My Smoothie Recipe

I love me a smoothie. While I was researching recipes and information about going plantbased in early 2017, I noticed some kitchen equipment and foods that kept popping us as practically essential for living a healthy, vegan lifestyle. A Vitamix or other high-powered blender was a must, and we were lucky to get one as a wedding present in April 2017. This opened me up to the world of smoothies. They became a staple in my regime when I started TriMarni training and had 3-4 early morning swims a week in my schedule. Unfortunately, where I live is a pool desert. The closest lap pool to me is a 30 minute drive away so squeezing in a morning swim means getting up at 5am and hitting the road, all before starting the work day around 9am. Swimming without a full meal on my stomach was not the way to go, but I just didn’t have time to eat, drive, swim, change, drive, and be at work. My solution was to pull out the Vitamix and make a smoothie the night before. Now, I drink ¾ of my smoothie on the drive to the pool, the rest of it on the drive from the pool to the office, and then follow that up with a larger breakfast of something oatmeal, fruit and coffee.

Recipe Basics

You can get really creative with your smoothies by choosing different fruit, greens, seeds, etc., but all of my smoothies have the same basic ingredients:

• Frozen fruit (my favorites are pineapple, blueberries, or mixed berries)
• Banana
• Greens (either a handful of spinach or kale)
• Nuts or seeds (think hemp seeds, flaxseeds, pumpkin seeds)
• Superfood (maca powder, cacao nibs, spirulina, beet powder, or goji berries)
• Liquid (almond milk or coconut water)
• Optional – sweetener (dates, vanilla extract, agave syrup, or maple syrup)

Smoothie Recipes

Here are my go-to smoothie recipes. I make one of these the night before my swim, keep it in the fridge, then grab it on the way out the door.

Green Machine

• Frozen pineapple
• Banana
• Spinach or kale (whatever’s in the fridge or ready in the garden)
• Hemp seeds
• Spirulina
• Coconut water

Super Blueberry

• Frozen blueberries or mixed berries
• Banana
• Spinach or kale (whatever’s in the fridge or ready in the garden)
• Flaxseeds
• Pumpkin seeds
• Maca powder, sometimes some cacao nibs too
• Almond milk
• Optional – add 1 or 2 dates to sweeten if you prefer