Tag Archives: smoothie

Smoothie! Strawberry Pineapple Pleaser

Smoothie! Strawberry Pineapple Pleaser

My New Big Green Smoothie Cup 🙂

Hey gang, so this past weekend I took a brief trip back to my former city of New York. It was nice to be back in the concrete jungle although more than once I had to stop, breath deep, and internally repeat Namaste to handle the inherent chaos. The highlight of my trip was getting to try some amazing raw dishes from some cool Upper West side raw vegan restaurants thanks partially to the awesome and generous hospitality of one of my dear friends. I had a beet ravioli, a zucchini linguini with spinach, a thai collard green wrap, seaweed salad, raw chocolate mousse (that was so good you want to do a jig while eating it), and a bunch of fresh juices. The food was so good I forgot to Instagram half of it until I was done eating!

The raw gourmet whirlwind was a real blast, but when I returned home today I was grateful for a chance to get back to basics and make a simple smoothie. It’s easy to get overwhelmed with the idea of being raw if you make yourself believe that you must dehydrate, food process, and gourmet it up every meal. Please relieve yourself of that tension and enjoy starting simple to start. Remember that fruit or veggies by themselves can be a meals, and you can always have fun blending up new concoctions in your blender in record time. When you get absolutely bored, are feeling creative, or have more free time, the gourmet dishes will be waiting for you, I promise. -XoXo Raw Girl

smoothie_blenderStrawberry Pineapple Pleaser

1 Cucumber

1 Stalk of Celery

2 cups Pineapple

1 cup Strawberries

2 Bananas

Filtered Water or Organic Pineapple Juice

Blend all ingredients. Serve, and enjoy!

P.S. I’m now totally obsessed with Instagram! You can find me @TheRawGirl.

Smoothie! Green Chia Energizer

Green Chia Energizer!Just in case you missed it, check out this past post on Ch-Ch-Ch-Chia Seeds and their amazing benefits. Chia seeds are a great addition to any diet to boost performance, energy, and weight loss. Chia seeds also help to stabilize blood sugar levels.

A brief recap: “Chia seeds are native to Southern Mexico and Guatemala, and are from a species of flowering plant that is in the mint family. In pre-Columbia times, chia was a staple in Aztec and Mayan diets and even used as a survival ration. The seeds are rich in omega-3’s even more so than flaxseed, and they offer a great dose of nutrients including: calcium, phosphorous, magnesium, potassium etc. In addition as I mentioned already, they are a good source of protein, antioxidants, and dietary fiber. Based on a 2,000 calorie diet, 1 oz of chia seeds provide 9% of the Daily Recommended Value for protein and 42% dietary fiber.” Chia can be eaten alone and sprinkled in salads, soups, etc., soaked in water and eaten as a porridge or pudding mixed with a natural sweetener, nut milk, and toppings, or you can add the chia gel to any kind of smoothie for a nice nutritional boost. -XoXo Raw Girl

Ingredients

1/2 cup Chia Seed Gel (or as much as you like) 

1 Teaspoon Spirulina

2 Bananas

2 cups of Pineapple 

1/4 Cantaloupe

Add all ingredients to Blender. Blend, serve, enjoy!

Smoothie! Strawberry “Milkshake” & Nutritional Benefits of Honey Dew Melon

Have you ever had a random craving that literally makes you go Hmmm? This weekend I wanted dessert, and not just any dessert, I really felt like having a strawberry milkshake. I have no idea why, I think I just wanted something kind of creamy, and sweet. So I got to work in the kitchen and made one, and decided to add in an unexpectedly good ingredient, honey dew melon.

Honey dew melon is one of the those fruits that is usually included as an afterthought. At least for me it is. We see it all the time in fruit salads, but it usually doesn’t get as much love as its sweeter and more colorful counterpart, the cantaloupe. Well given the fact that this melon provides you more than half the RDA of Vitamin C, you may want to pay a little more R.E.S.P.E.C.T. to good old honey dew. Vitamin C helps to boost our bodies’ collagen production, so we can avoid botox and keep our skin firm and youthful naturally! Honey dew is also a great source of vitamin B6 which helps to maintain healthy nervous and immune systems, potassium which is important for our bodies metabolic functioning, carries oxygen to the brain, can lower blood pressure, and folate. Folate boosts our brain function, preventing conditions like Alzheimer’s disease, and is especially helpful for pregnant women as it can help to prevent birth defects or complications during pregnancy. Below’s the recipe for the “milkshake.” Remember when you have cravings for junk food, there is ALWAYS a creative way to satisfy it and get some great nutrition in your body to boot! Never give in, there’s always something healthy that tastes better than junk food feels. -XoXo Raw Girl

Strawberry Milkshake

Ingredients:

Almond Milk (Make raw by soaking almonds the night before, then blending skin-less almonds next day w/ filtered water and optional  sweetener like organic maple syrup. For VEGAN version just use your favorite brand)

6-8 Frozen strawberries

2 bananas

1/8 honey dew melon (1 wedge)

Add all fruit to blender, pour in almond milk. I usually pour in almond milk to start to about  1/3 or 1/2 of the level of the fruit in the blender if I want a thicker consistency. Add in more almond milk if you prefer less creamy. Blend, Serve, Enjoy! 🙂

Smoothie! Sweet Popeye

 Remember Popeye? He was a dedicated vegan cartoon character who got all his energy and robust muscles from regularly gulping down cans of spinach. I’ve posted a recipe for a drink in the past that I call sweet popeye. I had a plain “popeye” smoothie at a raw restaurant that was awesome awhile ago that had only coconut water, coconut meat, and spinach. I loved it and when I got home I tried a couple of my own versions. Sometimes I add pineapple. This lovely version has one banana and some spirulina as well. I’m sure mango would be a fun addition as well. This version I like because the spirulina really does give you an extra super heroine boost. I also enjoy drinking it sometimes after workouts.  If you try your own versions post them on the Facebook page! -XoXo Raw Girl

Ingredients:

1 Thai coconut (water & meat)

1 banana

1 medium to large handful of spinach

1 Tablespoon of Spirulina

Blend all ingredients thoroughly. Serve & Enjoy!

Blueberry Banana Coconut Smoothie & Yogurt

Yesterday morning after my super intense weight training class, I came home to make my post-workout smoothie and posted about it on Facebook. Shout out to Brooke on the Raw Girl Facebook page, who wanted the recipe.  So funny thing is, I started out making a smoothie…and I ended up making yogurt which was equally as delish, just a lot thicker. I’m sure you’re wondering how this happened?  Well, I put in the ingredients listed below as usual, but what was different was the coconut. If you pick up a young Thai coconut that is smaller than the others, usually that coconut is more developed. The coconut meat inside is thicker and harder to remove, but it’s totally possible to get out if you put a little extra muscle into it. My coconut yesterday morning had some thick coconut meat going on, so when I blended everything together I got…blueberry banana coconut yogurt. Another way to make this happen, on purpose, is to add an avocado! This works for any fruit smoothie concoction and automatically will give you a creamy yogurt-y consistency if that’s what you’re in the mood for. All that said, recipe below for smoothie. If you want yogurt add an avocado, or get a small young Thai coconut with thick coconut meat inside! Want to up the ante, do like I do and add in some superfood powders.  -XoXo Raw Girl

Ingredients:

1 Young Thai Coconut

2 ripe bananas (1 works as well) 

1/2 cup to 1 cup of blueberries

Put bananas and blueberries in blender. Hack open Thai coconut while keeping your fingers and extremities in tact! (There are a lot of great videos on how to do that. If your interested and have never done so, go to You Tube and search “How to Open a Young Thai Coconut” and tons of videos will pop up to give you an idea.)  Pour coconut water into blender. Scrape the inside of the coconut and add the coconut meat into the blender. Blend, pour, enjoy!

****REMINDER******* My health radio show Healthy Living in a Toxic World airs tonight online at 7pm via www.newdradio.com. Anyone can tune in and listen. Tonight’s episode is on How to Quit Smoking Naturally, and I will be interviewing Holistic Health Counselor and Naturopath, Dr. Yew.

How to Make a Sweet Popeye Smoothie

Hey there veggie lovers, got another quick and easy  smoothie for you. This is a variation of the “Popeye” which is named that way cause Popeye got all his strength from spinach, if you remember….Although I think it was canned spinach or something, right? So this may be a better, organic version, with a little extra tanginess to boot.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OgvilWBQrog]

Ingredients:

Water and meat from 1 Thai Coconut, 2 handfuls of spinach, 1/2-1 cup diced organic pineapple

Blend all ingredients together and enjoy!

How to Make a Papaya Breeze Smoothie

It’s been gorgeous outside! When it starts to get warm I get in smoothie/juice mode, so I had a little fun in the sun and whipped up this papaya concotion. Has a very lovely and refreshing flavor. To make even cooler, add in some ice or freeze the berries before blending.  – XoXo Raw Girl

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GLMgFFQERnk]

Ingredients:

1/4 large papaya, 1/2 mango, 1 banana, 8 strawberries, juice of 1 lemon

Cut up and put all ingredients in your blender and give it a whirl. Enjoy!

VEGGIE LOVE: Cactus Pear

Hey gang. This Veggie Love segment is dedicated to a new find that has got me coming back for more. My new love is cactus pear, a Mexico and Latin American staple that is, quite literally, the fruit from the cactus plant. Its skin is scary and prickly, but the inside is sweet, earthy, and the most fabulous color pink. Pair this diamond in the rough with its insane nutritional quality and we have ourselves a supermarket superstar.

Cactus pear only recently began reaching the consumers in the 1980s, when health scientists became aware of their medicinal qualities–one researcher even called them magical. Perhaps we have the next “superfood” on our hands?

To start off, cactus pear is known for its extremely high antioxidant count–limiting free radicals in the arteries and throughout the body, and  preventing tumor growth and cancer cell production. Some studies have even found that this fruit shrinks tumors! The healthy oxidized state the pear promotes is also great for your skin–making you look younger, longer.

Cactus pear can also reduce blood sugar levels; meaning it can not only prevent, but treat diabetes. It’s great source of fiber also helps absorb and remove unneeded cholesterol. With traditional vitamins and minerals, cactus pear is high in calcium which strengthens bones and teeth. Its high Vitamin C content prevents cell damage, helps wounds to heal, fights infections, and aids in the absorption of iron. The fruit is also high in magnesium and taurine, nutrients important to brain and heart health.

Are you sold?

Preparation:

Handle with care. While most commercial cactus pears have had their spikes removed, you can still get a prickly splinter (which I found out the hard way). You might even want to use gloves. To remove the outer skin, cut on a tilt about a centimeter deep into the fruit and move knife in a circle around the fruit, then cut in half. You may even be able to peel the skin like an orange after the initial cut. The center of the fruit is loaded with tiny seeds which are edible, but hard. The flesh in-between the skin and the seeds is the best part and can be easily chopped once the seeds are scooped out. Just be careful of your clothing; the deep magenta color can be more dangerous than a red beet.

Cactus pears can be used in all sorts of ways: chopped on top of salads, made into jams, thrown into smoothies, or eaten plain. One you are familiar with the taste (a balance of light sweetness and earthiness), you can experiment. So far my favorite way to use them is in a delicious Cactus Pear Smoothie. Its sweet, chocolaty, and the color of bubble gum. I genuinely described this smoothie as “bomb-alicious.” Give it a try:

Ingredients: Flesh from 1 cactus pear; 1 frozen banana; 1/2 Tbs raw cacao powder or nibs; 2/3 cup coconut water; 1/3 cup filtered water.

Blend all ingredients together and drink up!

Note: I ran my whole cactus pear with seeds through the Vitamix before making the smoothie and then strained the liquid to remove the seeds. This way, you use a little more of the fruit. If you’re short on time, just use the flesh.

I hope you enjoy this wonderful smoothie and all the benefits cactus pear has to offer.

Here’s to feeling great about what you eat and sharing the veggie love.

Kenzie, signing in for Raw Girl

Tropical Green Sunrise Smoothie

 Since spirulina is my new supplement fetish, I have experimented with several morning smoothie combinations. This particular combination is divine, especially if you love tropical fruits like I do.

Ingredients:

1 Thai Coconut (will use meat and water, also can just use plain filtered water), 1/4  pineapple, 2 ripe bananas, 1 kiwi, 1/2 mango, 1 Tablespoon Spirulina

Break open your Thai coconut using a butcher knife. (If you have never done this, you may want to get help, but it’s worth the struggle.) Pour coconut water into a glass. Scoop out coconut meat and put in blender.  Add in all your ingredients  including the Spirulina, and pour coconut water into blender to get the fruits blending. You will probably only use about half of the glass of coconut water to blend, the rest you can drink and enjoy.  Blend until smooth and drink up!

The copyright of this recipe is owned by Esosa Edosomwan (AKA Chef Eazy E.) Permission to republish this recipe in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.