This fall I started making green smoothies as a get out of the house quick, I have class from 8am to 12pm, breakfast. I was really surprised that I liked it, I just KNEW that I wouldn't. I'm glad I tried it. It not too expensive to start. You really do not need those ridiculously expensive blenders, I bought my single serve blender from walmart it was between $9-$14. I don't remember because the price kept fluctuating.
Around thanksgiving time I tried Kale in my smoothie because I caught a manager's special on Kale for 99 cents. The spinach you can't really taste once blended in but the kale is pretty bitter. Some people add sugar/honey/agave/whatever sweetener to fix it. I don't like the idea of adding sugar to my smoothie. I tried to deal with it but I noticed that when I added banana, a little bit more fruit and lime juice (not lemon it doesn't seem to work as well) the bitterness was gone!
I switched from (frozen) Spinach to Kale because I like the taste and also because Kale is one of the most beneficial greens in terms of nutrition. I was further convinced after watching this TED talk where this physician changed her diet to include alot of Kale (and other things) to reverse the progression of her multiple sclerosis (MS). They are good for your mitochondria (BTW, mitochondria is my favorite organelle). I'm going to add a link so you can view it at the bottom. For the green smoothies my normal ingredients are listed below.
Components
Orange Juice (1 cup)
Plain non fat/low fat yogurt (2T)
Spinach (usually frozen) or Kale (2-3 cups)
Frozen pineapple, peach, etc (1/2 cup)
Ripe Banana (usually 1/2 or whole)
Protein Powder (I scoop ~20g protein)
Extras (things I sometimes add)
Lemon/ Lime Juice (a few squirts)
ground Flax seeds (a sprinkle) they will make your smoothie grainy
Oats (usually pre-soaked) it can also add grainy factor
Green Tea (usually I brew a strong 1/2 cup and replace 1/2c of orange juice if I do this)
Ginger (a little grated ginger)
*sometimes the blender gets stuck because the mix is too thick, I just add water.
I started buying more frozen veggie mixes from Kroger and using those to cook with instead of buying fresh and having to chop.I prefer the texture of frozen to canned veggies and with the recent BPA scare, I doubt I'll switch to using only canned veggies. Its a real time saver and with my intense graduate school life that will be re-starting in about one week, I'm trying to organize all the healthy shortcuts I can make now. My go to mixes are the
Vegetable soup mix
Fiesta mix
Italian mix
Mexican mix
I normally season the last three mixes according to the meal I'm making and serve myself so my plate is 2/3 veggies 1/3 meat or main dish.
What are your healthy timesavers?
Kemi! Happy New Year's Eve! I'm so glad you've got this blog, and, Lord willing, I hope you post lots on it in the New Year.
ReplyDeleteI had no idea kale was so good. I've never tried it. I get on fresh spinach kicks and use it to make stir fry, and I love it in soup. And dip, lol. But I get burnt out easily. I always thought it tasted kinda like tea?! Don't know why I think that....
The smoothies I used to make blended peanut butter, flavored oatmeal packets, yogurt, milk, berries/fresh peach. They were more like milkshakes, and had 400-600 calories each, so it was too heavy for a snack and almost too much for a meal when I was trying to lose weight.
Those frozen veggie mixes from Kroger are the bomb! The little bags are $1 here. I love the onion-three-color pepper mix. I can't make any kind of soup without a bag or two of that. Think I got the special soup mix bag once, too, with lima beans or something, but it was still great!
Here's wishing you a healthy, happy New Year!
Looking so forward to your recipes....
Happy New Year to you, too! I stay on task much better when I journal/blog. And when I don't blog, I get realllly behind on reading other blogs I really missed keeping up to date with everything. I will be staying on top in 2012!
ReplyDeleteI have a soup post coming up where I used the kroger soup mix. I love those veggie bags, I used to stock up when they would go on sale for 10 for 10 now they are $1 all the time.
I counted the calories for my smoothies and they run from 350-500 calories. I need to be more diligent in measuring out everything because regardless of how much stuff i throw in it, I get hungry about 2 hours after I drink the smoothie. I'm trying to add more filling things w/o too many more calories. Did you use protein powder when you made your smoothies?
I think Kale reminds you of tea because its bitter! It has a similar bitter leafy taste. Now that you mentioned it, I bought that kale to use in soup and I ended up blending it because I didn't want to waste it!