How do you smoothie?

I've been on a bit of a smoothie kick lately, one or two a day, and a milkshake once a week.

I'm starting to get bored of the same thing though, so I'm looking for some new tips.

Currently, I get a cup full of the frozen mixed fruit from GFS, pour in some berry blend juice from Aldi and go. It's good, it's simple, but I feel like there's so much more I could be doing.

Looking at Google I see a lot of milk heavy recipes, or stuff like chia seeds and flax paste, and that doesn't really sound good to me. 

So how do you make them?

Heavy citrus. Orange, pineapple, coconut milk, white rum- wait that's a painkiller. Take out the white rum. That's a decent summer smoothie. 

Frozen banana, some plain yogurt, a little ice and some milk. I'll add strawberries or other berries if I have them.

Prunes...

Sorry. 

Painted 15" steel rim, chrome trim ring, chrome baby moon hub cap.

Banana, greek yogurt, protein powder, peanut butter, sometimes ice, sometimes milk.

Ok, I love smoothies from the health aspect. Lots of things to do. Here is my “base” recipe, we have it most days:

1. Raw oatmeal, blended to a fine powder (protein and fiber)
2. a cup of a dark green leafy (arugula, chard, spinach, kale) (Protein, fiber, iron, potassium). I like to freeze them before blending
3. Berries! for flavor and antioxidants, vitamins, etc. Vary them in your smoothies. Freeze them before blending
4. Apples, Banana, Oranges - mostly for taste and texture, nutritionally they pale compared to berries
5. Water

Random ramblings:

Avoid juice. You don’t need it in there, really just adding calories.

Blend oatmeal into a powder before I throw the fruit and veggies in. Makes it heartier, adds fiber. Other options are flax seed, chia seed, other seeds... blend it into a powder, it adds a little flavor but not too much. Tried hemp seeds once. Didn’t care for that. Too fatty. 

Bananas: most important part of a smoothie for me. Love them. Any fruit works well. Apples and pineapple are great for covering other tastes. Berries are the healthiest fruits.

Veggie options to add add some taste: beets, arugula, spinach, chard. I put veggies in every smoothie-great way to get veggies in your day.

My wife likes yogurt in it. I don’t. But you can try it, along with Greek yogurt. Ice cream is awesome, but that makes it unhealthy. 

If you like like peanut butter, that can be a fun addition. I’m not huge on it, but a different taste every once in awhile. 

Vanilla ice cream and a good lemonade.  If I want healthy, I'll eat a salad!

If you're looking for healthy, then that other stuff is really amazing.  I do a healthy smoothie most mornings.  I start with frozen fruit; oranges, berries, mango, papaya, apples, bananas.  Just buy fresh fruit and freeze them... better than the pre-frozen ones that have been treated with sugar solutions and other junk.  The fruit doubles as ice.  Then I do a protein powder.  Soy is the most protein-dense one, but I'm not supposed to do lots of soy (it's a hormone thing and plays into the gout discussion), so I often do whey or hemp protein.  Then a little flax seed meal, a little chia seed, a probiotic powder (verdict is still out on if this helps), and some kind of almond/cashew/other nut milk.  All of the "other" stuff that goes in there is 100% flavorless, so all you taste is the fruit, the nut milk, and whatever flavor your protein powder is.  I prefer vanilla since it goes with nearly anything.

I sometimes add Kale which you can taste, but I don't mind it, and it's super healthy.  Spinach is pretty healthy and mostly flavorless.  Avacado is full of good stuff and mostly flavorless, but it makes it super creamy.

If you're just looking for dessert drinks, I'm way off the mark

Ok, what's the point of the protein powder?

Aside from upping my fruit intake, I'm not particularly concerned with healthy. Frozen fruit and juice as I've been using has basically replaced my breakfast, which was whatever leftovers happened to be in the fridge or nothing before. I'll try switching to water tomorrow to see if it makes a taste difference.

That's not to say healthier wouldn't be a benefit though. 

Yogurt, juice, frozen fruit, protein powder if replacing a meal.  Or i just go to Pulp

Here’s one of my faves, it’s pretty veggie-heavy but some orange-mango juice can sweeten it up a bit:

cucumber

avocado

fresh parsley

red cabbage

lemon (keeps it fresh)

Spring mix or spinach

carrots

I try to do smoothies for lunch during the week and be a little careful of how much I eat for dinner.  On the weekends it's food all the time.

I like to add a banana or avocado for the smoothness it adds.

I do a big handful of spinach which helps it last till dinner time.

I use Coconut or Almond milk and a healthy dose of mixed frozen fruits.  I hadn't tried to freeze the spinach because I thought the spinach would just turn into disgusting slimy water if I did that so now I have to try that.

I add some soy protein.  I've tried all the other plant based ones but they tend to taste and feel like sawdust.

Occassionally I will blend in some of the carbonated fruit flavored waters at the last second to give it a slightly fizzy and lighter feel.

We vary the mixture and fruit daily

Just made one for lunch. I used oatmeal, fine ground as per recommendations. 

Note for the future, grind it, dump it out, and put it in AFTER everything else. Real pita to blend with it on the bottom of the cup. 

It's good though, works well with the peaches, pineapple, strawberry, and grapes with apple juice. Bit thicker too, which is a plus. 

I just chew my food. Like really well.

RevRico said:

Ok, what's the point of the protein powder?

Aside from upping my fruit intake, I'm not particularly concerned with healthy. Frozen fruit and juice as I've been using has basically replaced my breakfast, which was whatever leftovers happened to be in the fridge or nothing before. I'll try switching to water tomorrow to see if it makes a taste difference.

That's not to say healthier wouldn't be a benefit though. 

 

The protein takes it from a snack to a meal, basically.  It's kind of a control thing for me.  When I make a smoothie for breakfast, I can control what goes in it as opposed to getting my protein from sausage or eggs.  It is a means of making a meal with just the stuff in it you want - making a meal that fits your needs by assembling the individual blocks, so to speak.

I mostly do it because I don't have much opportunity to eat during the day (or I get into a project and forget).  Then I get so hungry that I buzz down to a fast food joint and get a chicken sammich.  At least having a smoothie, I know that I'm getting what I WANT to put in my body once a day.

Replace half of your fruit juice with almond milk and make sure @1/3 of the fruit is banana for texture and adjust everything else for taste. 

Mostly tomato, some onion and garlic, with balls of beef and pork protein 

RevRico said:

Ok, what's the point of the protein powder?

My goal is 200g of protein a day.  Protein powder makes it easier to hit that number.

I prefer not to have my food pre-chewed. I just eat the food that would go into a smoothie.

Brett_Murphy said:

I prefer not to have my food pre-chewed. I just eat the food that would go into a smoothie.

Do you eat all the ingredients for all of your meals separately?

Chocolate milk, protein powder, frozen berries, bananas... sometimes ice.  
If you smoothie sans banana you're doing it wrong.

SnowMongoose said:

Chocolate milk, protein powder, frozen berries, bananas... sometimes ice.  
If you smoothie sans banana you're doing it wrong.

Preach it.

Frozen strawberries, frozen peaches, frozen blueberries, peach schnapps, add sprite till liquid enough. (+Raspberry schnapps if so desired.)

For something thing the neighborhood of two pints of smoothie. The berries and yogurt get tweaked 'til the amount looks right:

1 cup-ish Frozen berry mix

1 banana

1/2 avocado

1 cup-ish yogurt (to my astonishment, we've been doing the specific carbohyrate DIY yogurt in an instant pot; it would smoothie the same with plain ol' Greek, I'm sure, we're just nominally getting a bump in beneficial cultures and a reduction in lactose, I think)

1-2 tsp honey

juice of half a lemon