The Smoothie Maker

So my mother went above and beyond with gift giving (as per usual) and gave me a Ninja Blender with the fastest motor I have ever heard.  Apparently this was a gift to give or get because many people I talked to had also recently come into ownership of one of these devices.  I am not one to jump on juicing or cleansing but I took this bad boy for a test drive tonight and I can say it is quite an impressive kitchen tool I see getting used in the future.  

The first of its many accolades is that it hardly takes up room in the kitchen.  With our not huge space with limited countertop available, I hesitated to get a big blender/juicer that I would use almost never.  This device is compact and is even smaller than the coffee maker so they will cohabitate nicely side by side.  

As I mentioned before, the motor on this thing is serious.  There are something like 900 watts or megawatts or kilowatts or something impressive mostly to people who deal with watts and devices that use them.  Apparently chopping, blending, and completely pulverizing things are this machine's business and it does it good.

I didn't know what to at first put into my fancy smoothy making masterpiece, but I knew it would not be celery, kale and 12 grapes as one recipe I found suggested.  Who in the heck is having THAT smoothie and not hating themselves every second?!  There are things that I like that would go into a nice smoothie and some things that are common in smoothies that I knew I would despise.  First, bananas; seriously, fuck those guys!  I apologize only marginally for the language, but seriously, bananas are the worst and they have this great food reputation with no reason to deserve it.  They are sticky, hard to access, awkward to eat, smelly and their texture and taste are just the worst.  To all those that love bananas and put them in all of the food recipes, you can have them.  Blech!

Moving past my banana diatribe, I could put tofu in the smoothie and have seen many recipes calling for it.  I was not feeling brave enough tonight to tofu it up.  Tofu is special in that its texture is something to be acquired (I suppose like bananas or mushrooms, but gah, seriously) while its taste is nonexistant.  That is why it makes a good protein packed base for smoothie building.  So I chose to go with greek yogurt which while my husband loathes because of its smell and icky presence, I really enjoy not Chobani greek yogurt.  Fage is a great brand if you can find the total 2% but hardly any stores around here regularly have it.  I prefer my yogurt to have some fat because I can use less and feel satisfied.  Tonight I snagged Greek Gods greek yogurt because this is also a hard to get brand and they have two delicious flavors, honey vanilla and honey salted caramel (seriously, try it, it is the bees and the knees).  I put a whole bunch of fruits and even leafy kale into my cart along with some coconut milk and some chia seeds.  I have been hearing all this buzz about chia seeds and how I will start to Benjamin Button if I have them and while that seems a bit extreme and I hardly feel the need to reverse my aging, I thought now was the time to try something fun.  

I am the worst for measuring and finding exact ingredients when I make things and a smoothie just lends itself to that kind of recipe tinkering because you just toss ingredients into the container, twist on the lid and buzz away.  I took a picture to record for reasons on this blog and here is in no amountage except for the yogurt, what I threw in to the Ninja for its maiden voyage: 1/2 cup of greek yogurt.  This was just kind of eyeballing other recipes on the web and seemed like the right ratio to other stuff.  Strawberries-a bunch.  Strawberries are a gamble in our fridge.  Delicious if we can use them fast enough, yucky if I forget they are there for more than 24 hours (why do they go bad so fast?!).  Baby kale, yes, I know, kale is amazing and wonderful and stuff.  Frankly, I don't get the big deal and at least the baby stuff reminded me enough of spinach and didn't require intensive cleaning and picking.  I tossed in about two handfuls of the stuff.  Frozen raspberries, no I would have preferred not frozen, but it is Pennsylvania in January.  I already feel like I am oppressing migrant workers enough with the strawberries and I just couldn't find not frozen raspberries.  One tablespoon of chia seeds (I guess I did measure this). Coconut milk (a splash) and coconut flakes (a few finger fulls-does that measurement make sense-finger fulls?).  And I drizzled a couple swirles of agave syrup because I need it some sweet and was worried about the tart of the berry and the bitter of the kale.  

Results---delicious!  And alarming; I didn't realize how fast and furious that machine would sound once I clipped over the container.  I love how the blade screws on and then the container flips---genius!  My husband took a sip and could tell there was something leafy, but was none too impressed as was expected given his not love of stinky greek yogurt.  I could probably lessen up on the greek yogurt seeing there was a big glob not mixed in with the rest of the smoothie or I could put it in later in the loading process.  I used a spoon and mixed with not very many watt hands.  It tastes tart and sweet and is creamy and the seeds give it some body but don't feel intrusive or give it a funky taste.  I think I could be happy getting my protein and vegetables and fruits this way.  I also see frozen margahritas or sangrias also in the Ninja's future.  For now I am pleased with the first test drive.  Thanks Mom! Nailed it!