Recipe time: real smoothies
Colin Pistell Friday, July 2, 2010 at 10:02AM We haven't done a recipe in awhile... let's fix that, shall we?
With the rather incredible heat of the Carolina summer upon me, I've been trying to find easy ways to stay cool (that don't involve blasting the AC for hours on end). I normally enjoy cooking and eating hot and filling food but when the weather makes the slightest movement feel like swimming through a giant ocean of hot maple syrup, eating a huge plate of hot chicken loses much of its appeal.
Smoothies can come to our rescue - they are cool, refreshing, and can be quite filling. The past few years have seen the growth of many smoothie vendors like Jamba Juice. As an Operations geek, I appreciate the systems and lack of quality variance in these places, but I think their smoothies universally taste like sugared fruit ice cubes - there's not much "smooth" in there.
More than most recipes, the smoothie formula needs to be played with. Everyone has their own preferred thickness and flavors. Experiment with the amount of liquid you use and try many combinations of fruit. I've included one of my favorites below as an example. Here we go:
Ingredients: 1 banana, cut into slices; half cup blueberries; half cup mangos, diced; half cup whole milk; half cup vanilla yogurt (not frozen yogurt... but that would probably work well too)
1. First thing is first - all fruit must be frozen. ALL of it. using unfrozen fruit will give you something that may taste ok, but has the consistency of snot, which is just as unappealing to consume as you would imagine. Peel the banana and put it in the freezer whole. Dice the mango and put in the freezer. The blueberries can go in as they are. I'm not sure why, but freezing the banana whole seems to work better than freezing it in pieces. It takes many hours for full freezing so this is something that should be planned for ahead of time. I buy, prep, and freeze large quantities of fruit so I always have materials on hand. You can use store-frozen fruit if you want, but I've had better results freezing my own. Trader Joe's frozen fruit works pretty well.
2. You have a Cuisinart, or similar style food processor, right? If not, get one... they are a good investment and much better/more useful than standard blenders or "smoothie makers."
Get one of these. The cow shaped creamer is not required, but all the cool kids have one.
3. Set up your food processor, then add the milk and yogurt in first. Next goes the banana. Then the mango. Then the blueberries.
4. Seal the processor up and turn it on. It may buck a little at first as the larger pieces of fruit are chopped up, but it should smooth out quickly. Let it run for about 30 seconds, then power down, open up the top and stir the contents around with a spoon. If desired you can thicken the smoothie with more fruit or thin it out with more milk. A super secret step I do here sometimes is to add a teaspoon of vanilla extract. Blend for another 20-30 seconds, pour it into a tall glass, and enjoy.
This will yield a very smooth, somewhat creamy smoothie - I've heard it described as "like a milkshake" which I think is a good thing.
Some may object to the dairy and the sugar. I'd counter that the ingredients are all "real" food, and most of it is plant based. Relax, it's summer time.
Reader Comments (3)
You got good chicken and waffles down there?
Josh, how did you do that? You commented before I was done writing the post!
And yes, we have very good chicken and waffles.
Must... get... cow-shaped creamer.
Oh, and I could also really go for one of those smoothies right about now. Alas, I have no whole milk or frozen mangos. I guess I'll just have to substitute chicken and waffles like Josh suggested, and see how that works out.