Wednesday, March 11, 2009

It ain't easy being green

There seems to be a lot of buzz on the Internet lately about "green smoothies." Basically, you add greens (spinach being the most popular) to a mixture of fruit and juice (or water). I'm not the world's biggest veggie lover and so I was skeptical, but neither am I especially fond of eating salad every night, which I've been doing since I'm pregnant, and so reams of positive comments (like "even using 70% spinach, you can't taste it at all!" and "My kids love these!") on multiple blogs convinced me to give it a try.

Or rather, convinced me to make Matt give it a try. After first blending up the greens as recommended, I added a cup of orange juice and a little splash of carrot juice (my usual morning blend). Even after spending minutes in the blender, then transferring to the Cuisinart for a few minutes, as soon as I stopped the blades I noticed a bunch of little hunks of leaves settling at the top. It looked and smelled kind of like vomit to me. Uh-oh...this is just what I was afraid of. I still have a pretty low gag threshold in the morning and so I asked Matt to try it for me.

One look at his face convinced me this had been a mistake. (The green smoothie itself, not having Matt try it for me. THAT was a lifesaver.) Matt, who likes all kinds of earthy teas and other foods that I tease him taste like dirt, said "I don't think you want to drink that. And I don't really want to, either."

Needless to say, we won't be making those again. I guess I'll stick to salads.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

If you aren't opposed to bananas, throw one in. I'm sure you've read that online....

As long as I have a banana as the base, I can add lot of spinach. At first I used two bananas, but now 1/2 would be enough if I had a use for the other half. I use a half cup of water, too, instead of juice. Usually I add some frozen strawberries.

Do you read Happy Foody? She has lots of smoothie ideas.

For me, too, it's all about tricking myself into eating more spinach. :)

All the best!