Green Smoothie Tutorial

I have done several posts regarding green smoothies and thought I would consolidate all the important tips into one post. Remember, though, these are my tips regarding making tasty and healthy green smoothies that you and your kids will enjoy. However, my taste buds and yours may not agree on what is "tasty", so feel free to experiment if my recipes/tips don't work for your taste buds.

A simple, basic recipe for making green smoothies requires your choice of greens, a liquid, frozen or fresh fruits, and a sweetener (optional). Any greens will work. For liquids, water or juice are recommended, but some people do use milk, soy milk and coconut milk, etc. I just don't prefer the taste of milks in my green smoothies so I use water or juice, generally juice as I don't have to use a sweetener when I use juice. I prefer juices that are not from concentrate, like orange-pineapple juice from Simply Orange or acai juice by Bom Dia. For fruits, I prefer frozen fruits or a combination of fresh and frozen fruits as the frozen fruits give the smoothie a thicker more smoothie-esque quality, like the smoothies I used to make from yogurt, milk, and fruit. I have made smoothies with strawberries, mangos, bananas, peaches, blueberries, blackberries, and pineapple all with great success. When I use a sweetener, I prefer agave nectar or honey. I also add flaxseed meal to my smoothies.

To make your smoothies, place greens and liquid in your blender and blend until smooth. Add fruit and any other ingredients you choose such as flaxseed meal or sweeteners and blend until smooth again. You may have to add extra juice to allow the frozen fruits to blend completely.

My best tip for green smoothies is just try it. I know it sounds weird, but its a great way to get the benefits of consuming greens without having to deal with the greens taste.

Down to the single digits and Green Recipe #3 (also lactose free)

I'm sorry I've been MIA lately, but my husband is going to be shipping off for Army Basic Combat Training May 9th. Yes, Mother's Day. AKA a week from tomorrow. We have been crazy busy with all the little things that need to be completed by the time he leaves, so it has been understandably hectic lately and I haven't been online very much lately.

I have been diving more and more into green smoothies these days.

Recipe #3 (also lactose free)
handfull of spinach
3/4 cup Orange Pineapple Juice (I used simply orange)
1 banana
handful of fresh strawberries
handful of frozen pineapple
handful of fresh grapes

It was very good. Izzy cried when she finished hers, so I gave her more. Evie and Addy left some in their cups. I thought they were done with them, but they came back for the rest. I was so happy they enjoyed them so much. I enjoyed mine, too. At least, what little I got to drink. These days, whatever I have the girls want, even if they have the exact same thing in front of them. Its kind of cute, but more frustrating. I have to eat in the living room while they eat in the kitchen just so I can eat. . . This, too, shall pass. . . I hope ;)

Green Smoothie recipe # 2 (also lactose free)

Ingredients:
1/2-3/4 cup orange pineapple juice (I used Simply Orange with pineapple)
1 handful spinach (I used walmart brand, which was $1.98 for 10 ounces as opposed to fresh express that was $2.78 for 6 ounces and organic which was $2.98 for 5 ounces)
3/4- 1 cup frozen peach slices (I used whatever kind Walmart has in their frozen section.)
1-2 tbsp agave nectar (to taste)

I tried this recipe the other day and loved it. The shade of green was a bit disconcerting at first, but the flavor was fantastic and we all know good tasted really helps you get over looks weird fast. I'm thinking about getting the orange-mango juice from simply orange and getting frozen mango and trying that. I'm not sure what other kinds of greens I'll experiment with next, but I think its safe to say I'm hooked on green smoothies. . .

Oh, and even Joey (my picky hubby) liked this smoothie. I was shocked. I though he was just saying he liked it to spare my feelings, but he drank 1/2 a cup of it (which was all I gave him because I didn't expect him to drink it) and said he liked it. . . I drank this after the kids were in bed, so I don't know if they'll like it or not, but Joey liking it makes me brave enough to try it on the kiddos.

Non-Green Smoothie Recipe #1 (lactose free version)

I made non-green green smoothies for the girls for snack yesterday and they were a hit. Pretty much.

I didn't follow a recipe, just threw stuff in, but I'll try to guestimate.

I used about 1/2 cup of water and a big handful of spinach (it filled up my blender), blended on "liquify" setting until it liquified, then I added a banana, 7 fresh strawberries, about 1/2 cup of frozen blueberries and blackberries, about 1/2 cup of frozen peach slices, and some honey and blended until smoothe. It was a dark purple color (which I told the girls was from the combo of blueberries, blackberries and strawberries). They all liked it. Except Evie kept picking out the scratchy parts of the blackberries. So now I'm thinking its a texture thing, like the same texture as broccoli, which she won't eat. Also, she likes me to "feed" her like I "feed" Izzy (hold the straw for her). Its an attention thing.

Today, I'm going to try the yogurt, milk, peaches and spinach and honey and see if they will drink a green green smoothie.

Quick, easy, yummy recipes and green smoothies

For some reason, blogger won't let me comment right now, so I just wanted to give you guys a heads up that I'll be posting a lot more quick, easy, yummy, tried and true recipes in the coming days, partially because they are wonderful and I like to share and partially so I don't forget how to make them when Joey's gone. Its funny how many times I ask Joey to remind me what temp I cook dishes at, etc, when I'm cooking and I won't be able to ask him when he's gone, so I'll post them on here so if I forget, I can just reference my blog. I'll be using a lot of quick, easy, yummy, tried-and-true recipes while Joey's gone as I think that sticking with what the girls are familiar with and already like will be less stressful for the kiddos than giving them a bunch of new stuff to try, which sometimes stresses my middle daughter out. Not only am I going to add some more recipes, but I'm also going to add a new category that's "quick recipes" so you can find the quick, easy recipes quickly.

I am going to introduce some new stuff to the girls while Joey is here, though. If they like them, then they will be "tried-and-true" recipes by the time he leaves, so we'll be able to stick with them then.

The first thing I'm going to introduce is green smoothies. I've seen people talking about them on Diaper Swappers before, but wasn't inspired to try them until my sister said she was going to try them. I did some research about it today and the idea behind green smoothies (which don't have to be green by the way) is to add green, leafy veggies to your diet without tasting them. In theory, and keep in mind that I haven't tried these yet, spinach has no detectable flavor when added to a smoothie.

My typical smoothie recipe is 1/2 cup yogurt, 1/4-1/2 cup milk, 1/2 cup frozen fruit (peaches or strawberries and pineapple typically), 1 tbsp flax seed meal and 1 tbsp honey for one serving.

According to my research, to add greens to it you put the greens in with the liquid and blend that together before adding the rest of the ingredients. I also saw that if you add berries to the smoothie, it makes the smoothie a different color besides green (purplish), thereby creating a non-green green smoothie. So if your kiddos freak out at the color green, its rather easily masked.

You can also do green smoothies with bananas in them in place of the yogurt to make them creamy and you can use water in place of the milk to make a lactose free green smoothie, but I'm going to start with what I know that I like, add the spinach and see what kind of difference the spinach makes in the taste. I keep saying spinach because that is what my sister was adding to her smoothies, but in my research today I found you can use any kind of greens, although different greens have different levels of taste. Some are bitterer than others, so you'd have to add more honey/fruit to counteract the bitterness.

True to the creed that variety is the spice of life, my research also indicated that the best way to do green smoothies is not to eat today what you ate yesterday, meaning if you had a strawberry banana spinach smoothie yesterday, then today you should have something different -- different greens and different fruit. But since we don't eat a lot of greens and I'm just starting out and figuring out what recipes to use, etc, and since I just got back from grocery shopping for this week, I'm going to be making smoothies with spinach thru at least Friday this week and then I'll get a variety of greens and fruit for next week.

The best reason to incorporate greens into your diet is because they are invaluable at removing toxins from your body. Kale, for example, has so much fiber that it can soak up several times its own weight in toxins from your body. And less toxins in our bodies is always a plus in my book. Plus, if my girls will actually drink it, its another way to sneak veggies into their diet, which is especially important for Evie, who is very anti-veggie.

So the girls are having their nap time now. When nap time is almost over (since its important to drink them soon after making them to preserve their nutritional content), I will go into the kitchen, whip up a batch of green smoothies and then bring them downstairs for snack time. I'll let you know how it works out for us and what recipe I use (if it turns out to be any good).