I said I was going to add some spinach into my next smoothie and I did. If you’re wondering about the title, here is the background on how the name came about…
I was adding the ingredients into our Vitamix when Aristotle walks past.
Aristotle: Green! I’m not having any of that!
Me: It’s okay. You don’t have to. It’s for me.
At this time, I already had reservations about trying to offer my “green” smoothie to Aristotle. After blending everything, I noticed that it looked brown – like a chocolate smoothie (even though there isn’t any chocolate in it) – so I offered a little to Aristotle. He eyed it suspiciously and I quickly added, “It’s a chocolate smoothie! Sort of…” He agreed to try it. His reaction after he did? “Mmmm, not bad.” And he drank a cup.
And that’s how it got the name “Chocolate” Green Smoothie…
What’s in it?
- 3 stalks of celery
- 50 grams of baby spinach leaves
- 100 grams of blackberries
- 1 medium orange, peel removed
- 1 medium banana, peel removed
- 1 tbsp honey dissolved in a 100ml of hot water and cooled with 8 ice cubes
- 200 grams of mango yoghurt (I used Emmi)
- 2 scoops of Bulla Wildberry frozen yogurt
Throw everything into a high powered blender, like a Vitamix, and blend it into a liquid. This recipe makes roughly enough for 3 IKEA glass tumblers (plus/minus – depending on the size of your fruits and veggies).
The key to a “green smoothie”, when your target customer is a child who avoids “green veggies” like the plague, is to make sure it doesn’t look green. Dark coloured or strong coloured fruits or veggies can help to mask the colour. In this case, the blackberries did the trick.
Forget The Sneaky Chef and Deceptively Delicious (which failed miserably anyway). If you want your kids to get their veggies, this is the way to do it: Frozen Yoghurt Smoothies.
I recently tried the recipe below and I reckon it takes a pretty perceptive palate to taste the carrots and celery. Raw carrots and celery are two veggies I find particularly hard to consume but I’d happily drink this anytime, anywhere. Compared to the recipes from The Sneaky Chef and Deceptively Delicious, I reckon you’ll get in a lot more veggies per serve in a smoothie. Throw in some power fruits and you’ve got a pretty potent nutrient cocktail.
So what’s in it?
- 3 stalks of celery
- 1 whole carrot, peel and ends removed
- 100 grams of blackberries
- 1 medium orange, peel removed
- 1 tbsp honey dissolved in a 100ml of hot water and cooled with 8 ice cubes
- 200 grams of mango yoghurt (I used Emmi)
- 2 scoops of Bulla Wildberry frozen yogurt
Throw everything into a high power blender, like a Vitamix, and blend it into a liquid. This recipe makes roughly enough for 3 IKEA glass tumblers (plus a little bit more – depending on the size of your fruits and veggies).
And that is how your sneak veggies into your child’s diet…
Tags: children, diet, Health, recipes, smoothies, vegetables
This is a simple recipe from my SIL that was a real winner with my biggest fussy eater so it had to go down in the undomestic goddess recipe journal. I figure that if I can find a good udon, smallest fussy eater will love it too.
Without further ado, here it is…
Ingredients:
- Dashi powder
- soy sauce
- water
- soba noodles
- beef, marinate with salt and black pepper
- spinach
- spring onions
Method:
- Add water to a stock pot. Bring to the boil. Blanch the spinach. Put aside.
- Use the same pot to cook your noodles. Set aside.
- Grill or pan fry the beef – just enough to seal it. You will be pouring hot soup over it later and it will cook further so don’t over do it now. Set the beef aside for at least 10 minutes before slicing it up. You can also roast a larger piece of beef and freeze the excess for another day. It’s great for beef sandwiches and other easy meals.
- In a fresh pot, boil more water. Add miso powder and soy sauce.
- Put noodles, spinach and sliced beef into a bowl for one person. Add boiling soup. Sprinkle diced spring onions.
- Serve with wasabi and soy sauce.
And this is what you’ll get…
So my hubby says I never take care of his health because I don’t bother to brew Chinese herbal concoctions for him so I decided to make this soup. This is another soup recipe I recall my mother making when I was a child. I didn’t have the exact recipe for it, so I went on the fly. The recipe you see below is how I did it. Alternatively, you can check out a more authentic recipe from Visual Recipes which includes some herb called Dang shen (also known as poor man’s ginseng). If I recall correctly, dang shen is quite bitter so I’d think twice before adding it.
Here’s my soup recipe…
Ingredients:
- Half a chicken carcass
- 10 Red dates
- 2 Dried scallops
- 1 handful of dried Goji berries
- Water (I used 2 IKEA bowls)
- salt to taste
Notes:
- Before making any soup, the norm is to boil the meat in water for a few minutes to remove the “meat scum” (or albumin). After that, you wash the meat and put it back into fresh water. If you can’t be bothered, the easier way is to boil the meat in water, skim off the meat scum, then add your remaining soup ingredients. Chicken is generally more forgiving than pork because it doesn’t usually have as much “meat scum”.
Method:
- Put all the ingredients into the slow cooker and let it cook for a couple of hours.
It should look like this minus the dang shen.
My Mum used to make this a lot when I was a kid and I loved it so I tried making it some time back. I was delighted to discover that it’s a hit with the fussy hubby as well so I thought I’d better write down the recipe before I forget what I did. Here it is…
Ingredients:
- 1 whole chicken chopped into pieces
- marinade: 1 tbsp oil, 1 tsp sesame oil, dash of pepper, 2 tbsp light soy sauce, 3 tbsp dark soy sauce, 200 ml water
- a few slices of ginger
- a few cloves of garlic (smash them)
- 1 onion, sliced
- 2 potatoes, peeled and chopped into large chunks
- 1 carrot, peeled and chopped into large chunks
Method:
- Marinade the chicken pieces with the marinade ingredients.
- Put everything into a stock pot.
- Add the ginger, garlic, onion, potatoes and carrot.
- Bring to the boil, stirring occasionally.
- Drop the heat and simmer for 45 minutes, stirring occasionally.
- Remove from heat and serve.
The end result can be a bit oily so you might want to skim off some of the oil layer. You can also remove the chicken skin.
Variations: you can omit either the carrots or the potatoes, but I think you must have at least one of them to maintain the flavour of the dish.
Photos: again, I forgot to take some so you’ll just have to take my word for it that it was good – not that it was much to look at anyway.
