Green Smoothies and Protein Drinks: More Than 50 Recipes to Get Fit, Lose Weight, and Look Great

By Jason Manheim and Leo Quijano

The green smoothie is hands down the best supplement to any diet. With at least one green smoothie a day, your body will not only receive an extra boost of nutrients, but will eventually crave these healthier foods naturally. Slowly but surely, unhealthy foods will be replaced by healthier counterparts, and your overall diet and well-being will benefit from the change.

With fifty delicious and nutritious healthy green smoothie recipes, advice and information on digestion, food combining, detoxing, fighting disease, weight loss, and diet, this guide really packs a punch. You’ll learn why it’s vital to cycle your greens regularly, why smoothies are superior to juicing, why eating local and food sustainability are important to the ecological integrity of our entire planet, and tips for getting your kids to enjoy green smoothies, too. This book also answers the most-asked questions people have about green smoothies such as:

• How long do green smoothies keep? 
• Should I be concerned about oxalic acid in spinach? 
• I’m a vegetarian/vegan, what protein options do I have? 
• And much more!

While the recipes are fantastic on their own, they can easily be used as templates with the useful preparation tips within. Learn about adding healthy fats such as virgin olive oil, avocado, and coconut oil, and get advice on eliminating separation and foam. Everything you need to energize, look good, and feel great with green smoothies is packed within.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Skyhorse
• Release date: Jun 1, 2013
• ISBN: 9781626363076

Book preview

INTRODUCTION

In my first book, The Healthy Green Drink Diet: Advice and Recipes to Energize, Alkalize, Lose Weight, and Feel Great, I introduced the notion of supplementing your current diet with at least one green drink or smoothie a day. The idea is that not only will this give your body an extra boost of nutrients, but eventually you will naturally begin to crave these healthier foods. Without much conscious–and sometimes painfully annoying–effort, you can slowly replace unhealthy foods with healthier counterparts and your overall diet and well being will benefit because of it.

The previous book was very much a book for beginners. In it I went over the many varieties of greens, fruits, superfoods, and sweeteners as well as basic tips on growing, buying, saving, storing, and the equipment needed. In my new book I will pick up where we left off and dig deeper, while offering a quick recap of the essentials.

As in the previous book, there are 50 recipes all with matching photographs, ranging from novice to more advanced flavor profiles. However, this time around we will focus entirely on green smoothies (made using a blender) instead of a mix of both juicing and blending. In the chapter titled More on Juicing vs. Blending, I will go over why I’ve eliminated juicing and why blending is where you should focus your efforts (unless digestion issues keep you from enjoying the benefits of fiber). This isn’t to say juicing is bad, but that blending is juicing 2.0, if you will, and offers more bang for your buck.

We will also be focusing on how to turn your green smoothies in protein drinks. This is for those who want to use them for a post workout recovery or for more of a meal replacement rather than a starter. Most recipes will contain suggestions on the best types of protein to add.

WELLNESS:

Digestion, Detoxing, and Fighting Disease

Throughout this book I recommend, at the bare minimum, enjoying a green smoothie first thing in the morning to break your nightly fast. Not only is it a great way to consume a wide variety of nutrients in a quick, convenient package, but it also helps tremendously with digestion. This should not be an accompaniment to your normal breakfast, but rather a pre-breakfast. Wait at least an hour before eating any solid foods as this will minimize gas and bloating and maximize nutrient absorption from the green smoothie. This is not a hard and fast rule, but if you notice any excess gas and bloating, you may want to increase the time between your green smoothie and your regular meal.

The fiber is the magic here. This is why I strongly encourage you to think again before going the juicing route and instead opt for the colon cleansing, digestion powerhouse that whole green leaves and fruits provide. You can even add foods like flax seeds to bump that fiber content up more. And adding ginger to your green smoothies will further aid digestion by preventing gas when consuming common gas-producing foods like beans, fruit skins, and starchy vegetables.

Now let’s focus on the method of food combining, which in my opinion is simply a poor solution to an even greater underlying problem. Food combining is a term for the nutritional approach that encourages specific combinations of foods as central to good health and weight loss. Many believe that combining certain foods allows for the full digestion of nutrients and aids in the prevention of certain chronic metabolic diseases. Through observance, both personal and impersonal, I have come to realize that food combining is mostly a ridiculous notion.

While food combining does not help promote healthy digestion, combining unhealthy foods can actually have a negative effect. Our bodies are naturally equipped to digest the three constituents of food: protein, fat, and carbohydrates. Digestion begins the moment we smell or even think about food. This stimulates the secretion of digestive enzymes and we begin to salivate. Fat and carbs begin to digest as soon as they enter our mouths, so if we’re

Reviews for Green Smoothies and Protein Drinks

[lisawharton · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

The first six chapters contain a wealth of useful information, such as: a morning smoothie should not be part of a meal. You should “wait at least an hour before eating any solid foods”. There are tips on detoxing, weight loss, protein sources, variety suggestions, and ways to get kids to drink green smoothies.

The recipes start on page 80 of 180, leaving 100 pages for recipes but with only one recipe every other page, there are only 50 recipes (not more as the title indicates). The smoothies are categorized into five types: Beauty, Greens Lover, Post Work-out, Kids/Beginner and Savory. Each recipe shows icons that indicate which category it falls into.

A lot of page space is taken up by full color photographs of lush green ingredients. Full page and two-page spreads are common. Frankly, I have an ebook with no photos that is of more use to me; instead of one recipe every other page, the ebook has multiple recipes on every page.

When the recipe section starts, there is a full page photo of each smoothie. In this case, it’s nice to see how the drink should look because the recipes don’t tell you exactly how to make any of them. I should explain, I’m not a good cook. Cooking is not intuitive for me. I cannot tell by tasting a soup whether it needs salt, pepper, oregano or apple pie spice. I need a recipe to tell me how much of each ingredient to at least start with. So the fact that every recipe in this book has the same directions—“Blend with water and ice to desired consistency.”—really leaves me stranded. How much water and ice should I start with? Give me a hint. My blender and I are not friends. I don’t trust it not to explode and my cat is terrified of it. So I want to use it as little and as fast as possible, not add a little water and a little ice, run it, stop, maybe add more. Run. Stop. Add. Ooops! Too much. Start over.

And another thing! He doesn’t tell you how much each recipe yields because “that all depends on the amount of water/ice you use to achieve your desired consistency. The amount you drink in one sitting is up to you...Experimentation is your friend. Enjoy.” I make smoothies for two people in the morning in a rush. I don’t have time to experiment. That’s why I buy recipe books. The least I expect is for a recipe to tell me if it serves one person or three.

Can you tell where I’m going with this review? It’s a beautifully illustrated book with a lot of interesting facts but unless you’re comfortable with experimentation or already have a good sense of how much water and ice a smoothie, or smoothies, should contain, I would look for another green smoothie book. I never review a cookbook without trying at least one recipe but this book has been the exception. I’m too daunted by the prospect of experimenting that I can’t bring myself to begin. I’m sticking to smoothie recipes from other books.