Elevate Your Smoothie Recipes With These Tricks

If you’re looking for new smoothie recipes to up the game of your favorite liquid breakfast, you’ve come to the right place. With many health fads coming and going, it’s hard to keep up. Neither is it advisable that you follow them without consulting with a professional first. 

Healthy smoothie recipes, however, have been around for decades. They are recommended by many nutritionists, fitness trainers, and physicians. Whether you’ve been making and drinking smoothies for a good long while or only starting to appreciate it now, a few tips to make it as best tasting and healthy as you can do any harm.

Are Smoothies Good for Losing Weight?

Smoothies can be a part of your health routine. Whether you aim to lose or gain weight, it can be a useful aid, but only if done right in ingredients and intake. 

There are many emerging trends of pre-packaged smoothies that supposedly cause magical weight change. These fads can be dangerous, especially if they use laxatives, so do be aware.

Experts agree that smoothies can help those trying to lose weight as it could manage hunger levels and increase fiber and protein intake. 

However, if the ingredients used to make it are still full of sugar and artificial food, it becomes nothing more than a glorified dessert that claims to be the healthier choice.

While there is not much scientific evidence that smoothies are highly effective for weight loss, as long as you stick with the healthy kind, it could still do you more good than bad. Incorporate smoothie recipes in your diet but remember that lifestyle change is the key. 

Combine your favorite liquid meal with a well-balanced diet, proper exercise, and adequate rest and sleep.

Best Smoothie Tips

Even if you simply enjoy smoothies for their taste and do not pay much attention to their health aspects, there’s no reason you can’t try out new smoothie tips to elevate your favorite recipes. 

Apart from the usual fruit, ice, water, and blender, there are still a few things you can add — or remove — to make your drink taste a lot better and maybe even healthier. 

Check out these simple smoothie tips and see for yourself if they taste as good as they sound.

Add Variety to Your Greens

Green smoothies may not look very appealing to some, but they are some of the healthiest mix drinks you can make in the comforts of your own home. 

Adding a bunch of green, leafy vegetables increases the nutritional value of your smoothie. 

Kale, spinach, broccoli, moringa leaves, and cucumbers are some of the more popular options as ingredients.

They also contain antioxidants that are good for the body and the immune system. Blending and drinking your veggies is a neat trick if you loathe cooking and eating them.

Mixing it with other fruits and vegetables can even mask these greens’ natural flavors if you’re not too fond of them. 

There isn’t a universal recipe for greens’ ratio to a tall glass of smoothie, so add as much or as little as you like.

Freeze Your Fruit Before Blending

When making smoothies, fruits are almost always present. The most popular types of berries are blackberry, blueberry, strawberry, currant, and bananas (yes, they’re considered berries!). All of these offer different flavors, texture, and consistency. 

Mind you, and these are not the only fruits you can work with — try freezing fruit juices as well, such as lemon, apple, or orange juice. If you find yourself cutting up fresh fruits to add to the blender, don’t pour it in just yet. 

Try popping them in the freezer for a few hours or even overnight. Frozen bananas for a strawberry banana smoothie can provide a rich, creamy texture that you might not get enough of. 

Depending on the type of banana used and how ripe it is, it can also add sweetness or a little bit of sour, tangy flavor to your recipe. 

This smoothie tip is even great if you have too many fruits on your hands and they’re about to become overripe. Simply peel, quarter, and seal the fruits in an airtight container and pop them in the freezer.

This preserves the fruits and at the same time gives you easy access to them at any time of the day you feel like blending a nice, tall glass of fruit smoothie to cool you down. When preparing, simply throw them in the blender with the rest of the ingredients and mix until the desired consistency is achieved.

Skip the Ice

Skipping ice for a smoothie? Que horror — or not. Ice-less smoothies could even taste better. Indeed, its consistency would be a lot more different. 

Smoothies that use plenty of ice tend to be thin in texture and sometimes become watery. 

But what about the temperature? Surely, no one wants lukewarm smoothies? This is where the smoothie mentioned above tip comes in handy. 

Frozen fruits as a substitute for ice is a great idea. You can even freeze them in ice cube trays ahead of time and keep them in storage when you need them.

As for the making process, do the same with the frozen fruits when you add ice to your green or berry smoothie recipe. 

You can still add in water but not too much, just enough to help the ingredients mix well together.

Use Coconut Milk or Butter for a Smooth Texture

Much like skipping the ice, lessening water, or foregoing it all together isn’t a capital crime against the smoothie community.

Your typical replacement choices include milk (dairy or non-dairy is fine) — coconut, butter, almond, skim, or whatever tickles your fancy. 

Thicker inconsistency will help your drink become smoother in texture, and thus, easier and more pleasant to drink. For a lighter option, opt for coconut milk. 

It also contains less sugar and fat compared to regular whole milk. Add 1/2 cup up to two full cups, depending on your serving size or preference.

While it is still better to go natural, small amounts of sweeteners can’t hurt all that much. Adding half a teaspoon of butter — sunflower or almond butter is a great choice for this — it can make your smoothie just a tad bit tastier. It gives it more flavor and also adds a layer of texture and consistency. 

Try Mixing in Some CBD Oil

As popular as cannabidiol or CBD has been over the recent years, you’ve probably heard about it once or twice. While it originates from the cannabis plant called hemp, it is a generally safe substance known for its health benefits. 

No worries about getting the infamous “weed high” because CBD oil is entirely non-psychoactive. The best part? It just might increase your smoothie’s nutritional value.

While this hemp oil extract comes in many forms like pills, oils, topicals, and others, the popular option for adding CBD to food and drinks is usually oil tinctures and powders. This is so it can be appropriately mixed and thoroughly with the ingredients of your treats. 

Its claimed benefits include pain management, anxiety relief, aiding with sleep disorders, and even skin problems. It is also good for improving the immune system by boosting your mood and energy. 

When using cannabidiol with your smoothie, you can opt for a natural-flavored CBD oil tincture or a flavored one to add taste to your smoothie recipe. Simply add it in with the rest of your ingredients and thoroughly enjoy it. 

Add a Dash of Coconut Water

Known as the tree of life, coconut trees produce a fruit that is one of the most versatile foods out there. First coconut milk, now coconut water. Can you mix them both?

There’s no reason not to. Though they differ in thickness and sometimes taste, they don’t contradict each other, considering they come from the same fruit.

Replacing water altogether, coconut water is thin enough in consistency to make your smoothie sippable. This smoothie tip is also great for added flavor, natural sweetener, and electrolytes. 

Honey or maple syrup are also good sweeteners to add if you want more for your drink. Be careful of adding too much, though.

What Should You Not Mix in a Smoothie?

While you may prefer your favorite smoothie for breakfast or as a meal replacement throughout the day, there are still a few things you should be cautious of when whipping up or buying your drink. These include considering the ingredients, their health benefits, and possible hazards.

Fruits and vegetables are needed by the body to maintain vitamins and minerals that it doesn’t naturally produce. However, too much of particularly sweet or calorie-heavy fruit or veggie can cause unwanted weight changes.

The same goes for sweeteners, whether natural or artificial. Always go easy on the sugar intake as it is one of the leading causes of many cardiovascular conditions. 

Even putting in too many add-ons like chia and flax seeds, protein powder, spices, and others can alter the taste and the overall nutritional value of your smoothie.

Final Thoughts

The beauty of making your smoothie recipe is choosing whether or not to follow these smoothie tips. The important thing is you know your ingredients and how much and how often you should take them. 

Much like most things in life, too much or too little can be bad for your favorite drink. However, don’t be scared to enjoy it now and again. Make it as complex or simple as you like, but above all, enjoy!