Healthy January #smoothieaday

Christmas is well and truly over and we are all in the same boat where we start to worry about our health. I am sure that majority of us feel guilty about the amount of food and drink that we have consumed over the festive period. January is the perfect time to take stock and change our lifestyle and eating habits.

10 things to change:

1. De clutter your kitchen cupboards and fridge of all junk food.
2. Rewrite your shopping list to include, fruits, vegetables, nuts and seeds.
3. Replace refined sugars with natural sugars such agave nectar, maple syrup, stevia and honey but still consume them in moderation.
4. Stop buying cartons of juices and smoothies that have sugars and additives.
5. Make a meal plan and shop accordingly to avoid eating ready meals. Why not check out some healthy budget recipe ideas suggested by my friend Jan.
6. Replace sugary fizzy drinks with water.
7. Give up smoking
8. Reduce alcohol consumption
9. Replace sweet treats and desserts with fresh fruit. Aim to eat five fruits and vegetables a day.
10. Exercise, walk, swim, jog at least 30 minutes each day.

Breakfast is the most important meal of the day. Its important to eat a healthy breakfast as it will stop you getting sugar cravings mid morning. Eat porridge, granola or low fat cereals with less sugar. If you don't have time for breakfast the best thing to do is to make a smoothie to take with you.

At the weekend add to your shopping list the fruits and vegetables listed below. They are so that you can create single portion smoothie mixes to keep in your freezer ready to blend in the morning.

Fruits / Vegetables	Seeds/ Berries /Nuts	Milks/ Liquids	Spices / Sweeteners
Mango Pineapple Bananas Apples Pears Peaches Melons Baby Spinach Kale Avocado Kiwi Fruit Plums Berries Sharon Fruit White Cabbage Beetroot Cauliflower Cucumber Carrots Celery Coconut Lemon Lime Oranges  Fresh Ginger Fresh Turmeric	Pumpkin seeds Chia Seeds Flax Seeds Goji Berries Golden Berries Almonds Cashew nuts Oats	Soya Milk Almond Milk Water Coconut Milk Coconut water Rice Milk Yoghurt Hemp Milk Fresh Juice Ice cubes	Nutmeg Cardamom All Spice Cinnamon Maple Syrup Honey Agave Nectar Dates Stevia Cocoa

To make your smoothie freezer mixes:

1. Peel, cut and dice the fruits and vegetables into one inch pieces. 

2. Peel the root ginger and turmeric and cut it into small 1 cm pieces.(You only need a very small amount of this to add to your mix)

3.Once the fruit is cut, select 3-4 fruits and vegetable combinations from the above list. There is no strict ratio but I usually select the main fruit and make it to 1 cup, add 1/2 cup second fruit, and then 1/4 cup of vegetable such as spinach, kale, cucumber, celery or cabbage and put them into a zip lock bag. If you like you can add a cm cube of turmeric or ginger too. 

4. Make up all the pouches and label the zip lock bags to say what ingredients are in them and add a date. The best thing to do is to let your family add their own choice combinations into a zip lock bag to make individual smoothie servings. Label each bag with their name and what fruits are in them. 

5. Place the zip lock bags into the freezer ready for use.

6. To make the smoothie in the morning take a smoothie mix from the freezer and add it to the Optimum 9400 Blender or any other heavy duty blender, select or two ingredients from the seeds, berries and nut column and add it to the fruit, now select a liquid from the liquid column and add 50ml  to the blender. Finally choose a sweeter or spice and add a tiny bit to the blender, This is optional.

7. Blend the smoothie and pour into a onthego cup and your smoothie is ready.

There is no hard and fast rules about the combinations of fruits and vegetables you can choose but below are some suggestions.

• Pear and Pineapple and Ginger
• Mixed summer Berries (strawberries, blackberries and raspberries)  cabbage, banana,
• Kiwi, cucumber and kale
• Beetroot, carrot and Orange
• Sharon fruit, lime and Orange
• Melon, raspberries and banana
• Avocado, spinach and pineapple
• Red apple, beetroot and ginger
• Mango, turmeric and pineapple
• Kale, apple and melon
• Spinach, celery and cucumber
• Peaches, apple and ginger 
• Banana, avocado
• Blue berries apple and ginger

To get you started do check some of these wonderful ideas:

Carrot ginger and Orange

Kale and Mango smoothie

Blueberry and Apple smoothie  

Lemon Blueberry Muffin smoothie

Golden kiwi, pineapple and turmeric smoothie

To make the smoothies you will need together with all the ingredients a heavy duty blender. This is important as the fruits are frozen and budget blenders will not be able to blend frozen fruits.

I used my tried and trusted Optimum 9400 or Nutri Force Extractor. Both Blenders are capable of blending frozen fruit and give you the correct texture. They are both easy to clean and maintain too.

The Optimum 9400 is currently on offer for £299 and the Nutri Force Extractor is on offer for £189 . Froothie also offer 0% finance on products over £ 299 and only require a 10% deposit. That's not all, the fab people at Froothie are offering you lovely readers FREE DELIVERY too (for a limited time).  Just use this code 1572 FREE AMBASSADOR DELIVERY in the comments box when making your purchase, the delivery charge will then be refunded.

You will also need something to put your smoothie in such as on the go cups, mason jars with lids, glass bottles with lids and also straws. 

Although this sounds like an investment, it's totally worth it, think of the money you will save when you make your own smoothie. One single shop bought smoothie can cost up to two pounds and it also has many sugars and additives in it. For a fraction of this price you can make your own smoothie at home.

Tip: Buy bulk packs of fruits that are value for money. Also stock up on seasonal fruits. Shop at market stalls they often reduce berries etc at the end of the day as they often have short shelf life.Since we are freezing the fruit it does not matter if its a little over ripe. On average I worked out that one serving sometimes even two smoothie on the go costs less than 50p to make at home.