Question RE: Fresh juices on the beach

We used to buy the fresh juices from Flex and others on the beach. Mango, Orange, Pineapple, all of them went great with some Appleton! Two years ago, however, my fiance got really sick the last two days of our trip and he was confined to the room. Not sure what did it, but it got us thinking about the bottles that the juices are in. How do we know that the bottles are sanitized between uses? We don't, which is why we won't buy anymore. I hate to be like that because the juices are always so good, but the thought of drinking after some random person creeps me out.

Any thoughts? Am I being irrational?

You gotta die from something. ;)

Do you bring your own dishes and glasses? Do you check the water that your vegetables are washed with? Are your vegetables washed? How about the meat ? Is it kept at a controlled temperature? I understand your phobia. I got sick on Tequila once. Can't touch it now.

yu can buy "TRU Juice" by the jug (variety of fruits) at the supermarket (Hi-Lo) or buy the bags of oranges or grapefruits , cut them in half and squeeze the living daylights out of them to make your own juice. Tru-Juice is quite tasty and making your own citrus juice is quite easy to do

Geez, I didn't think it was that wrong of a question. I was just wondering what people thought.:rolleyes:

I am less worried about the vegetables being washed than I am about some dude with a lip sore chugging out of a bottle, only to have that unwashed bottle refilled with juice that I may buy.

Ackee - thanks for the suggestion!

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by sher

Geez, I didn't think it was that wrong of a question. I was just wondering what people thought.:rolleyes:

I am less worried about the vegetables being washed than I am about some dude with a lip sore chugging out of a bottle, only to have that unwashed bottle refilled with juice that I may buy.

Ackee - thanks for the suggestion!

---

do you turn your bottles back into the juice guy? It was my understanding that they were used liquor bottles. If so, the alcohol disinfects the bottle.

Also, have you tried the OJ from Shamrock? It's a small store on the beach road and their OJ is liquid crack. Yep, that good.

Sher, it wasn't a bad question , I myself love the jerk chicken probably eat it everyday im on my trip, and
at times , have had a small worry, like oh, did it sit out in the sun to long before they cooked it....... sometimes
you just have to go for it, and enjoy.
Dash, when I turned 21, ( LONG TIME AGO, :) ) my friends took me out , and I drank Tequila all night. Haven't
been able to so much as smell it since, and I was a bartender for ten years !
Booger, where is this place please with the great juice, do love my screwdrivers:)

Jojo,
It's right by Grand Pineapple on the Morass side. Don't miss it.

Thanks for the Shamrock tip! The juice guys ask that you return the bottles, so that's why I say you never know who drank out of them before your juice was in there. If the bottles have been filled a few times, I can't imagine there would be any alcohol residue left to kill off anything questionable.

I saw Anthony Bourdain give a talk one night. He said that if you get freaked out by getting sick from roadside vendors, think about the fact of how many locals eat from this person everyday and don't get sick. If the vendor was making folks sick, no one would eat there. That's why I say, if a place ain't that busy, there is probably a reason. It seems to me that the juice guys sell lots of juice so most folks must be OK with it. That being said, there's something bad everywhere and some of us react differently to the bad stuff than others do. I got brutally ill my second trip to Jamaica after eating a patty at Sandals of all places. Once you are laying in the bed in the fetal position with cramps, etc, it will take you a long time to eat or drink whatever you ate or drank last before getting sick. I understand that!!! Took me about 10 more trips before I tried a patty again, but I'm definitely back on the horse now. Hope I never get sick on overproof rum!!!!

As for the juice, I'll keep drinking it until something bad happens.

M&M

I've bought juice the past couple of years, and have had no issues. I always return my bottles. I never drink directly from them either, and don't really know why anyone would instead of using a glass.

Ryan, yu are kidding, right?

Lol! My thoughts exactly.

Ali at the Little Sandwich Hut told me that he goes to the AIs to pick up empty liquor bottles before they get thrown in the recycling bin (or trash). I have also returned my empties in the past, so my guess is that they use a combination of both.

Shamrock's bottles are professionally relabeled liquor bottles, so I always feel comfortable that they are properly sanitized.

Yeah,I used to buy the juice from the guy on the beach but got ill also,so I decided not to buy last time. I mean the bottles are reused and I'm not sure if the alcohol will really disinfect.

I also think that locals don't get sick and we do may be due to the fact that their bodies are used to the germs from there and our bodies are not.

It did keep me off the J-Wray more last reach.

I don't think its the bottles so much as the juice within. I found that the juice you buy on the beach has a very short shelf life before it starts fermenting, even before you can even taste it. When I see these vendors selling their juice in the late morning or afternoon, I'm very skeptical of the quality of the juice, because their coolers aren't that cold when you do buy a bottle. That's my experience at least.

Exactly what Navvet said ^

one time I was buying a bottle of juice from a guy , cant think of his name but hes been selling juice for years in the morning on the beach that took a cap off so I could smell it, he dropped the cap at the edge of the water , picked it up and put it back on which I tht. was not very sanitary andI said something too him about, He just shrugged and said it was perfectly fine. I was not happy about that at all. Now I buy my juices at Shamrock . I have no idea about how good the bottles are cleaned and I never got sick from any and have bought quite a few over the tears on the beach but that 1 incident turned me off

Open bottle, pour some juice out, pour some rum in, shake not stir, sanitized!

Might be a good time to remind people, who haven't already, to get their Hepatitis A vaccine. Hep A transmitted through water and food. Even washed raw veggies. Recommended by CDC for all countries outside Western World.

Tony is the juice guy that calls out 'arangg juice' 'maango' 'papaya'. He is a fantastic guy. His process -- after a day selling his juice he stops to buy fruit for the next day which he washes, he also washes out his juice bottles. He awakes the next morning very early to squeeze and bottle his juice. He travels with his juice in coolers with ice as he walks the beach. I have been drinking his juice for many years - MANY different bottles - and have never gotten sick. Attachment 35671Attachment 35671

I always buy my juice from Merlyn who has a fruit stand in front of Moondance Villas. After I finish the juice, I wash out my bottle with hot water before returning it to Merlyn. She is not happy if you don't bother to clean your bottle before you return it. I know it's not fully sanitized but she does a very low volume of fresh juice - sometimes me and my buddy are her only customers and she squeezes the juice to order so you know it's fresh. She even peels the oranges before squeezing so there's no bitterness -- which she claims is why she has the tastiest fresh juice on the beach. She also likes to warn against the beach vendors claiming the juice is old, watered down or cut with tang.

Merlyn is a real character and can be a bit caustic but her face lit up this year (after she lost a lot of weight from last year) when my buddy says to her "My god Merlyn you're looking like a swim suit model." Cracked her daughters up.

It is questionable what exactly is in the bottle. The seller may say that it is freshly squeezed O.J. but is it fresh, and is it even squeezed O.J. We bought some freshly ground Blue Mountain coffee from a guy on the beach. It was in a burlap sack just like you would find at the Hi Lo but the sack looked like it was sewn up by hand. The guy said they buy the beans, open the package and then grind them. They then sew the burlap back up. Sounded like a believable story but when we tried it, it was definitely not Blue Mountain coffee. Probably high mountain coffee bought at the Hi Lo and sold as Blue Mountain coffee at double the price.

I thought all vendors selling consumables on the beach, had to be licenced and subject to inspection by the Tourist Security. I’m pretty sure that the jerk chicken barrels are licenced.

And while we on that, where are the Tourist Bureau Security? You know, the ones in the white shirts and pit hats. Two years ago you couldn't swing a dead cat without hitting one of those guys walking the beach. This year, maybe one or two every second day and even then mostly sitting in the background texting.