A week into my Crazy Sexy Diet cleanse, I ran into a small problem. The 21-Day Adventure Cleanse advises an optional liquid feast every seventh day, to pamper the body with with lots of alkalizing juices and smoothies while giving it a break from all that digesting work. Sadly, I had no juicer — and wasn’t looking forward to a day full of bulky smoothies.

But luckily for me, I live in SoCal — a.k.a. heaven for would-be cleansers and fasters. And a local juice maker came to my liquid rescue.

The company? Ritual Cleanse, an organic juice cleanse company based in the O.C. Ritual Cleanse had just added a couple L.A. pick up locations, and let me try a cleanse day on them. So last week, I got up bright and early and headed on down the street to Barry’s Bootcamp in West Hollywood — and picked up a cooler bag full of liquid libations to get started.

In the bag was Ritual Cleanse’s Classic Reset — a set of six fresh, organic, unpasteurized juices that come in 17-ounce bottles, numbered with the order you’re supposed to drink them in. But I actually began a day with the Shred — an extra two-juice add on to the cleanse made for juicers who still want to get their workout in! As soon as I got home, I sipped the pre-Shred — a potently sweet mix of carrot, beet, apple, pear, and celery — which gave me an organic sugar kick that pushed out the door for my morning run! Post-workout, I refueled with the post-Shred, a creamy almond milkshake spiced with cinnamon and vanilla that felt like a well-deserved treat for miles well run.

After that, it was on to the six regular juices. Four were alkalizing drinks made with all good green veggies — spinach, romaine, kale, celery, and cucumber — sweetened with green apple and kicked up a notch with ginger. Early afternoon came the spicy lemonade sweetened with agave and spiked with cayenne to get the metabolism going. At the end of the day, I rewarded myself with the most decadent drink of all: A thick and sweet cashew milkshake spiced with cinnamon, nutmeg, and vanilla.

With the Shred, the juice cleanse comes to about 1400 calories — so it’s not really surprising I didn’t feel hungry. In fact, I found that a day of just juice did my tummy a lot of good — because in the days before, I’d found out the hard way that eating raw spinach doubles me over with stomach cramps for unknown reasons. The Ritual Cleanse juice feast cured me of the queasiness I’d been feeling — and got me ready for the next day of the Crazy Sexy Diet cleanse, with food again!

Ritual Cleanse especially impressed me because it uses all organic juices — unlike many juice cleanse companies. Plus, the fresh, unpasteurized liquid goodness is made nearby in the O.C. Each day of juice comes in a cooler bag topped off with ice packs — which you can keep for future picnics or return to any pickup location for reuse. Of course, there is the issue of plastic waste, since all the juices are delivered in PETE plastic bottles. That puts the cleanse off limits for plastic purgers — but in all fairness, the waste for the Ritual Cleanse isn’t any greater than the bottled juices and other drinks you buy at the store.

Want to try the cleanse yourself? The Classic Reset costs $80 a day — which isn’t cheap, but the 10 percent off coupon from Vital Juice should help! Adding on the Shred option will add on an extra $15. You can pick up your cleanse at locations throughout L.A. or O.C. — or less greenly and more expensively, get it FedExed to you.

Top photo via Ritual Cleanse; bottom photo by Siel

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