ADDING SMOOTHIES

It’s been four months since I’ve posted anything on this blog. AND it’s been just as long that I have been struggling to be motivated to make healthy lifestyle choices. Why? Learning how to be a retired teacher, winter, clouds, rain, being alone.

When my husband got back into his truck after having his knee scoped (and his blood sugars skyrocketed enough to scare him), we bought him a Magic bullet so he could make healthy smoothies in his truck. Unfortunately, he found that trying to keep fruit frozen in his tiny truck fridge was difficult if not impossible. He liked the smoothies, but it was too much trouble to make them in the space he had.

So, when he came home in early May, I asked him to let me use it. No problem. Right? Wrong!

When I finally kicked myself in the backside enough, I found that he had forgotten to give me the extracting blade base. He delivered that right before we took off for a camping trip.

So, last week was the first time I had the opportunity to use it. Last spring, I had been buying prepackaged smoothie mixes and using a different blender. I was hooked on the smoothies. I added some flax and chia seeds to the concoction, and found that I had energy for the whole day. But the prepackaged smoothies became hard to find and some contained ingredients that I couldn’t pronounce. YUCK!

So I scoured the internet for smoothie recipes. What I found were recipes with ingredients that I didn’t have, came in bulk, or were difficult to find where I live. EXCEPT for one source. It gave me a proportion suggestion and ideas of what to put in the blender cup.

Here’s how I’m interpreting the recipe.

1 cup green stuff (Spinach, kale, spring greens are the green stuff of choice at the moment.)

1 cup frozen fruit/s (I froze blueberries, raspberries, and blackberries last fall when they were reasonably priced. I find that frozen fruit doesn’t water down the smoothie and gives it the consistency of a icy smoothie. It also seems to taste better than if it was just cold.)

1 cup unsweetened almond milk

2 oz plain yogurt (This is the tastiest plain yogurt I have found.)

1 Tablespoon of a Superfoods powder (This is a combination of chia, goji, cacao, and maca ground into a powder. It is put out by Nutribullet, and I found it at Bed, Bath, and Beyond. The cacao gives it a somewhat bitter, dark chocolate taste, but it was easy to get used to.)

Layer in the order given and blend until smooth. (I take a spoon to see if the greens have been completely pulverized. If not, I run it for a few more seconds.)

I started this last Tuesday, and have become addicted to this. I either have it for (or with) breakfast, as a snack between breakfast, or as lunch. One day I tried it for dinner, but found I was wide awake well past midnight.

I also know that before the camping trip, my weight had been rising, and on the camping trip, we indulged in s’mores, beer, and moonshine. When I weighed myself on Saturday, I found that I had already lost at least 3 pound over the 4 days I had been drinking smoothies.

I’m so hooked on these that I plan on taking the Magicbullet and ingredients on our next camping trip.