St. Patrick’s Day is tomorrow. In honor of the holiday, I thought it time to share our recipe for the smoothies we drink each morning, being that they are green.
Our smoothie ritual was born after I watched Dr. Wahl’s TED conference presentation on how she uses nutrition to overcome her MS. If you haven’t already seen the video, it’s definitely worth a watch (click here). While I am not completely onboard with all of her nutritional theory and advice- going gluten and dairy free to reduce food allergy risk- (yet, I am dying to see more published research), her idea to eat more fruits and vegetables, particularly green leafy vegetables, is one I completely support.
Have you ever tried counting the number of fruit and vegetable servings you eat in one day? The USDA recommends that we eat between 5 and 9 servings, with a serving defined as a 1/2 cup. That’s 2 1/2 – 4 1/2 cups per day. Dr. Wahl doubles the high end of the USDA recommendation to suggest that we eat 9 cups! of vegetables and fruit every day in order to optimize brain function and reduce risk of excessive inflammation. She even defines it further by recommending we eat 3 cups of green vegetables, 3 cups of sulfur-containing vegetables,and 3 cups of fruits and vegetables of color to ensure we get enough B vitamins, minerals (sulfur, iodine, magnesium), and antioxidants through our food. Nine cups, my lovelies, is a lot…and, it’s difficult to do. So, I decided that a way to attempt to come close to the ultimate goal of 9 cups is to start our day with a green smoothie.
It’s part of our morning breakfast routine and Jack and I, in particular, look forward to it every day. For Jack, it’s typically paired with a breakfast bar or a piece of nut butter toast. For me, I have it with a piece of toast spread with either nut butter or mashed avocado sprinkled with cayenne pepper and kosher salt or with a bowl of plain non-fat yogurt and homemade granola. It’s a lovely and tasty way to start your day and it provides 2 cups of colorful fruits and 2 cups of greens, leaving only 5 more for the day!
I have to apologize for not being able to provide the exact quantities for most ingredients…instead of measuring, I just eye the amounts, but my guess in parentheses is pretty close. Go with your instinct and you likely can’t go wrong!
GREEN BREAKFAST SMOOTHIE
1 1/2 cups unsweetened almond milk
(1/2 cup) frozen organic raspberries
(1/2 cup) frozen mango chunks
(1/2 cup) frozen pineapple bits
1 banana
(4 cups) kale
Squeeze of honey
Liquefy in blender. Drink…to your health.
And, Happy St. Patrick’s Day!
hi ,
Me too , just started doing smoothies … after watching the TED SPEECH !
thnx for sharing the video and the recipe !
It was inspiring, no? Made me want to eats greens with every meal!
I’ve only really done green smoothie once and it was delicious. I’ve always felt like I needed to use bananas to thicken it but never seen to have any around (haven’t they gotten expensive?!). Anyway, I’ll have to try what you’ve done with the all frozen. I realize I go some days with no veggies at all. Really embarrassing
I can’t wait to hear what you think of them!
All day without vegetables…what a crime!!!
I tried this this morning. Mine did not look like yours and did not taste well.
My mom is going to be thrilled you took this away from the TED video…will forward this post to her for sure. And I’m going to try your green smoothie at the beach next week during spring break (with mom & dad–they will love). Just bought some fresh kale from the garden at Sophia’s school!!
xoxo.
Oh, and our arugula ravioli was GREAT…complete with cross-country-traveling-mini-raviolis…thank you!!
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