I am in love with my smoothies. And now that I have figured out how to make ahead green smoothies (and every other smoothie for that matter) I am in smoothie heaven. I can literally take a bag out of my freezer, toss the ingredients in my blender and have a smoothie ready to go in a minute. Strawberry banana, orange dream, peach, Pina Colada smoothie…I love them all.
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My ultimate favorite though is green smoothies because they are packed full of good stuff that my body wants and I can’t taste the spinach. It’s true. It’s like a neutral flavor. It took a lot to convince me to even first try a green smoothie for the first time as I am one of the pickiest people on the planet. I was terrified to try it. It was my daughter that was shoving the green smoothie sample in my face and I was fighting it big time. Then gave in. But after I did..I was like “hmmm…not bad. Not bad at all!” Which then later turned into “Oooh…green smoothies are yummy!” And then into “Gotta have my green smoothie today!”
In fact, I loved my green smoothies so much that I decided to grow spinach for the first time this summer – yes, just for the smoothie. Too bad the spinach harvest only lasted a week or so for me – I wanted it all summer long. So the rest of the year I buy bags of spinach at the grocery store. I often have the problem with the fresh spinach going bad in the fridge before I can use it all up since sometimes the bags are fairly large. And oh that smell of rotten spinach…yuck! It’s a real nasty smell. Gags me. Bleh.
The good news is that once I figured out that how to make ahead my green smoothies I haven’t had another bag of spinach go bad. Yahoo! Saving money rocks.
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How to Make Ahead Green Smoothies
Here are the ingredients you need for 13 quart sized green smoothie bags (about 26 servings)
- One large 40 oz. (2 1/2 lb) package of Spinach
- 6-7 Bananas
- 4 lb. bag Frozen Pineapple chunks
- One Frozen Orange Juice Concentrate Can
- Optional: Pinch of fresh Parsley, pinch of fresh Cilantro
Grab a Huge Handful of Spinach and toss it into the bottom of a quart-sized bag.
Add in 1/2 ripe banana peeled, 1 tablespoon orange juice concentrate and 1 cup frozen pineapple.
Add in your optional parsley and cilantro or any other add-ins you like. Some folks like flax or chia seeds, aloe vera or even protein powders.
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Squeeze as much air as possible out of bags and seal. Label and freeze – I like to layer them on a cookie sheet so they stay flat as they freeze.
To later make your make-ahead green smoothie just take out one of your pre-frozen bags. Then pour ingredients into the blender – I will squeeze the bags on both sides and all the ingredients slip out nicely. Add in about 1 – 2 cups of cold water and blend away. Start with less water and get it to the consistency you like your smoothie.
Serving size? It makes about a quart sized mason jar full. So if you drink that much it serves one. Or if you just want a nice 8 oz. glass you can get a little over 2 cups full. So this works for me and my husbands’ breakfast in the morning.
You can also make ahead smoothies of all types. Just add your frozen or fresh fruit, bananas, frozen yogurt and even ice cubes.
If your recipe has yogurt in it there are 2 ways you can do this. First, you can buy a big tub of yogurt, scoop it into ice cube trays and freeze. Then take out the cubes and add them to your make-ahead smoothie bags. If you don’t think your blender is strong enough to break down a big square ice cube of yogurt then you can also just drop your yogurt by the teaspoon onto a parchment or waxed paper lined cookie sheet and flash freeze. Then remove and add to your smoothie bags.
And that is it! See how easy it is to make ahead smoothies? What are some of your favorite smoothie recipes? Do you make green smoothies too or am I the only weirdo out there that loves these things?
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