There are lots of nutritious things you can boost your smoothie with. It is easy to supplement the nutritional content and adjust the recipe to just what your body needs. Most of these added ingredients can be found in health food shops, and many of them are also available in well-stocked supermarkets in general.
One kind of extra nutritious supplement is dried super fruit and powdered berries such as acai, goji, lucuma, rose hips, inca berries, mulberries, maqui, buckthorn, cranberries, and blueberries. Healthy cold pressed oils such as linseed oil, coconut oil, and hempseed oil are brilliant for providing the body with an extra energy boost, too. Or why not add a little extra fiber with, for instance, linseed, chia seeds, hemp seeds, oat germ, or wheatgerm? You can also mix in various powdered seaweeds, such as spirulina, chlorella, arame, wakame, and dulse, or superfood powders such as maca, corn grass, nettle powder, and wheatgrass.
If you want to boost the smoothie with extra proteins, there are various wholly natural, vegan, and GM-free protein powders in different flavors. You can also try raw brown rice protein, pea protein, hemp protein, oat protein, and seaweed protein. And don’t forget all the nutritious nuts, seeds, nut oils, and nut butters that are also great for blending into smoothies.
Some fruit and vegetables have very strong flavors and need to be used in small quantities. For example if you have too much chili or ginger in your smoothie it will become undrinkable. Taste it while you are making it and dilute it with bland juices if it is too strong. If you think one flavor is too dominant, add a little water and juice from, for instance, carrots, apples, pears, or oranges.
Some fruit, such as melon, mango, and banana, are particularly sweet and can make the smoothie nauseating. A useful trick for reducing the sweetness is to add a little lemon or lime juice, which also enhances the fruitiness.
If the smoothie is too thick and the consistency is like a purée—which can happen if the fruit does not contain much liquid—you can thin it with a little water, nut milk, or freshly pressed juice. In order to preserve the pure fruit taste, water is the best option.
If the smoothie is too thin you can try adding a little soy yogurt, banana, avocado, mango, or protein powder. You can also add tofu, muesli, nuts, or other healthy ingredients that will absorb a little of the liquid.
Some fruit and vegetables are very rich in fiber, and they will make the smoothie coarse and difficult to drink if the blender does not pulverize them properly. In that situation you can run them through a juicer first (or blend them into a purée) and then press the fruit juice through a fine sieve before mixing it all with the other ingredients.
If you want to make a refreshing and icy smoothie, the best way is to use frozen fruit. It also works if you blend ice into the finished smoothie. Remember that the ice will melt if the smoothie is too warm, so it is a good idea to refrigerate the fruit before preparing the smoothie. It is better to use too much ice than too little, small quantities melt quickly and make the smoothie watery.
Most fruit smoothies can be made into popsicles. Leave out the ice and most of the water from your recipe and try to make the flavor a little more concentrated—ice cream has less flavor because it is so cold. Pour the smoothie into ice cream molds with a stick in the middle and place them in the freezer. You can make the ice cream stripy by filling the mold with smoothies of various colors and flavors; allow each layer to freeze for 30–45 minutes before you add the next so that they do not run together. Do not fill the molds up to the edge as the liquid expands slightly in the freezer. The popsicles keep for a week in the freezer, after that they become icy and lose their flavor.
To do justice to the vitamins, flavor, color, and consistency you should serve smoothies and freshly pressed juices as soon as possible after preparing them. Home-made smoothies do not contain any preservatives and are not pasteurized either. If you want to save your smoothie for later, it can be stored in a clean, sealed glass container in the refrigerator but preferably not for more than 24 hours, as the vitamins disappear slowly but surely and it will go off quite quickly. Shake the smoothie well before you drink it if it has been standing in the refrigerator for a while.
Don’t forget to decorate your smoothies. Serve them in attractive glasses and decorate them with fresh fruit, herbs, edible flowers, and other pretty things. You can buy fun ice molds, cocktail stirrers, umbrellas, and similar things in craft shops, or you can make them yourself or bring them home from your holidays.
Be creative and invent your own recipes. You can really use whatever ingredients you like in a smoothie. Your imagination is the only limit, so experiment!
