Many people have asked for our green smoothie recipe! I know that it looks unappealing, but it doesn’t taste like it looks! It took a while for some of the family to gain enough courage to try a green smoothie, but once they tried it, they really liked it.
Green Smoothie Recipe
1 cup unsweetened almond milk (or milk of choice)
16 ounces apple, sliced (we use fuji)
10 (approx.) ounces frozen spinach (frozen or fresh)
2 scoops (1/2 cup) vanilla flavored whey protein powder (We use Swanson’s.)
1/4 cup golden ground flax seeds (We use Bob’s Red Mill.)
9-10 ounces frozen banana
3/4 cup frozen wild blueberries
2 cups ice
Blend almond milk and apple. Add spinach and blend. Once spinach is incorporated, add protein powder and flax seed; blend. Add banana and blueberries, and let rest a few minutes; blend. Add ice until container is filled. Blend until smooth. Note: you have to be careful not to overheat your blender. With so much of the smoothie ingredients being frozen, it is easy to do! I just keep an eye on it and make sure that I’m not adding too much frozen too quickly! Also, we buy our spinach in big bags at Costco and then divide each big bag into four smaller bags and then freeze it.
Yields approximately 5 sixteen ounce glasses
“What? know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own? For ye are bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are God’s.” 1 Corinthians 6:19-20
What kind of blender do you use, is it a Vita-Mix ??
Thanks
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Yes, Vitamix
I also “eat” green smoothies! Spinach is a great way to sneak in the greens because is blends up so well (unlike kale). I’ve never tried apples in my smoothies, though. Orange juice, banana, and spinch is another great combo!
Where do you get the protein powder?
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Swanson’s.
What brand of blender do you have? Also, is it true you can’t taste the spinich? I’ve heard several people say they put spinich in smoothies, but I haven’t been brave enough to try it!
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We don’t taste the spinach. It’s a Vitamix.
I enjoy smoothies most days. I actually use raw oats in my smoothies as a filler and previously used wheat germ. It may be an acquired taste but it a great source of fiber and protein for your smoothies as well. I think with the fruit and other ingredients the oats aren’t that noticeable. Thank you for sharing your recipe and always being a fabulous example to those who read your blog.
Thank you for posting this! I have been waiting for it. Love the earplugs. 🙂
Thanks for sharing the recipe. We have a Vitamix too and love it.
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I too am a little squimish but I have all the ingredients so I’m going to freeze the fruit and give it a try! Thanks for posting
Thank you for sharing this recipe with us!Can’t wait to try it.
Hi Anna,
We’ve made smoothies for years and love them! One thing I’ve never done is freeze the spinach though! Do you need to thaw it before using it? Can you take the amount you need from a frozen bag or does it all freeze together in a clump? Do you wash it before, after or at all??? Hmmm…
I’m definitely intrigued about freezing the spinach because so ofter it goes bad before we use it all!
Thanks,
Trish
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Don’t thaw it beforehand. We crush it in the bag before pouring the frozen spinach in. Then it isn’t a clump.
Thanks for sharing this recipe! 🙂 Sounds very nutritious.
Thank you for posting this. Do you have to have a Vitamix or do you think it would work in a regular blender?
Also, I’d love y’all to do a post on what exercises you do, especially the ladies, as I know y’all much be in phenomenal shape to be able to do the hiking that you do. 🙂
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A regular blender usually won’t blend it as smooth. It may also overheat.
I always enjoy Anna’s cooking posts. May I suggest some yummy homemade salad dressing recipes for a future post? I love the earplug idea, and look forward to trying whey powder in our smoothies when we return to the states:)
Blessings,
Kim C.
I actually think it looks pretty good. :-)We love green smoothies at our house. We have them almost every morning for breakfast. Our recipe is very similar to yours. The only difference is that we do not add the flax seed (I plan to try that now!) and we do add plain yogurt. Sometimes we add a banana, too.
Thank you Sarah! I appreciate you taking the time to put this up. Is this your family’s go to breakfast or do you have other standbys? (hint, hint) LOL!
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Everyday for half of us.
We, too, do something similar around here but also add organic plain yogurt and organic banana, and sometimes honey depending on what fruit we have on hand. My children think they are getting such a treat, but really, I’m just packing them full of a bunch of healthy things to get their day going. I was disappointed in the whey powder we were buying (it was expensive and tasted weird), so we stopped using it.
Sounds really good!
We’ve found it helpful to cut bananas into 1-inch pieces, arrange inside of an airtight bag on a cookie sheet and freeze (that way they don’t stick together). If the bananas are ripe, no additional sweetener is needed. And you’re right-you can’t taste the spinach!
Are you familiar with the question of using the whole apple vs getting rid of the core?? Some say the chemicals found in the seeds are dangerous, others say they’re beneficial (maybe even cancer preventative). I’m not sure of which to take seriously.
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Considering how many pounds of bananas we go through, we wouldn’t be able to freeze them on cookie sheets. Nice idea though. We too have found there to be many opinions on healthy eating. We put in all in.
I’m in for more cooking posts 🙂
Looks interesting. How much protein do you estimate in each serving?
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We’ll have to check and update this later.
I love looking to your family for encouragement and this post was a great encouragement as usual! Living in the freezing north country (AKA: Canada) we soo often are lacking in energy (mostly my husband and I, but never our five little ones!) So, we will definitely be giving this a try… though I may not mention that it contains spinach 🙂 Thanks Anna and Lord bless your family.
We made these this morning and they were wonderful. I was wondering if the whey protein powder you buy from Swanson’s is superior in quality to the brand you can buy at Walmart. I have heard different things about whey protein powder and wondered what you knew or what the difference might be. Thanks so much.
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Christopher originally did the research about protein powder. All are not equal. I’m thinking there was a Consumer Reports article about unhealthy chemicals or heavy metal, something that was in many of the brands. He is the one that found Swansons and we have stayed with it.
Have you ever heard of Juice Plus? They have a nice plant based protein powder in vanilla and chocolate. Your smoothie sounds delicious! It sounds very much like the one we make, except we use frozen strawberries instead of apples, we’ll try apples next time.
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No we haven’t heard of them. We will probably check them out sometime. Thanks.
instead of the milk, try pineapple juice..yum!!
Okay, I actually tried a “Green Machine” smoothie thing I found at Starbucks, and it was n-a-s-ty! I have never made one at home…too big of a sissy I guess. I think I may have to try this one with your ideas and all the other comments.
Thanks for the recipe. I also make smoothies and love them.
I was wondering, do you buy your protien powder in bulk?
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I don’t know about bulk, but they are large gallon containers from Swanson.
One more thing. Can I cut this recipe down to make only a third as much? Since we are trying it, and there are only three of us, I do not want to make too much at once.
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Sure. We will cut in half but a third will work.
Thanks for the recipe. I definitely will try this. A Vitamix is another possible purchase. I learned, years ago, NEVER to use ice in a blender; it meant the death of my last blender! So frozen fruit is what I use; mainly frozen banana. I make it a practice, for overripe bananas, to mush them up into plastic containers and freeze it. And spinach is my staple; my only salad green. Thanks for your inspiration. I continue to pray for your family.
We use Swanson protein powder as well.
That looks yum! lately here in Australia, i pack in the ice to keep it icey cold. I looked up the Vitamix and will consider buying one in the future. Anna, I always thought you should publish a cookbook- i love the ideas you have. 🙂
Do you know how many calories are in a 16 oz. glass?
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No but you could figure it out based on the listed ingredients.
Thank you for sharing this. It was mentioned at a conference too. We bought a Blendtech to make smoothies. We love the recipe. It will be a great meal replacement, especially during hot weather. Thank you for your terrific ideas and inspiration!
You know sometimes you post recipes and hope your readers will enjoy as much as you do. Speaking for myself, I have enjoyed many of your recipes. Maybe that is the end of it. One thing I want you to think about though is how the recipes you share can actually be another branch of ministry. I have been feeling physically bad. I have been desperate for answers and thought about your post about green smoothies. I was easily able to find your recipe (another perk to your website is how easy things are to find). I have made two batches this week and for the fourth morning in a row, I have had two glasses for breakfast. I am beginning to feel much better. I trust you folks and figure if you post a recipe, it must be good because I know how careful you are to operate your website with integrity and care. So thank you for having a wonderful website and thank you that it is so easy to navigate and lastly thank you for sharing healthy, tasty recipes. You are a blessing Anna and keep up the great cooking!
Yum! This is really good! Our 2-year-old son and I just made it together, and I love it! We’ve been making green smoothies for awhile, but differently. This new way is really yummy, too! Thank you for the post!
I made this smoothie this morning (with a few variations). Yummy! The family really liked it! Thanks for sharing!
Alicia
I had to buy a new blender and I couldn’t spend $600 for a vitamix at this time. I got a NINJA professional NJ600 and it is blending as good as a VItamix. I hope it doesn’t burn up, but it seems to do the job with the green smoothies. Thanks for the post and the repost of the link with Anna’s birthday! We read the package and did a short lesson on FLAX and as an acronym is stands for F=Fiber L=lignans A=alpha linoleic Acid(omega3) X= eXcellent choice for your diet!
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Also, Vitamixes can be purchased for significantly less. Refurbished, on special store promotions and Craigslist are ways of getting the price down. I do think the NINJA was highly rated by Consumer Reports so it will likely do well for you.
We are always looking for good smoothie recipes. I had meant to post a comment back in January, but life gets a little busy around here. We have several who are allergic to bananas so we substitute carrots. All but two of our children drink it; we’re working on them and sometimes they will try it depending on the frozen fruit we put in.