I recently acquired a used Vitamix from my mom and I have been in smoothie heaven. My first Green Smoothie consisted of: a couple of handfuls of spinach, 1 orange, 1 banana, 1/2 cup ice, 1 cup water. Delicious! I had my husband take a picture so I could send my mom a thank you note.
I made this smoothie for breakfast:
1/2 cup oats
1 cup unsweetened almond milk
1 tbsp peanut butter
1 banana
2 dates
cinnamon
nutmeg
It was excellent, although next time I think I’ll thin it out with 1/2 cup of cold water.
So… do you make smoothies? If so, please share your favorite concoctions here!
-Sarah
I pretty much put a handful of kale or spinach or some carrots in every smoothie I make. You can’t taste that stuff at all. I also put Acai in all my smoothies, so they are purple from that and I don’t see the green.
I pretty much put a handful of kale or spinach or some carrots in every smoothie I make. You can’t taste that stuff at all. I also put Acai in all my smoothies, so they are purple from that and I don’t see the green.
Which brings me to this slight hijack…I finally made some kale chips after reading about them in your blog and YUM! I ate a whole batch today.
Joel Fuhrman, M.D., who wrote the book Eat to Live and most recently Eat for Health, is the king of green smoothies. His website has a recipe index with green smoothies and a forum with green smoothie threads. The only catch is that it costs $7.95 a month to get access to this material. Some recipes are available for free on his blog, though--diseaseproof.com. Do a search for “green smoothies” and click the “Smoothie Moves” search result for one version of my all-time favorite, chocolate-cherry smoothie. Here’s the one I make in my Vitamix (measurements are approximate):
Susan’s Chocolate Cherry Smoothie
1 c frozen cherries
1 banana
1/2 c plain soymilk
1-2 T cocoa powder
1 T flaxseeds
5 oz package baby spinach or baby lettuces
your choice of sweetener to taste
Here’s another of my favorites:
Susan’s Baby Bok Choy Smoothie
4 baby bok choy
1 medium apple
1 frozen banana (slice before freezing)
1 T flaxseeds
1/4 cup plain soymilk
your choice of sweetener to taste
I have cut way down on my green smoothie consumption though. I found that drinking my calories makes it easier to consume too many of them.
I am replacing my afternoon snack with the smoothie, not adding the smoothie in on top of my regular meals; I agree it is easy to over do it. I am finding that a bunch of raw fruits and veggies gives me a really great mid-day boost.
I’ve been thinking about smoothes as a way to increase my fruit and veggie intake. I used to have a smootie maker that had a tapered container and a spout at the bottom that I lived but it died on me. Vitamix is pretty far outside my price range. Any suggestions for alternatives? I already have a regular blender but it has the flat bottom and all the crud gets lodged in the bottom like the protein powder.
This thread inspired me to skip work this afternoon in favor of smoothie maker shopping. One of the benefits of working from home is that people never know that you are answering them from you iPhone while looking at jeans on sale at Luck Brand. (I got a little sidetracked from the smoothie maker shopping.)
I work from home 4/5 days of the week – er, 6/7 days? – so I know what you mean about iPhone + errands. I figure working at 10 p.m. makes up for it.
If you come up with an interesting smoothie concoction, let us know. I just made homemade hummus in the vitamix when I got home from the gym. Excellent!
I got my VitaMix used on craigslist and it is running like a champ. The older ones are great, and there is no need to pay top dollar for the latest version.
