It’s cleanse season! This time around, I’ve ditched the nasty powdery mix and have tried to reproduce the popular and expensive Blueprint Cleanse.

The main purpose of the Blueprint Cleanse isn’t losing weight, it’s detoxification. However, since I don’t smoke, drink alcohol, or use drugs, I think I’m more or less a toxin-free zone. What I do need help with are some PCOS-related symptoms that make me very uncomfortable. Additionally, I also have the desire to develop more self-control when it comes to food. Don’t we all?

Luckily for frugalistas everywhere, BPC lists the ingredients of each part of their cleanse on their bottles:

After procuring some recipes, I got started on my three-day DIY BPC minus the red juice because I forgot to buy the ingredients for it.

Side note: It’s tough to get an exact measurement of ingredients when a recipe calls for “a handful of romaine” and I ended up getting a bit more than I needed. I also made double of the green juice to compensate for the forgotten red juice.

Here’s what I got:

• 24 small Granny Smith apples – $10
• 1 box of romaine lettuce – $4
• 3 bags of celery – $7.50
• 6 English cucumbers (these are longer than the normal ones and was all they had) – $15
• 1 bunch of kale – $1.50
• 1 bunch of parsley – $3
• 2 bags of spinach leaves – $6
• 1 pineapple – $2
• A few sprigs of mint – $1.75
• 8 large lemons – $6
• 16 ounce box of cashews – $10
• Small bottle of vanilla extract – $6
• Cayenne pepper $5
• 24-pack of Nestle bottled water – $4

I bought the cheapest of everything. There’s a reason why this cleanse is $70 per day – the ingredients are pricey.

Here’s what that all looks like after your husband hauls it out of the car for you. Minus the bottled water – he had to go back for that. Thank you, ST.

Making these juices was a DEBACLE. First of all, you don’t need a fancy juicer. I used our non-fancy Cuisinart blender and a strainer. The strainer is key.

Before Juicing

• Prep your cashews. Before you start doing anything, dump the cashews into a large bowl. Pour enough bottled water into the bowl so that all the nuts are covered by at least an inch of water. This prepares the cashews for the cashew milk. Some people recommend soaking for 8-10 hours. I soaked mine for about 2 hours and they turned out just fine.

• Line your sink. Get one or two large trash bags and place them in your sink. Doing so will prevent from having to unclog and clean up this result:

Begin with the green juice. It’s the most labor-intensive and messy.

Green Juice

Each 16 ounce bottle of green juice requires:

• 5 stalks of celery
• 1 cucumber
• 2 green apples
• 3 kale leaves
• 1 ounce of lemon juice
• 1 handful of parsley
• 3 romaine leaves
• 1 handful of spinach
• 1 bottle of water

You can adjust the ingredients depending on your reference. I will scale back on the celery next time.

• Wash and cut up the celery and apples. Don’t bother peeling the apples – it just wastes time. The strainer will take care of the skins.
• Peel, wash, and cut up the cucumber.
• Wash and tear up the kale, parsley, romaine, and spinach.
• Add these to your blender – the order does not matter.
• Add lemon juice and bottle of water.
• Puree for a minute.
• Put your strainer over a large bowl and pour the contents of the blender into it. If you have a small bowl, you will have to do this in stages. The straining takes a while, so prep your next ingredients while you wait.
• Press out the last bit of juices with a spoon. Discard the pulp and pour the juice into the empty water bottle.

I was pleasantly surprised when our blender combined the ingredients so smoothly.

Pour out the contents in batches into your strainer. There was such a large quantity of green juice that I eventually had to fill our crock pot, which is the largest pot we have.

Repeat, repeat, repeat.

The green juice was the most time-consuming part. The other juices are actually kind of fun.

Pineapple Apple Mint

This one is delicious! Here’s what you need for three 16 ounce bottles:

• 1 pineapple
• 5 Granny Smith apples
• Juice from half a lemon
• 2-3 sprigs of mint, depending on how much you like
• About 2 bottles of water

• 16 ounces of cashew nuts
• 3 tablespoons of Agave nectar
• 1 tablespoon of ground cinnamon
• 2 teaspoons of vanilla extract
• About 2 bottles of water. I used 3 and found that my cashew milk was a bit on the thin side.

Its amazing how creamy it looks without any milk in it.

Four hours of juicing and here’s what I have to show for it:

Three bottles each of pineapple apple mint, spicy lemonade, and cashew milk. Six bottles of green juice + a bunch more I made for a friend. I’m set for the next three days. Hopefully, the results will be worth all the juicing. In a way, all the blood, sweat, and tears motivates me more.

Update
You guys have been asking some really good clarifying questions! I drank the juices in this order: green juice, pineapple apple mint, spicy lemonade, and cashew milk. I didn’t really have a set time for each juice, but rather a time frame. Green juice for breakfast, PAM, green juice, lemonade, and cashew milk. It felt awesome to complete it!