smoothies

My VitaMix has arrived, so now I intend to be the smoothie queen. Does anyone have a favorite recipe they'd like to share? I've got 2 basic recipes that I rotate.

peanut butter / banana / chocolate smoothie

frozen banana
1 to 2 T peanut butter
1 to 2 T carnation instant breakfast mix
milk / yogurt

and then your basic fruit smoothie

frozen berries
frozen banana
milk
honey

[alison]

Re: smoothies

I put a scoop of kashi GO LEAN shake mix in with milk, a very ripe banana and frozen berries (raspberries, strawberries, blackberries, etc).

[Cumberland]

Re: smoothies

Green Smoothie

1 banana
1 inch chunk of peeled ginger
one whole seedless lime, peeled
1/3 cup of frozen fruit such as pineapple
a large handful of a green leafy vegetable-like collards, beets tops, spinach
fill halfway with water, add ice if you want it super icy.

Blend.

I swear, it is pretty good. The combo of the ginger and the lime makes it very refreshing, you dont really taste the greens. I have cut out the ginger and used coconut cream which is even better but that adds the fat.

[Meenah]

Re: smoothies

Vanilla Yogurt
Vanilla Soy milk
Banana
Frozen Berries

[Flynn]

Re: smoothies

Vanilla Yogurt
Vanilla Soy milk
Banana
Frozen Berries

I use this one too but sometimes add some ice cubes!

Re: smoothies

Is that Kashi thing a diet thing, or just a protein thing?

[alison]

Re: smoothies

Is that Kashi thing a diet thing, or just a protein thing?

I a protein thing.
You can take a look at the nutrition facts:
http://www.kashi.com/products/golean_shakes_vanilla

Instead of pumping my shakes with sugar (let's face it, a banana doesn't always cut the bitterness out of berries), I feel good about using this mix.

I use the vanilla one.

[peggyfromwastate]

Re: smoothies

I'm curious about the VitaMix-- is it way better than a regular blender? And if so, how?

Re: smoothies

So far, absolutely! It's got amazing power. It just devoured the frozen banana - in seconds. I also liked the texture I got out of it as well - much more professional smoothie than I ever got from my Kitchen Aid blender. My MIL uses hers to make chutney, so it handles leafy stuff well, too (cilantro).

They're really expensive though - I don't know that I would have bought one for myself.

[peggyfromwastate]

Re: smoothies

Thanks!!! If you make a lot of smoothies, you can run through the motors relatively quickly... At least we did-- we like to chop up ice and stuff in our smoothies- and frozen fruit can really be tough.

Re: smoothies

Alright - back to Kashi. I've been to 3 places and haven't been able to find it. Do you order it online??

[alison]

Re: smoothies

Alright - back to Kashi. I've been to 3 places and haven't been able to find it. Do you order it online??

I just go to Dominick's (Safeway/Vons) and get it in the health food area.
Trader Joes also has a mix that is very similar (it might actually be Kashi).

[Meenah]

Re: smoothies

It is in every grocery store here, in the cereal section.

Re: smoothies

I finally got the Kashi stuff. A dept. manager at one of the local groceries was nice enough to offer to call me if he could get it in, and then went ahead and ordered it for me. I bought 1 chocolate and 1 vanilla. The boys & I had a vanilla w/frozen strawberries and a banana in it this morning. YUM!

Thanks for the rec.

[DCJenn]

Re: smoothies

I just made one recently that turned out GREAT:

1 c skim milk
roughly a cup of frozen blueberries
a few pieces of candied ginger
a sprinkle of ground ginger
a sprinkle of cinnamon

Yummy!

I'm so making that espresso one. delish sounding.

as for the Vita-mix- there is nothing it can't do, except grind meat. (thought better of it and used the food processor instead.) I've made great soups with it, too.

Jenn