Breakfast Smoothies and the Quest for Health

As I may have mentioned, I've been on a health kick. After spending 2 months of 2005 being ill, plus most of the first 2 months of 2006 being sick, I finally got SICK of being sick! I strongly believe that our health is directly related to the fuel we put in it. Your car wouldn't run well (or at all) if you watered down the gas or put in any liquid other than gas, and your body can't run well on junk food and stuff that does nothing to nourish it or support your health functions.

This time around my healthy eating looks like this:

no sugar
phasing out of items with white flour and other non-whole foods
a heavy emphasis on raw fruits, veggies, nuts, and seeds
when I eat cooked foods I try to keep it to "whole foods" (you can read about it in an excellent book called The Healing Power of Whole Foods by Beth Loiselle)

I've put my quest for health on my mental "front burner" for the past month or more, and it's going very well. I've found that especially in the area of raw foods I'm doing much better in keeping up on making raw foods I like and most of the time can eat a large percentage of my daily food in raw foods, which is great.

My goal in changing my diet is to allow my body to get healthy and stay healthy. I am also looking forward to the natural side benefit of this kind of diet, which is weight loss. I have been exercising on my Needak rebounder most days and that is going very well. I am also working with my naturopathic friend and doc with some supplements to help various body systems get going back in the right direction after a lot of years of stress and strain.

As I've been going along this month I've had several ideas that I wanted to share with you so I am planning to share some them in the hopes that some of you might pick up some healthy ideas that will work for you.

Today I want to tell you about my breakfast smoothies. I have been into smoothies for breakfast for at least a couple of years now. I started with it because fruit is considered by some health gurus to be the ideal first food of your day. It's easy to digest so it doesn't start out your day by creating a sluggish digestive situation as will happen if you eat a heavy breakfast.

My smoothies usually consist of:

3 bananas
some frozen blueberries (maybe a half cup)
frozen strawberries (probably 1 cup or more)
as much fruit juice as it takes to make the fruits go around in the blender (I use whatever kind of juice I have in the fridge--apple, orange, in a pinch I've used lemons and limes, and if I'm out of juice I just use water)

You can whiz it all up in your blender, smoothie maker, or in my case, a Vita Mix. This recipe makes enough smoothie for everybody here that wants smoothies for breakfast. I love to give my kids smoothies! Typically my husband and I will each have a tall glass, our older kids will have large coffee mug sizes, and the littler kids will have smaller amounts.


One great use for leftover smoothies is to make popsicles out of them. It's very fun for kids to get popsicles for breakfast or treats any time. :) You can also leave the blender pitcher in the fridge with the leftovers in it and have some smoothie later in the day.

Some days I feel hungry for something else after about 3 hours or so, so at that point I may eat some homemade whole wheat bread, some whole grain cereal, drink some veggie juice, or eat my lunchtime salad early. It just depends. Since I've been eating healthier I've noticed that my smoothie seems to take me all the way to lunchtime a lot more often.

There are a zillion variations on this smoothie. When peaches are in season I use those, and I toss in apples, leftover grapes, or whatever other fresh or frozen fruit is around. Some people like to put yogurt, milk, or milk alternatives such as rice or soy milk in smoothies. For me, I like it that I'm just having the fruit. If I had a reasonable way to make juice from apples I would even make my juice that goes in it raw and make it an entirely raw breakfast.

Smoothies can work for anybody: raw foodists, vegetarians and vegans, people with special dietary needs and allergies, and for anybody who just enjoys a really delicious and quick treat to start their day. Try it!