Sunshine smoothie

A large and delicious taste of summer for under £1. I am a great fan of frozen fruit in my freezer-storecupboard, for affordability, and some even suggest they have more vitamins than fresh fruit that has been sitting around for a while. At my local supermarket (Tesco) they sell 500grams of frozen strawberries for £1.99 or 3 boxes for £5. This smoothie is a large one person portion (happy husband) and uses 100grams of frozen strawberries- 33pence.

Not trying to suggest that we are all pinching pennies, but just to point out there are many ways to eat more fruit and vegetables without spending the earth

This is GORGEOUS.

• 125 mls water
• the juice of 1 lemon (15- 30pence, depending)
• 100grams of frozen strawberries (in this case, 33pence)
• 1 flavoursome apple (20-40pence, depending….)
• 1 flavoursome clementine (10-20pence, depending)

My photo uploader has been malfunctioning for ages, hence no photo again.  For a more filling smoothie add a small banana and a touch more water. I would not omit the lemon here- it totally lifts it. Bon appetit friends!

 

My 99p shake

I am always divided when people dispute whether it is cheaper to eat wholesome healthy food, or junk food. On the one hand berries will always be more expensive than biscuits, and buying the raw ingredients of a dish are often dearer than buying the same dish in a “ready meal” form. On the other,beans are cheaper than bacon, and they go a long way.

 In my heart, on balance, I know it is usually cheaper (in money) to buy unhealthy food, but long term, more expensive (in many other ways) And believe me, I am watching my shopping budget like the best of us.

As I was making our breakfast smoothie I costed it up out of curiosity. It turned out to be less than £1 for an adult portion (400mls) These prices are based on what I bought in my local store (Tesco)  this week. My not-even-99p shake was:

• 1/2 a pineapple 50p
• 1/2 a honeydew melon  50p
• 2 big handfuls of babyleaf spinach (abt 75grams) 40p
• 2 BIG handfuls of frozen raspberries (100g) 45p
• 125 mls water

This made 1.2 Litres of smoothie, which is what we make most days in our house, and is adequate for 2 adult portions of  400mls and 3 x small childs portions of about 125mls.

So there you have it. A 99p breakfast shake! If you are lucky and/or clever with your shopping (especially in summer) you can prepare some delicious smoothies for very little money every day, especially if you happen upon marked down fruit which can be frozen, or just special offers, the lifeblood of UK supermarkets.

I am not saying cheap is everything but let’s face it, when you need to make the numbers add up but you want a healthy drink, it sure helps.

Happy Wednesday friends. Love yourselves in body and spirit  🙂

PS My maths is poor, And happily so, because an adult portion of this costs even less than I thought……about 60p. Even better!

Gazpacho: Worthless fragments??

Apparently that’s where they think the Moorish word for gazpacho comes from. The worthless fragments probably referring to the week-old bread they used to pound up in the pestle and mortar with the summer vegetables. Using a blender is easier, and throwing in a chunk of wholegrain (or even sprouted grain) bread is of course optional. What is not optional is the salad! As I am sure you will know, gazpacho is just an ice-cold blended Mediterranean summer salad, and oh my heavenly!! This is so delicious. Definitely not worthless. My photo just makes it look like some wierd sort of carrot juice….but you have to give this a try!

The essential bits (in my opinion) are TOMATOES, RED PEPPER, CUCUMBER, EXTRA VIRGIN OLIVE OIL, SALT, and VINEGAR (I use apple cider, normally). The optional extras (in my opinion) are garlic,  little onion, and some wholegrain bread to thicken.

You cannot really call this a recipe, because let’s face it, it’s a vegetable smoothie…but here is how I did it. Makes about a litre.

• 2 large, flavoursome tomatoes.
• 1 large red bell pepper
• Half a cucumber, unpeeled.
• 250mls of ice cold water
• 1/8 cup of extra virgin olive oil
• 1/8 cup of quality vinegar
• 1/2 teaspoon sea salt.
  

  This is not wierd carrot juice. It is a heavenly mediterranean elixir of goodness!

If you add onion, add only a very little, it’s quite overpowering. If you add garlic, be aware of the social consequences 🙂  Your cells will love it though. When eaten raw, it’s anti-bacterial, anti-viral-anti-fungal, anti-everything-nasty properties is kicking.

Roughly chop your vegetables, and blend all ingredients until very smooth. Taste test- and be a little more heavy handed with the condiments if you like.

YUM! This is packed with beta-carotene, the plant form of Vitamin A, which also happens to be a powerful anti-oxidant in our body, to protect your cells from free radical/oxidative damage.

It has all the enzymes of the raw plants, fibre, water, and plenty of other phytochemicals for your body. The fresher the plants, the more nutritious they are, as many vitamins begin to deplete after picking. I cannot wait to make this fresh from my father in laws garden.

4 days to go!

Green Goddess Lemon Smoothie :)

Oh my goodness! The alarm clock: friend and foe. It felt like an authentic foe this morning, but I conquered self and got up, and could not be happier once I was up and out with the sun on my face. So much better than sleep! And since I had conquered myself, well, in a miniscule sense of the word, in one tiny portion of time, I decided to give myself a prize of an extra massive drink. And this, my friends, is so good!

I know the juicing craze is out there. And I am sold on the benefits of juicing. I saw amazing things happen when my husband went medication-free and just juiced for about 4-5 days.  Juices are totally refreshing and your body gets a huge flush of the vitamins and minerals and phytochemicals in record time, because it is digested really fast. But hey….as a general rule, what’s the hurry? And I do hate to take all that fibre out. I mean, that’s how the plant grew, and that’s how I like to eat it. Or drink it. Plus, a blender is way easier to clean than a juicer. This recipe makes about 1 litre (almost 2 of the glasses in the picture) So….

• 125 mls water
• 1/2 a ripe pineapple
• 1/2 a cucumber, washed but not peeled
• 1 whole lemon, peeled, and de-seeded.
• A small piece of the lemon peel aswell if the lemon is organic/unwaxed
• 2 handfuls of leafy greens.

Blend, blend, blend. Glass. Straw. Schluuurp.

This is kinda-sweet-kinda-tart. If you like it a little sweeter, you could add more pineapple, or a sweet apple.Or even a handful of frozen strawberries. Feel that chlorophyll power.  Enjoy!