Even the rose doesn't help to make it look all that more appealing:) I promise though, once you start experimenting with green drinks, you'll grow to adore the beautiful hue!
Here are a few reasons why you should consider adding some green drinks to your diet...
1. Increased fiber. Because your blending your fruits and veggies instead of juicing them, you get all that good for you fiber that is easy to miss out on. Read: Weight Loss Aid!
2. Energy in a glass. Blending your food will make the minerals and nutrients more readily available to your body. Smoothies are easy to digest and much quicker than sitting down and eating a salad.
3. Drinking your greens instead of eating them greatly reduces the high amounts of added unhealthy fats and sodium found in salad dressings and condiments.
4. A SUPER EASY way to dramatically increase your consumption of fruits and veggies. The more you consume green drinks, the more your body will start to crave good for you fruits and vegetables.
5. Improved skin and hair. Not that vanity is why you'll do this, but because your increasing the amount of produce in your diet, your skin and hair will start to look great from the inside out. Much better than expensive face creams:)
6. Green smoothies are FAST. Only minutes to make and you'll be sipping back delicious, nutritious, veggies and fruits all day.
I honestly could go on and on about the multitude of benefits to green smoothies but there are a ton of sites that can expand on them much better than I. Here's a great one with a ton of different recipes to get you started.
While there are a ton of different ways to make your smoothies, here's how I do mine.
Step 1. Add your fruits and veggies into a blender with about a 50/50 ratio to begin with. As your taste buds adjust, you can decrease the amount of fruit. I suggest starting with spinach as it's flavor is easily masked by pretty much any fruit. For this particular smoothie, I used 1 banana, 1 large nectarine, and 1 small bunch of kale.
Step 2. Add anywhere from 3-4 cups of water and 1 cup of ice. I usually aim to make about 1.5 liters of smoothie for each recipe, so I just top up my water to around that mark. I also add 1 tbsp of a good quality omega 3 oil. I really find that this cuts down on the foam that can occur.
Step 3. Blend away! I know not everyone can afford an awesome blender like a vitamix or a blendtec but if you can, I HIGHLY recommend them. If your using a basic blender, just make sure your adding your fruit and veggies in stages so you don't jam up your machine.
Step 4. Drink Up! I make a big batch, drink a glass, share with the kids and then pour the rest into a wide mouthed drink bottle to enjoy for the rest of the day.
Cade guzzled his back in about 60 seconds flat!
Despite how these look, they are really good. So give one a try and let me know what you think!
Happy Sipping,
Sarah
