My husband and I recently started making ourselves a smoothie every day before work. We discovered that even though we do not consider ourselves ‘breakfast people’, and don’t typically feel like eating until later in the morning, we don’t mind sipping on one in the car on the way to work. Knowing that eating breakfast is extremely important to good health and wellness, we thought a smoothie each morning would be a painless way to start out our day with the nutrition we know we should be getting each morning.
When we first tried smoothies, we started with a very basic recipe. A cup of milk, some protein powder (we use plain rice protein because it is fairly inexpensive and does not affect the flavor of our smoothie) and a handful of frozen fruit. This is a nice mild and simple way to get started with smoothies and is a great way to discover what types of flavors you like. For example do you prefer a chocolate, vanilla or plain base? What fruits add flavors you like or don’t like? What protein powders are palatable to you? What ratios make your smoothies the consistency you like (thick, thin, frozen, or just chilled?). Once you have discovered the basics of what you like, you can move on to discover a world of REALLY nutritional items that can be added to your smoothie, many of them ingredients you may have never even heard of before but are easy to find at your local natural food store.
An easy way to change up the nutritional value and/or taste of your smoothie is by changing the liquid you use. Instead of using standard cow’s milk, try soy milk or almond milk. Replace some or all of the milk with different fruit and vegetable juices you like or have nutritional values you are looking for. Add other liquids that may have added health benefits like aloe juice or coconut water (both are said to promote healing of the digestive tract). There are also many liquid nutritional supplement available that can easily be added to a smoothie that have tremendous health benefits such as wheatgrass juice, goji berry juice and acai berry juice. Adding a spoonful of acidophilus rich yogurt to your smoothie will support a healthy digestive system. A splash of flax seed oil or flavorless fish oil will add the health benefits of omega 3 fatty acids without any taste.
Another way to mix it up is to try different powders and dry ingredients. Not only are there a variety of different protein powders to try (whey, rice, soy, different flavors, etc), there are also many nutritionally rich powders and other dry ingredients that are easily added to a smoothie. Some to try are raw cocoa powder, spirulina and other algae and seaweed based powders, medicinal mushroom based powders, ground flax seeds and hemp seeds, raw coconut, and ground nuts. Dried goji berries is an item that is huge in nutritional value and we really like in our smoothies.
As you can see, once you have a basic recipe down for a smoothie, you can add a splash of this and a scoop of that and get tons of vitamins, minerals, antioxidants and healthy fats in your body every day with little effort or sacrifice. Start experimenting today and discover easy and delicious ways to start each day with a nutritional treat for your body!
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