Banana and Coconut Smoothie

 

 

We are all guilty from time to time or not taking a moment to stop and reflect. Modern life can feel like one big whirlwind that picks us up and whizzes us around before dropping us off sometime in our 60’s/70’s leaving us to a hopefully peaceful retirement. Or at least right now that’s how it feels to me…

On the 1^st of January everyone was full of hope and excitement for what the New Year would bring; fresh starts, new challenges and the like. For me however I had important exams, exams like Solicitors Accounts and Professional Conduct and Regulation – really fun sounding exams… I took these on the 3^rd of January and told myself that me “new year” would come a little bit later. I tried celebrating around Chinese New Year when I posted my Tea Smoked Duck and Rice Noodle Salad and although things had calmed down a little, with another set of important exams just around the corner I never quite got the chance to take a step bake and reflect.

I still haven’t quite got there. After a couple of half-hearted attempts to “spring clean” and the odd weekend away I still haven’t quite cracked the art of me time. In the week I am an LPC student, I attend roughly one networking event a week at the firm, on Saturdays I work 9-6 in a shop for a few extra pennies and on Sundays I catch up with family. There really aren’t enough hours in a day or days in a week!

I have however got the hang of mornings… This may sound a little strange, but until recently I’d been a firm believer in waking up at the latest possible moment, getting ready and getting out of the door. It only takes me 45 mins from bed to car so the morning is just another part of my fast paced life. However, recently I have been taking time out to make myself a morning smoothie.

I decided to get back into smoothies after I had a horrible cold. When I have a cold the last thing I want is fresh fruit and veg so instead I gorged myself on carbs. Carbs are not my friends. So with the cold gone I’m back to stocking up on all the good things in the morning.

I take out my fresh fruit and veggies (more on green smoothies in a week or so) chuck them in my blender and off they go. For once it’s not me whizzing around but the fruit! I get 5 mins to simply stop and knowing I’m doing something positive for my diet at the same time is a big plus!

Now this won’t initially strike you as the “healthiest” of smoothies, but it is certainly one of the tastiest!

Smoothies often use bananas as a base as they offer a subtly sweet, creamy base on which to build other flavours. However, I for one LOVE bananas, and I can’t always get my fix in banana bread!

Bananas may also be better for you than you think! IncredibleSmoothies.com lists a number of benefits of including bananas in your smoothies, from being a great source of energy, promoting cardiovascular health, their natural antacid effect, and immune system support thanks to vitamin B6 to name just a few!!! So with all of this in mind I decided to come up with a smoothie recipe that made the banana a star.

Breakfast Detox Smoothie

Diet is a word you will often see on my blog. I come from a very weight conscious family, all of us have struggled with our weight at some point and most of us are healthy but now struggling to keep ourselves this way.

As a result much of my food is cooked with a subconscious desire to make it as low fat as possible. Most of the time this means substituting products such as cream, cheese, yogurt and more, for low or fat free alternatives. It also means choosing leaner cuts of meat – you will find way more turkey and chicken recipes here than you will pork for instance.

Detox however is not a word you will come across here. Until now.

Detox to me has always meant something faddy. Something that celebrities do to shed tens of pounds without even lifting a finger.

I’ve been reassured however that many detoxes do not require you to drink only strange coloured shakes and exercise every hour god sends, but instead many involve simply cutting out processed foods, going for whole grain carbs, and low in fat yet high in protein foods.

Well that’s not so bad after all is it?

With that in mind, I’ve not put myself on a detox this January as such, but I have been following some of the principles many detoxes promote.

Our griddle pan has been getting a lot of use and brown rice is most definitely back on the menu (more on that in a later post...)

I have however taken a liking to the concept of a detox smoothie for breakfast.

This year in my first post for the Shake Up Your Wake Up Campaign I mentioned how I often feel sick after eating in the morning. This is probably a combination of not needing a heavy meal in the mornings, and the fact that once I have eaten breakfast and left the house I then embark on a 40 minute commute including walking up and down millions of steps/escalators. Not a good combination!

It seems however that smoothies are the perfect start of the day for me.

This recipe includes high in fibre fruits, citrus to help cleanse your digestive tract, and oats for extra fibre (and a little more substance for a fuller stomach feeling, we don’t want to be hungry afterall!)