Ingredients :

• Raw beet — Firm, with no soft spots or wrinkled skin. Forget the pre-cooked vacuum-packed beets from the supermarket — they’ve already lost their nutrients and will produce a juice that is too watery with a baked-earth taste. Market-fresh with the skin intact is what you need. Be warned: it stains everything it touches — hands, boards, towels.
• Nopal (cactus paddle) — You can find it in Mexican grocery stores or good organic shops, sometimes in jars in brine. If using fresh, remove all spines from the entire surface before peeling — one by one with a knife, scraping along the small bumps. If using jarred, rinse thoroughly under cold water, otherwise it brings a vinegary aftertaste to the juice.
• Lemon — Fresh, always. Bottled lemon juice is acidic but flat, lacking the volatile aromas of the zest. If you want more intensity, grate the zest of half a lemon and add it to the blender — it’s optional but it really wakes the whole thing up.
• Celery stalks — The green stalks with leaves, not celeriac. The leaves are the most aromatic part of the plant — don’t throw them away; they go straight into the blender. They bring a light, fresh bitterness that balances the sweetness of the beet.