb carries far less of those oils, so I would call this an easy, gentle glass after a heavy meal rather than a remedy. If bloating is a regular thing rather than an occasional one, that is worth a trip to your GP.
Can I drink this while pregnant or breastfeeding?
Keep it to the odd glass and run it past your midwife or GP first. Fennel is traditionally used to bring on breast milk, and concentrated fennel preparations have been linked to breast development in a baby who was given fennel tea. A normal adult glass is a very long way from that, but fennel is not something I would drink in quantity while pregnant or feeding, and it is never a drink for babies or small children.
What does it taste like, and can I make it without a juicer?
It tastes of sweet celery with a soft orange behind it and only a whisper of aniseed, so if you do not like liquorice you will probably still enjoy this. In a blender, blend the fennel, orange and apple with 150 ml of cold water, then strain it through a nut milk bag or a fine sieve, press the pulp with the back of a spoon and finish with the lemon. Either way it is best on the same day.
More gut-friendly juices: see the full Digestion collection.
Fennel, Orange and Apple Juice
Equipment
- Nut milk bag
Ingredients
- 1 large fennel bulb about 300 g. Trim the base but keep a few of the feathery fronds back for the glass
- 2 oranges about 300 g of flesh once peeled
- 1 large sweet apple about 200 g, cored
- 1/2 unwaxed lemon peeled
Instructions
Juicer method
- Wash the fennel and cut it into wedges through the base so each piece stays together, then keep a few of the fine feathery fronds back to drop into the glasses at the end. Quarter the apple and cut out the core, and peel the oranges and cut them into chunks.
- Juice the orange and the apple first so the basket is already wet and running, then feed the fennel through in wedges, alternating it with the last pieces of apple so the fennel never sits in the basket on its own, which is how a centrifugal juicer starts to struggle. Finish with the lemon.
- Give it a stir, then pour straight over ice. It is best drunk the same day, and a squeeze of the fronds on top is all the garnish it needs.
Blender method
- Trim the fennel and chop it roughly, then peel the oranges, core the apple and cut both into chunks.
- Blend the fennel, orange and apple with 150 ml of cold water for about a minute until there are no lumps left.
- Pour it through a nut milk bag or a fine sieve into a jug and press the pulp with the back of a spoon to get the last of the juice out, then squeeze in the lemon, stir and serve over ice.