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Easy Chocolate Smoothie

written by Ali

This post is sponsored by Barlean’s. All opinions are mine alone.

This easy chocolate smoothie is a great way to include just a bit of chocolate into your week. One of the great sponsors for #Choctoberfest is Barlean’s. I’ve had the privilege of working with Barlean’s before and made these great healthy whole grain scones using their butter flavored coconut oil. It’s a one to one substitute for butter. I use it all the time on popcorn.

\I love the Barlean’s story - the Barleans started out as a fishing family, pioneering a direct order system to deliver salmon. One Barlean son got interested in a better way to press flax seed and between the direct order system and the Omega 3 rich flax seed oil, a business was born. Barlean’s products are health-focused. As I said at the start, I’ve made great use of their butter flavored coconut oil. During #Choctoberfest, I got to try out several new ingredients, including the Green Powder Chocolate Silk Flavor and the Essential Woman Omega Swirl Chocolate Mint. The Green Powder Chocolate Silk is an essential ingredient in this easy chocolate smoothie. But I love the Essential Woman Omega Swirl Chocolate Mint , too - it’s so good in my yogurt in the mornings!

Barlean’s Green Powder Chocolate Silk is made with antioxidant-rich fair trade cocoa. You won’t notice the super concentrated blend of greens, fruits, and vegetables, because you will be thoroughly immersed in the great chocolate flavor. Best yet, there’s no added sugar, which means I have no problem adding it to my all natural smoothies.

I’ve been enjoying this easy chocolate smoothie with my lunch all week this week. I’d definitely encourage you to try this smoothie out.

Easy Chocolate Smoothie
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Easy Chocolate Smoothie

Ingredients

  • 2 ripe bananas
  • 1/2 avocado
  • 1 cup plain or vanilla Greek yogurt
  • 2 scoops Barlean's Greens Powder Chocolate Silk
  • 1 cup water

Instructions

  1. Combine all ingredients in a blender and blend until smooth.
  2. Serves 4. Enjoy!
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October 19, 2017 1 comment
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BeveragesFarmer's MarketLunch RecipesVegetarian

Tomato Celery Green Smoothie

written by Ali

It’s rapidly getting to the point of the season when I’m just overwhelmed with veggies enough to think that making a tomato celery green smoothie is a good idea. Fortunately, it really was a good idea. Yes – I’m getting to a point of vegetable overload. It’s ok – it’s a pattern I go through every year. Around January, I miss fresh veggies so bad, I’m driven to purchasing tomatoes and cucumbers from the store (and instantly regretting it). April brings some degree of hope: after all, morels are showing up in the market and there are the occasional snap peas. May and June are much more hopeful. July is reasonable in its level of abundance. September, well, September is a full out onslaught of squash and tomatoes and greens.

This week was especially bad. We got our CSA veggies (zucchini, tomatoes, red onion, cucumbers, carrots, collard greens, peppers, strawberries, and celery) and then went to the farmer’s market and bought more zucchini, more peppers, lettuce, basil, red cabbage and cherry tomatoes. I could have managed if I’d just left it there. But no, then I went on Saturday and helped a friend can 300 pounds of Albacore tuna. Yes – you read that number right. 300 pounds of fish. I still smell like tuna. I also can’t wait to dig into a jar and make a tuna salad, but that’s a post for another day. What’s more important to this post is that by Sunday, my back had said no more. Forget it – don’t even dream about even moving. Abundance of veggies in the fridge versus cranky back. The back won.

I ate the cucumbers and cherry tomatoes as snacks. I made zucchini pancakes, despite the protests of my back. I sat and drank sangria and read. That was Sunday. By Monday, Labor Day, the Icy Hot had kicked in. I did yoga and then contemplated the contents of the fridge. I couldn’t let the beautiful celery leaves go to waste. (The celery itself will survive a few more days.) I couldn’t neglect the collard greens for another week without serious guilt. Plus, all those tomatoes.

So, I made a tomato celery green smoothie with the tomatoes (did I mention that somehow in the process of tuna canning, we ended up walking away with even more tomatoes from our friends’ garden?), the celery leaves, and a few of the collard greens. The only thing that it was missing was vodka – but that’s just not healthy. This is a healthy tomato celery green smoothie. And I’ll totally look the other way if you add an ounce of vodka to this and call it a Bloody Mary smoothie.

This week, I’ll be working on catching up with the abundance. I’m pretty sure we’ll skip the farmer’s market this week and just eat what comes in the CSA. I’m positive that by January, I’ll be missing all of this again and the cycle will start all over. In the meantime, I’m going to be drinking my tomato celery green smoothie and being just the slightest bit annoyed by all the produce that keeps coming my way.

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Tomato Celery Green Smoothie

Ingredients

  • 4 medium tomatoes, cut into quarters
  • 1 cup celery leaves
  • 4 collard green leaves, spines removed, and roughly chopped (or 2 cups spinach leaves)
  • Juice from 1 lemon
  • 3 dashes green Tabasco

Instructions

  1. Combine all ingredients in a blender and blend. Add water as needed to smooth out the smoothie. Serves 4. Enjoy!
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September 5, 2017 3 comments
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BeveragesBreakfastLunch Recipes

Sunshine Powered Carrot Smoothie

written by Ali

My inspiration for this week’s sunshine powered carrot smoothie was a bunch of the most vibrant carrots I received in this week’s CSA share. The carrots absolutely radiated sunshine, which I can’t get enough of here of late.

Here’s a quick re-cap of what this last week’s CSA bounty brought us: peas, broccoli, carrots, cauliflower, Tokyo bekana, basil, and strawberries. Briefly, in case you were wondering, Tokyo bekana is a Chinese cabbage – really good in stir fries, which is how we used it. The peas and broccoli also ended up in stir fry. We also bought chard and radishes at the farmer’s market, so the chard went to a frittata and a breakfast bowl. I’ll munch on the radishes throughout the week. The basil ended up in a pasta caprese dish. The cauliflower will be showcased in a post later this week – definitely check back in or subscribe to my email list, as I’ll be posting my first in a series of recipes over the next few months that features an awesome product.

The carrots all went into this sunshine powered carrot smoothie. I had some lovely organic oranges laying around, as well as a bottle of pineapple juice. I couldn’t help but wonder how it would all go together. The carrots lend an amazing sweetness to this smoothie and the color is so intensely orange. Carrots are also a spectacular source of all sorts of vitamins, including vitamin A. Between all the fruits and veggies, this is a vitamin packed smoothie.

I used my immersion blender to make this smoothie. I grated the carrots first and then combined orange segments and juice and blended it all to make the smoothie. I portioned out the smoothie into half pint jars and froze them for the week. This is a perfect pick-me-up at lunch time.

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Sunshine Powered Carrot Smoothie

Ingredients

  • 4 carrots, peeled and grated
  • 2 oranges, peeled and segmented
  • 1 ½ cup pineapple juice

Instructions

  1. Combine all ingredients and blend until smooth. Enjoy! Serves 5
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July 10, 2017 0 comment
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BeveragesLunch Recipes

Healthy Pineapple Mango Smoothie

written by Ali

This Healthy Pineapple Mango Smoothie is my go-to treat for a week that has been nothing but chaotic. I’ve mentioned in previous posts that we might be moving and as it turns out, we are most definitely moving and very soon. We finally have most details worked out – you know, like if we’ll have a house to live in and that kind of thing. I’m transitioning out of one job and into a new one while also trying to avoid packing anything that’s essential until the last minute. Through all of this, I’ve still wanted to have a healthy lunch. Which made the timing of a sponsored post kind of perfect, especially since I had a chance to work with Halo Top Ice Cream to create this healthy pineapple mango smoothie.

If you aren’t familiar with Halo Top, all I can say is get familiar quickly – it’s so worth it. Halo Top is an all-natural ice cream that’s low-calorie, low-sugar, and high in protein that actually tastes like ice cream. At first I was a bit skeptical, but I promise you, it’s true. We started out with the chocolate mocha chip, and while I’d planned to use it in a recipe, one night, after we’d spent all day packing boxes and moving them to our garage, I needed chocolate too desperately to wait. We devoured it in one sitting, which is ok, because the chocolate mocha chip is only 280 calories.

I went back to Whole Foods and got a second pint of the vanilla bean, which I used to make these healthy mango pineapple smoothies. I never use ice cream in smoothies because of the calories – but Halo Top ice cream makes me feel perfectly ok with it. The Vanilla Bean ice cream is 240 calories so divided out over four smoothies, the calorie impact is minimal. Plus, it’s so creamy and good. I was a kiddo of the eighties, so vividly remember getting Orange Julius at the mall. This smoothie takes me back to those very happy memories. It is tropical tasting and smooth and perfect for what’s shaping up to be an intensely busy few weeks.

On a total side note: since I bought a whole pineapple for this recipe, I couldn’t resist looking to see if I could actually grow another pineapple plant from the top of the one I chopped up for this healthy pineapple mango smoothie. Because, in the midst of a move, what I need is a project that takes some degree of attention and care. Still, I can’t resist sharing what a pineapple top looks like before it gets put in water to grow some roots. I’ll post updates on Instagram about whether or not this actually works.

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Healthy Pineapple Mango Smoothie

Ingredients

  • 1 pint Halo Top Vanilla Bean ice cream
  • ½ fresh pineapple (about 2 cups)
  • 4 mangoes, peeled and chopped

Instructions

  1. Blend all ingredients using an immersion blender or in a blender. Makes 4 eight-ounce servings. Enjoy!
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Disclosure: This post contains sponsored content brought to you by Halo Top Ice Cream. As always, all opinions expressed in this post are 100% my own.

 

 

 

April 12, 2017 15 comments
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BeveragesFarmer's MarketLunch RecipesQuick and EasyVegetarian

Sunrise Spring Smoothie

written by Ali

This Sunrise Spring Smoothie is a great, healthy way to start the day. Of course, they might be even better if I actually drank them at sunrise. Let me rephrase - they’d be great if I could actually see the sunrise. Here of late, it’s just been rain…and more rain. I’m starting to feel like the sun is never going to come out. Even the three daffodils that I planted in our front bed are looking depressed (ok - two daffodils - I cut one of them for the photo shoot for these smoothies).

Regardless of when you decide to drink your smoothie, the sunrise spring smoothie is a beautiful blend of all sorts of in season fruits and veggies. Yes - you read that right. I used a handful of beet greens for the top layer of these smoothies. I love all things beet, and any time I find a bunch of beets that have a great looking set of leaves, I buy them so I can get maximum benefit out of them. Beet greens aren’t very beet-y; instead, they taste like a very green version of, well, greens. Beet greens are full of protein, magnesium, zinc, potassium, and B6. One of my favorite ways of making use of them is blending them into smoothies.

I’m also getting desperate for strawberries. However, we live in the PNW, which means the best berries are the ones we get locally here. They won’t be available until around June. In the meantime, I’m willing to buy strawberries that have been shipped here, but will use them primarily in smoothies, because they just don’t quite taste right yet. I also threw in some more mangoes - I discovered champagne mangoes the other day at Whole Foods. Champagne mangoes are a smaller mango and are definitely sweeter than their larger counterparts. They are perfect for the yellow layer for my sunrise spring smoothie.

As I mentioned in my tropical turmeric smoothie recipe a few weeks ago, one of the best parts of smoothies is that they can be stored in 8 ounce jars and frozen. I pull a smoothie out of the freezer in the morning, throw it in my bag with the rest of my lunch and have both a great lunch treat, but also an automatic ice pack for whatever else I’m taking with me for the day. By lunch, my smoothie is thawed out and all I need to do is give it a good shake and drink it.

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Sunrise Spring Smoothie

Ingredients

  • 2 mangoes, peeled and diced
  • 1 pint strawberries, chopped
  • 1 bunch beet greens, roughly chopped
  • 1 1/2 cups unsweetened vanilla almond milk
  • 1 cup pineapple juice

Instructions

  1. If you are going to layer the smoothie, start by blending the mangoes and pineapple juice. Pour this layer into your glasses. Blend the strawberries and 1 1/4 cups almond milk next. Carefully pour onto the first layer in the glasses. Blend the remaining almond milk and beet greens last. Pour onto the second layer.
  2. If you are not layering, combine all ingredients and blend.
  3. Makes 4 eight ounce smoothies. These can be frozen and enjoyed as needed. Enjoy!
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April 5, 2017 1 comment
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BeveragesLunch Recipes

Green Power Smoothie

written by Ali

When life gives you beets, make a green power smoothie – this might just be my new motto. We’ve had a project going on for the past three months that has involved a lot of driving, a lot of weekends away from home, and, unfortunately, eating what feels like a lot of fast food. Since that project is pretty much over, I’m feeling like it’s time to detox. Fortunately, it is summer and the farmer’s markets are in full swing, which means I have an abundance of fresh produce in the fridge. This past weekend, in addition to first of the season tomatoes, I also came home with Chioggia beets and a bag of mixed kale greens (though the latter was by accident – I actually thought I was grabbing a bag of spinach). My first impulse with the beets was to recreate a beet tartin recipe I’d had in Bandon, but then I decided that would take too much work, so opted to create a smoothie instead.

Chiogga beets are wildly striped pink beets. They are a variety of beet that hails from Italy and they have a decidedly un-beety taste. In other words, a beet hater might find them more palatable than the traditional dark red beet. I’ll take beets in any form, but I do like the milder, sweet taste of the Chiogga for a smoothie. I hate wasting beet greens, so decided to wash up a handful and toss them in the smoothie too. And of course, I had that bag of kale greens that needed to be used up. We also brought home blueberries and thus, a power smoothie was born.

I made up freezer smoothie packs. This entails putting together some or all of the fruits and veggies for a smoothie in individual freezer bags and freezing them. It makes it easier to blend a smoothie a day for the week. I’m not a fan of including the greens in these, so left them separate and will add them as I go this week. I also added banana for a bit more flavor and to get some additional potassium in my diet. The most time consuming part of this is boiling the beets, but that’s a very hands-off process.

Green Power Smoothie
Makes 5 Servings

3 beets of any variety
4 bananas, peeled and chopped into chunks
1 pint blueberries
Several bunches of greens (kale, spinach, and/or beet greens)
Coconut water

Wash the beets to remove any major deposits of dirt. Add the beets to a large saucepan and cover with water. Bring them to a boil and let simmer for 45 minutes to an hour. You’ll know the beets are done when a knife or fork goes into them easily. Remove the beets and run cold water over them. When they are cool enough to handle, slip the peels off. Chop the beets into chunks.

To make smoothie packs, distribute the chopped beets, the chopped bananas, and the blueberries evenly into five freezer bags. Freeze.

When you are ready to make smoothies, add one frozen smoothie pack to about a cup of washed and de-stemmed greens in your blender. Add a half cup of coconut water and blend until smooth, adding more coconut water if needed to get a smooth consistency.

June 22, 2016 0 comment
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