I started daydreaming of an alternate solution... and then it came to me - SMOOTHIES! I could get more fresh fruit into my diet and trick my sweet tooth. Lacey has been posting sweet smoothie recipes and I knew I had to give this a try.
Like a typical New Yorker, I keep a bare minimum of kitchen supplies and therefore didn't even own a blender. After a few searches on Amazon, I ordered the Oster My Blend 250-Watt Blender. At only $30 this was a perfect smoothie maker for me. I loved the orange color, you can blend the smoothie right in the sport bottle (easy clean up!), it's dishwasher safe (not that I have a dishwasher), had great reviews and they also send recipes in the instruction manual to try!
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| http://www.oster.com/productdetails.aspx?pid=3573 |
Any tips on making a delicious smoothie? Do you prefer soy milk or orange juice? Do you use a lot of ice? What are your favorite fruits to mix? Do you use fresh or frozen fruit? Please tell me I can't mess up a smooth recipe!
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I love smoothies! I have one pretty much 6 mornings out of 7. I also have a single serve blender that blends in the travel cup and it definitely does make smoothie-making outrageously convenient!
ReplyDeleteI use frozen fruit and almond milk in pretty much every recipe. The frozen fruit (especially the banana) helps create a creamy, frosty texture without watering down the taste (which is what an iced-based smoothie with fresh fruit will do. The times I don't have a frozen banana and use a fresh one, it ends up being more like a liquid shake. If I add ice to fix it, it gets bland).
By using frozen fruit, you combine the needed ice and fruit into one! I stock up on bananas and keep a bag of sliced (somewhat ripe) bananas in my freezer so I can have a smoothie ready to go anytime! You'll have fun mix-n-matching and not every smoothie will taste exactly the same! It's fun!
I would say the one way you could mess up a smoothie (as I have!) is to put notoriously bitter greens into it that no amount of banana can compensate for (if you want a green smoothie, use banana and/or a nut butter to round out the taste). Kale is doable and you can keep adding more as your tastes adjust to it. Collards or chard on the other hand... deadly. I once made the mistake of making a swiss chard smoothie... Never. Again.
This is my favorite recipe (made almost daily!)
(Omit the wheat germ since you're GF)
http://madeformorehfs.blogspot.com/2012/06/smoothie-tastic-mornings.html
Have fun!
Also, if you love ice cream (as I did in my dairy-days), you must try banana soft serve! It's brilliant and hardly different than the real thing!
ReplyDeletehttp://madeformorehfs.blogspot.com/2012/12/made-for-more-lives-banana-nut-soft.html
There's no limit to what you can do with it/add in! (Cocoa, mint, coconut, etc).
Ahh that all sounds SO GREAT!! Thanks so much for the advice! I'll be getting my smoothie maker delivered this week so I will definitely be making smoothies next week (and kicking Ben & Jerry out the door for a while...). I will def need to stock up on fruits to make it convenient to make every day. Will keep everyone updated!
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SH! I'm so excited for you to join the smoothie club. Just as an added note, I've been making my smoothies lately with coconut water instead of soy! It's also super yummy.
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