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A Green Smoothie Is The Perfect Way To Hide Vegetables

I can’t stand eating vegetables.  It’s a funny thing, considering I’m trying to grow as much of my own food as I can in our small city lot, but it’s true.  Salad makes me gag.  Green beans are evil.  I don’t even understand the point of broccoli.  BUT they are super good for you.  And fresh grown vegetables from your garden aren’t nearly as despicable as the ones from the store.  Luckily I DO like a green smoothie!

A green smoothie is a great way to get more leafy greens into your diet without choking down a salad.  It's even better when the greens are garden fresh!

The green smoothie is a delicious way to use up your garden greens, eat more vegetables and not spend your lifetime at the table chewing something you’re pretty sure your rabbits would enjoy a lot more.  It’s versatile, so you can use whatever is growing at the time, AND you can use your homegrown goat milk in your green smoothie if you so desire.

I make a green smoothie for myself almost every morning, and aside from bananas, there are many days of the year where the majority of the ingredients come from our own yard.

Another great way to hide vegetables is beet brownies!  Get the recipe at Beet Brownies Are The Best!(Made With Honey).

Garden Fresh Green Smoothie Recipe

Green smoothies have three components, the greens, the sweetener, and the liquid.  Mix and match of those three elements to create many different flavors and textures.

Greens

Good greens for a mild and sweet tasting green smoothie (AKA not disgusting) are mainly spinach and chard.  Kale does okay sometimes if it’s young, and a mild tasting kale variety.  There are some varieties that just smack you in the face and scream “KALE!” no matter what you do, so watch out.

Dandelions are awful and bitter.   Don’t try those unless you like the taste of green.  Once I tried using a mustard in a green smoothie.  Yeah, that was funny.  And spicy.  Mostly spicy.  So stick with the spinach and the chard, and all will be well in the breakfast world.

Sweetener

My all time ultimate favorite sweetener in my green smoothie is very ripe bananas.  They blend well, make it taste good, and go well with just about anything you might want to add, such as berries.  If you freeze the bananas beforehand they are even more delicious.  (That’s is also a good way to get cheap bananas.  Buy them brown, peel and freeze for later).

You can throw in some strawberries for a strawberry banana smoothie, or some blueberries if you like it a little more tart.  You can use berries alone, but I know my kids won’t drink it if I do that, so I drizzle a little honey or maple syrup in if I’ve skipped the banana and just have berries on hand.  Use pineapple, banana, and coconut milk, and it’s like a vacation in the blender.

Base

My go-to smoothie liquid is goat milk kefir.  You can also use cow milk, almond milk, coconut milkyogurt, or any kind of juice.  I suppose technically you COULD use water, but GROSS.  Once you add in your bulky ingredients add in the wet.  I strain my kefir right into the blender and save myself a dirty jar.  Booyah!

Once your ingredients are all in the blender, call the kid who’s turn it is to push the button over and let them blend it while you fend off the hoards of disappointed masses (apparently blenders are super duper awesome kid attractors, just FYI.  It’s a great way to get your kids more involved in cooking).

And BAM!  Vegetables you don’t have to taste.

Need some more specifics?  Here is my very basic green smoothie recipe with amounts of each ingredient.  This makes a great place to start experimenting with other flavors.

Green Smoothie Recipe
 
1 cup baby spinach
1 frozen banana
2 cups kefir
 
Put greens in blender
Add banana
Pour kefir over the top
Blend until smooth
Drink

This is a good way to make vegetables more palatable if you have kids who are picky eaters. If you add in just a few greens and some bright colored berries it doesn’t even look green.

What’s your favorite way to hide vegetables?

This post shared at Simple Saturdays, and Wake Up Wedensday

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Catharina

Tuesday 16th of February 2016

I love this post because, like you, I'm not really in to vegetables even though those I grow myself are much more appriciated...

Kathryn @ Farming My Backyard

Wednesday 17th of February 2016

Homegrown is definitely better. For a vegetable.

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