Tag Archives: smoothies

January 23, 2020 · 12:32 am

How about a super breakfast smoothie?

This is a redo of a post I wrote 10 years ago when the blog first started. I thought it was worth revisiting as it is full of useful information and people love smoothies.

I wake up slowly. As a result, one of the problems I have had in maintaining my weight was meal management. I don’t feel like eating in the morning. For years, I started the day on coffee and a donut or something equally tasty and nutritionally inadequate. I drank coffee all morning at work and then found myself starving by lunchtime. If I had a busy workday and was only able to get a small lunch, I would be uncomfortable all afternoon. If I had time for lunch there was a good chance I would eat too much which of course cut into my productivity that afternoon. There’s no way a bad start worked out well for me.

Your first meal should be your biggest. What could be more logical? You are fueling up for the day. Fill your tank early and spend the rest of the day burning it off. You will be healthier, happier and more productive. If you wait and load up at lunch, or worse, at dinner, you are adding a lot of calories that you might not have time to burn. This is a sure recipe for weight gain.

I have replaced my original blender with a Vitamix machine.

How do you solve it if, like me, you start out kind of foggy and don’t feel like eating first thing?

My solution was a happy accident. I bought a Vitamix machine at Costco. With my new toy, I found myself looking forward to mixing up stuff in the morning to drink. For some reason it was easier for me to drink a smoothie than to think about preparing and eating a breakfast. Go figure. As a result, I now have a morning smoothie that I call my rocket fuel because it fuels my morning bike rides. I include a banana, strawberries, blueberries and salad greens. Also, green tea for all its nutritional value and apple cider vinegar for the same. Another benefit of the smoothie is that I can put in my vitamin and mineral supplement pills. That way, I don’t have to swallow a bunch of pills every morning – one by one. I don’t take any drugs. I have been doing this for around 15 years and continue to tweak the ingredients.

The latest version has 400 calories 2 grams of fat, 14 grams of carbs 7 grams of fiber and 23 grams of protein not to mention all of my vitamin and mineral supplements.

2020 addition: After reading about and writing up raw cacao and turmeric, I have begun including a spoonful of each in my morning smoothie, too. The slight tartness in the cacao is softened by the sweetness of the berries.

Tony

Vita-Mix – How to Make Green Smoothies

Herewith an oldie, but goodie. Think of it as a belated St. Patrick’s Day post. I heard some folks talking about green smoothies and remembered this wonderful work by Lea Ann Savage back in the early days of the blog.

Wellness Secrets of a SuperAger

Lea Ann Savage, a Vita-Mix demonstrator, is a reader who has conquered chronic fatigue through lifestyle changes associated with her diet. She contributed the popular item on Watermelon Sorbet and we invited her to share her story and some of her expertise on green smoothies. What she shared with us below is in my estimation the last word on Green Smoothies and just in time for summer, too. You can read more about Lea Ann at her website.

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I made three lifestyle changes that helped me to overcome my 7-year battle with Chronic Fatigue: 1) I got off all forms of processed Sugar, 2) I got off of all products that contain Wheat, and 3) I began drinking Green Smoothies daily.

Lea Ann Savage AKA The Vita-Mix Lady

I learned about Green Smoothies from the book, “Green For Life” by Victoria Boutenko. Everyone needs more raw…

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Super WebMD Item on Food Frauds

Regular readers know that I have written lots of posts based on WebMD items. I think their latest one – Food Frauds That Can Wreck Your Diet is one of their best.

Here are some of the highlights:

Caesar Salads: “You might think that because it’s a salad, it’s fine. But just a small bowl has 300-400 calories and 30 grams of fat, thanks to loads of dressing.”

Banana chips are not a healthy fresh fruit snack

This is an element in most salads. You really need to watch out for how much salad dressing you add.

Fresh Smoothies: “That berry blend at a smoothie shop can have a whopping 80 grams of sugar, 350 calories or more, little protein, and often no fresh fruit. Fruit concentrates are often used instead of fresh fruit.”

Energy Bars: They recommend, “Choose bars that have 200 calories or less, some fiber, and at least 5 grams of protein, which helps provide energy when the sugar rush fades.”

Latte with 2% Milk: “Reward yourself with whipped cream on top. But this trade-off still adds up to 580 calories and 15 grams of saturated fat in a 20-ounce white chocolate mocha. That’s more than a quarter-pound burger with cheese.”

In my opinion, designer coffee drinks are really diabolical when it comes to watching your weight. I found out years ago that more often than not they set you back instead of helping you out.

Microwave Popcorn: “The word “snack” can be a little misleading on microwave popcorn. One popular brand packs 9 grams of fat into each “snack size” bag.”

This is another calorie trap. Popcorn is usually a healthy snack, depending on how you fix it. The microwave way, while very fast, is one of the worst in terms of health. Lots of bad fat and calories.

Banana Chips: “Deep-fried bananas don’t look greasy, but just one ounce has 145 calories, 9 grams of fat, and 8 grams of saturated fat: about the same as a fast-food hamburger.”

How can anything made from fresh fruit be a calorie bomb? Easy, deep fry it. WebMD suggests snacking on a fresh banana for four times the food, no fat and only 100 calories.

There are a total of 21 of these examples of what they term food frauds. I have picked out the ones most meaningful to me. Do yourself a favor and go back and click on the link for the full series. They also give suggestions on how to tweak them to make them less unhealthy.

As always, it pays you to be alert to serving size and portion control. I grew up snacking and most of the weight problems that I experienced resulted from that.

Check out my Page – Snacking – The Good, The Bad and The Ugly for more on this.

Tony

Vita-Mix – How to Make Green Smoothies

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Lea Ann Savage AKA The Vita-Mix Lady

I learned about Green Smoothies from the book, “Green For Life” by Victoria Boutenko. Everyone needs more raw, dark green, leafy vegetables in their diet. Green Smoothies are the easiest and best tasting way to get mega-doses of fresh, dark greens into your body!

Victoria’s Green Smoothies Blog which has a lot of very good information.

Here are some additional links related to Green Smoothies:

Ode to Green Smoothie
A Veggie Adventure

You will get used to the taste of Greens over time. I like to joke with my audience that the Green Smoothie I serve to them is like a “Kindergarten” Green Smoothie and you can work your way up to Graduate Level 🙂 In the beginning, try the milder tasting greens and use a 60% fruit to a 40% greens ratio. Over time you can graduate to the more bitter tasting greens and change your ratio to 50/50 then 60 to 70% greens and 40 to 30% fruits. Or, you can just stick with whatever balance works best for you! I find that the more dark green leafy vegetables I can get into my diet, the less cravings I have for junk food and the more energy I have during the day.

Greens
Here are some Greens I have tried with asterisk by the ones I use the most:

Kale*
Romaine
Baby Spinach*
Collards*
Parsley* (this took some getting used to but now I like it a lot!)
Arugula
Dandelion Greens
Endive
Carrot Tops
Broccoli (strong flavor)
Celery (also a strong flavor)
Cucumber (another strong flavor but good for skin)
Wheat Grass*
Cabbage* (good for preventing colon cancer) and remember, cabbage is one of the magic vegetables.

Fruits
I’ve used about all of them…
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