A Colorful Rainbow of Smoothies – Smoothie Recipes

A while back, Vargr and his teammate at work put up a “Smoothie Bar” at the office, and invited everyone at work and all the other shops on our floor to enjoy samples of a big variety of smoothies. The idea was to show them all the healthy properties of a good substitute for a fast-food lunch, and to introduce them to a bunch of new smoothie flavors they might not have thought of before. Also to have a lot of fun during a work day (We justified it as “team building” to the bosses! *grins*).

We had 20-30 folks pass through and try samples. Really kept us busy on the blenders (we had 3 running)! Every one of these was declared “Delicious” by our sample audience, though of course there were a LOT of different preferences for one or another.

The most universal comment was, “There’s spinach in there? I can’t taste it at all! This is really good!” *grins*

General Smoothie Tips:
For best results, a good blender that can handle lots of ice and frozen fruits is required. Luckily, there are a lot of these available. (We had a “Blendtec”, a “Ninja”, and a “NUTRiBULLET” running.)

Many of these include all sorts of ingredients to make them healthier, like Spinach, Flax seed/meal, Carrots, etc. For the most part, these make no or miniscule difference to the flavor, though they do alter the appearance (this is where the green comes from).

We used vanilla soy milk both for the healthy properties and because the vanilla adds a nice flavor component to the smoothie. Feel free to use “normal” milk or almond milk, as desired.

Some of these make enough for one big smoothie and others make several servings. Check the ingredient amounts to tell them apart.

Universal Directions:
Put all ingredients in blender and blend until smooth. Generally, putting the smaller berries and stickier things (like peanut butter) in first and the ice (If used) on top worked best.

If using a “normal” blender, slice up the fruits as needed for your blender to handle the load. If using a “High power” blender like Blendtec or Vitamix, you can toss in the whole fruits (Peal the oranges first! Remove stems from pears or apples.) including the green leaves on strawberries, and the core of pears; these powerful blenders will render them into juice, just like the pulp of the fruit.

!IMPORTANT! If using a high-power blender like a Vitamix or Blendtec, you must include ice or frozen fruits in the mixture! Otherwise these powerful units will heat and cook your smoothie from the friction during the blending, and you end up with soup instead of smoothie. Ninja and similar blenders do not seem to have this problem, but it’s a good idea to use cold/frozen ingredients in those as well.

Pictured Smoothies, going clockwise starting at top:

Hala Kahiki Green Pineapple Orange (11 o’clock)
• 2 oranges (peeled)
• 2 C fresh spinach
• 1 C frozen pineapple chunks
• 1 C grapes
• 2 Tbs Flax Seed Meal
• 1 C water (approximate – can use extra ice)
• 1 C ice

Orange “Glorious” (Similar to Orange Julius) (1 o’clock)
• 6oz frozen orange juice concentrate
• 1 C soy / almond milk (vanilla) (Note – use evaporated milk for extra creaminess)
• 1 C water
• ½ C sugar (or equivalent in acacia syrup, or sub “Splenda” for lower calories/sugar)
• 1 tsp Vanilla extract
• 12 ice cubes

Purple Monster – Fruit Juice with no yogurt or milk (3 o’clock)
• 2 bananas (frozen)
• ½ C frozen blueberries
• 1 C grape juice
• 1 Tbs honey (optional)

Chocolate Peanut Butter Banana (5 o’clock)
Note: This is definitely a “dessert smoothie”, and not one of the healthier ones.
• 1 frozen Banana
• ½ C Soy Milk (vanilla)
• 2 Tbs Peanut Butter
• 2 Tbs Chocolate Syrup
• Ice (as needed, or if using unfrozen bananas)

Groovie Green (7 o’clock)
• 1 banana
• ½ apple
• 1 C grapes
• 1.5 C fresh spinach
• 6 oz vanilla yogurt

Strawberry Banana (9 o’clock)
• 2 Bananas
• 1 C frozen Strawberries
• ½ C Soy milk (vanilla)
• ½ C Orange juice
• ½ C ice cubes (about 5-6 cubes)

Others we made, but not pictured. They were also very good!

Mango Pineapple Spinach
• 2/3 C frozen pineapple chunks
• 1 C frozen mango chunks
• 1 banana
• 2/3 C fresh spinach
• 1/3 C orange juice
• 1 C ice

Heavenly Blueberry - Creamy
• 2/3 Frozen blueberries
• 1 banana (frozen if desired)
• ½ C Soy Milk (vanilla)
• 1 C Yogurt (vanilla)
• 1 ½ tsp honey
• 1 ½ tsp flax seed meal

Berry Breakfast
• ¾ C Orange juice
• 1/3 C Frozen Pineapple
• 1 C Frozen Blueberries
• ½ C Frozen Strawberries
• ½ Banana
• 2 C Yogurt (vanilla)

Tropical Fun
• 1 C Frozen Mango chunks
• 1 Banana
• ½ C Orange juice
• ½ C Strawberry
• 1 C Yogurt (vanilla)

Falling From the Trees (Just the fruit)
• 1 Pear (remove stem)
• ½ Apple
• 1 C grapes
• 1 C ice
• ½ C white grape juice

Goin’ Bananas
• 2 bananas (frozen)
• 1 C Soy Milk (vanilla)
• 1 Egg (use Egg beater if you want to avoid raw eggs)
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 dash nutmeg or cinnamon
• 1 Tbs sugar (as needed)

Smoothies Not Made that Day – but Still Would Taste Good:

Apple Banana Carrot
• 1 frozen banana
• 1 Carrot
• 1 Apple (gala)
• ½ C Orange juice
• ¼ C milk (soy milk okay)

Pineapple Banana
• ¼ C frozen Pineapple chunks
• 1 banana
• 1 C pineapple or apple juice
• 5 ice cubes