A SECOND post today? Yeah, that’s right! I’m on a roll!
A couple of my work friends requested some easy recipes. At the time, I was drinking a smoothie that I had made at home, and they started to ask how I had made it. It sounds silly, but I hadn’t really thought about what went into it. I just threw a bunch of fruit and yogurt into the blender and voila! my smoothie was born. I had never actually measured the ingredients, though, so I couldn’t really explain the recipe to anyone. So, I decided to actually measure the ingredients when I made my breakfast smoothie today, and to then post them for you to try out yourself.
I made a raspberry smoothie today, but that’s just because I felt like raspberries. I’ve made mango, strawberry-banana, mixed berry, pineapple, etc. I buy a bunch of different frozen fruits, so I have a lot of options. This recipe is just one example of what you can do with a little fruit, yogurt, milk, and a blender. The possibilities, though, are endless. Change the fruit, change the yogurt, change the liquid, and add in some extras, and you almost always have a delicious smoothie.
The basic recipe is 1/2 cup Fruit (I like frozen, usually) + 1/2 cup Yogurt + 1/2 cup Liquid (+ add in + sweetener–both optional). You can add more liquid (to thin) or fruit or yogurt (to thicken) if you want. See the bottom for some more ideas.
Raspberry Smoothie
Serves 1
Prep time: 5 minutes
Blend time: 1 minute, max
Ingredients:
1/2 cup frozen raspberries
1/2 cup plain yogurt (low-fat or fat-free)
1/2 cup plain soy milk
1 tablespoon chia seeds
1 teaspoon honey
Put everything into a container and blend with an immersion blender (or, put everything in a blender and blend). Serve.
Change it up:
- Fruit: Frozen strawberries, mango, mixed berries, pineapple. Fresh berries or bananas are also good. Try mixing different kinds of fruit together such as:
- strawberries and bananas
- strawberries, raspberries, and blueberries
- mango and pineapple
- raspberry and mango
- not a fruit, but try adding a small handful of spinach or kale to your fruit smoothie if you want to be trendy and drink a green smoothie (this is not recommended by me, because I think it’s kind of gross).
- Yogurt: use vanilla or plain
- Liquids: regular milk, soy milk, rice milk, almond milk, orange juice, apple juice, cranberry juice, pineapple juice, etc. They all taste good with various types of milk, but I think that OJ is good in the strawberry-banana smoothie and mango-pineapple smoothie.
- Add-ins: chia seeds, oat bran, protein powder, or just forget about the add-ins altogether. The add-ins tend to make smoothies more filling, so you might want to make two smoothie servings if you’re not using any add-ins.
- Sweetener: you don’t always need one, but if you do, try honey, agave, sugar, brown sugar, maple syrup, stevia, or anything else you can think of. Start with 1/2 teaspoon and add more to taste.
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