Green Smoothie Recipe That Actually Tastes Good!

So you've probably heard people raving about the benefits of green smoothies, but to most people, drinking vegetables isn't inherently appetizing. I am a pretty picky eater and I found that by adding fruit to green smoothies, you can mask the taste of the green in it. Green smoothies are a great way to get nutrients that you don't usually get in a daily diet. By using the raw leafy greens in the smoothie, you are keeping the nutrients in those greens. Cooking things like kale, spinach, arugula, etc. loses some of the benefits. To get a more detailed description of nutrients in leafy greens, click here.

Because I use spinach in my green smoothies, I'm going to paste the paragraph explaining the benefits of Spinach from the website linked above.

• Spinach
  Spinach is a dark leafy green vegetable and one of the most nutrient-dense foods on the planet! Because it’s high in fiber and very low in calories, spinach can help you manage type 2 diabetes and is a terrific addition to any weight loss plan. It's also packed with nutrients — it's a good source of antioxidants, including vitamin C, beta carotene, lutein, and zeaxanthin, which help maintain healthy eyes, hair, and skin. Spinach contains very high amounts of potassium and vitamin K, two nutrients that may help preserve bone health. The iron and B vitamins in spinach help maintain strong, healthy hair and a healthy circulatory system.

If you went to the website linked above and liked the benefits of another green better, feel free to substitute that for spinach, but I can't guarantee that it will still taste good. I ran out of spinach one day and had arugula laying around, so I decided to use that. It was disgusting! If you want to use arugula or another green with a strong taste, I recommend mixing spinach in with it. 

The spinach taste in this smoothie is not detectable at all.

I recommend adding the ingredients in the order listed here because I put the heaviest item on the bottom so that it would push everything to the blade. I'm using a magic bullet so if you're using a regular blender, you would want to reverse the order of things added so that the heaviest item is last for you.

1. Add 1 cup of fruit. I use Dole frozen mixed fruit. I recommend using frozen because it makes the smoothie colder than fresh fruit. I also recommend microwaving the fruit for 30 seconds before adding because the completely frozen fruit sometimes doesn't get blended and then you have huge chunks at the bottom. You can purchase the bag in the image from Sams Club.
   **I found that peaches most mask the taste of the vegetables so I recommend some fruit with peaches in it.
   1 cup of this specific bag of fruit has 17 calories.
   
   
   
2. Add two tablespoons of yogurt. If you like your smoothie very thick, add more yogurt. It doesn't matter what flavor yogurt you use, I have a variety pack of Yoplait and I use a different flavor of yogurt every day and it doesn't affect the taste.
   2 tablespoons of Yoplait mountain blueberry yogurt has about 30 calories.
   
   
3. Add 1 cup of spinach (or other leafy greens). I usually use spinach in a bag from Giant, but our garden just started getting spinach, so I used home grown today.
   1 cup of spinach has 7 calories.
   
   
   
   
4. Add 1 cup of coconut water. Adding coconut water to a green smoothie is a great way to get electrolytes. I also found with coconut water it doesn't matter what flavor you use, it still tastes about the same. I have used coconut water with no flavor, with mango and peach flavor, pineapple, and lemonade. I like the VitaCoco brand found in the water aisle because it has a close-able lid.
   8 fluid oz of VitaCoco Lemonade coconut water has 70 calories.
   
   
   
   
5. Add a tablespoon of flax seed. This provides omega 3's that help to prevent blockage in the arteries. You can also use chia seed.
   1 tablespoon of flax seed has 47 calories.

Finally, blend until everything is completely liquid. This takes about 30 seconds.

The smoothie on the right is how much smoothie you get from the amount of ingredients added.

The total calories in this smoothie are 224.

Hopefully you find the taste as good as I do!