Foodie Friday Smoothie

Good morning, my friends.  Although this quarantine is a out of the norm, it does offer you moments to reconnect to your former self or to reinvent a new self.  I vacillate between those two elements.

I've reconnected with my interest in nutrition.  I was always into the ideas imbedded in clean living and healthy environments. I was one of those teenagers who tried making her own perfume because of all the chemicals in those on the market. I smelled terrible and never mastered the art. Eventually, I gave up just wearing perfume and makeup all together.  I was a funny kid.  I'm sure my Mom got a lot of laughs out of my endeavors.

I've been starting my mornings off with smoothies.  There are plenty of internet sites that have good smoothie recipes, Yummly, Sunset, YourSuper.com, for examples. I naturally stay away from added salt and sugar, so I tend to minus out a lot of the items from the Sunset recipes.

I'm a slow mover in the morning. I have at least one cup of coffee before doing anything. Just black coffee - no cream, no sugar and definitely none of the foo-foo flavored stuff.  After that first cup I think about what's next.

I like having fruit in the mornings. I also love cucumbers, especially in salads and dips, so  I often combine them when I make a smoothie.

This morning's smoothie is basically water (I used coconut water), cucumber, orange, mint or basil from my plants and spinach.  I'm a spinach freak. I love the stuff.  It's brain food because of the folate and the B-vitamins. Cucumbers are also good for you. They help keep the body hydrated, stabilize blood pressure because of nutrients like potassium. It's better to eat them unpeeled since many nutrients are in the skin.


What I tend to do is have one glass of the smoothie without the spinach, then blend in the spinach and have the rest.  So good.       

                                                     
I'm enjoying my smoothie mornings but to me breakfast should contain protein. That being said, I usually add an hardboiled egg, oatmeal or at least whole grain toast and sometimes I use Greek yogurt instead of water in the smoothie.  No sugar on the oatmeal, please. It's better if you use homemade applesauce and/or a variety of berries. When the kids were young I didn't think about putting applesauce on their oatmeal, so they'd have to eat it without the sweetening. My son was the oldest, so he remembers. Lucky for me, he's the forgiving and kind person that he is.

Enjoy your day folks.

Ciao.