Our spinach berry smoothie recipe is a simple, delicious way to eat lots of nutrients in one go. Spinach, strawberries, blueberries, and bananas all get blended with Greek yogurt for a rich treat.
Is Spinach Berry Smoothie Healthy?
Yes, our spinach berry smoothie has a lot of health benefits.
To begin with, it’s a blend of different fruits and veg: bananas, strawberries, blueberries, and spinach. One serving can give you many nutrients such as vitamin C, vitamin B6, vitamin K, potassium, calcium, iron, manganese, and many more.
The smoothie also contains dairy products such as Greek yogurt and milk, which can provide you with trace amounts of minerals. Compared to other types of yogurts, Greek yogurt has more protein.
We sweetened 4 servings of this smoothie with 1 tbsp of sugar, which weighed 13 g. This amount takes up 6.5 % of the USDA’s suggested upper limit of added sugar for a 2000-calorie diet.
Speaking of which, one glass of our smoothie contains about 148 calories. This amount is moderate for a drink, allowing you to easily manage your daily calorie intake.
Ingredients for Our Spinach Berry Smoothie
This spinach berry smoothie recipe calls for bananas, strawberries, blueberries, spinach, Greek yogurt, mint leaves, sugar, milk, and ice.
To make a quality smoothie, we have some tips to share:
- We leave out the stems: remove the spinach stems and save them for other dishes, such as stir-fries, casseroles, pasta, etc. They are quite fibrous in texture — healthy to eat but not ideal for smoothies.
- Overly ripe bananas make the best smoothies: those poor fruits that have gotten soft and gained brown spots haven’t gone bad! They are super sweet and will make your smoothie sweet without adding extra sugar. However, if they’re squishy or slimy and have a black peel, they’ve indeed gone bad and need to be discarded.
- We sometimes use frozen berries: we love how convenient a bag of mixed frozen berries can be.
- Make a tasty frozen fruit bowl with frozen fruits: simply skip the ice and freeze the fruits before making. It makes for a healthy breakfast bowl with some grains, seeds, dried fruits, or granola on top.
- Make this smoothie vegan by using vegan alternatives for dairy: some types of plant-based milk have a pleasant aroma, which might make for a better smoothie!
- Alternate your sweetener choice: honey, maple syrup, brown sugar, diet sugar, stevia, you name it. FYI, dried dates are super sweet and don’t count as added sugar.
What Berries to Use in Smoothies?
Strawberries and blueberries are great — they have unnoticeable seeds and are usually sweet.
If you’re a big fan of seedy berries like raspberries, you can heat them in a saucepan with a splash of water. Once they’re tender, run the mixture through a sieve to discard the seeds. This berry purée can be portioned out, kept in the freezer, and blended with other components when needed.
How To Make Spinach Berry Smoothie
Once you’ve gathered the ingredients, place them all in the blender and blend until smooth. The ingredient measurements are listed in the ‘Spinach Berry Smoothie Recipe’ card at the bottom.
If you don’t have a strong blender, avoid making chunky drinks by using only soft ice like ice nuggets. If that’s not an option, break your ice into finer pieces using cheesecloth and something hard like a mortar before blending.
To speed things up, layer the ice at the bottom of the blender. The blade will crush it first before the fruits get in the way.
Blend ingredients.
Pour into serving glasses.
Serve immediately.
Is It Ok to Drink Smoothies Every Day?
Smoothies are a great way to get nutrients if your plate often lacks fruits and vegetables. You can have smoothies every day, but there are certain things you need to keep in mind.
- Added sugar level: sugar coming from sweeteners instead of fruits and veg counts as added sugar and should be consumed in moderation. As suggested by the USDA, calories from added sugar should not exceed 10% of the total calories you get within the day.
- Eat a variety of foods: try to fit not just fruits and vegetables but other types of food into your meal. Getting a variety of foods from the main food groups assures that the body gets enough of different nutrients.
How Long Does Spinach Berry Smoothie Last?
Considering there’s ice in this smoothie, you should have it all in one sitting. There’s no way to preserve it without compromising its quality and consistency.
If you leave out the ice, you’ll get a smoothie mixture that can be preserved in the fridge or the freezer. The fridge should keep it for 2 days, and the freezer for up to 3 months.
Note that your smoothie mix can become discolored because low temperatures can’t stop it from oxidizing. Still, as long as it’s correctly preserved and gets used within the right time period, it is edible.
We usually use airtight containers when refrigerating. To freeze, on the other hand, we portion the smoothie mix into small Ziploc bags, seal them, and stack them in the freezer. This allows us to individually thaw each serving with ease.
Spinach Berry Smoothie Recipe
Ingredients
- 12 oz bananas sliced
- 8 oz blueberries
- 4 oz strawberries hulled and halved
- 3 oz spinach washed
- 1/4 cup plain Greek yogurt
- 1 tbsp sugar
- 3 cups ice
- 8 mint leaves
Instructions
- Place all ingredients (except the mint) in a blender, starting with the ice. Cover and blend until smooth.
- Pour into serving glasses.
- Garnish with mint leaves and serve immediately.
Nutrition
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