All things green and lovely...

I did it today. By "it" I mean I fell prey to the much touted Green Monster. I had my doubts. I did. For everyone who said you can't taste the spinach, you are 100% correct. I was hesitant to create a smoothie whose largest ingredient was spinach. It sounds, well, less than appetizing. The appearance, well, the same. Now that I have had one, I REALLY liked it. I know...

What ended up putting me over the edge was just the idea of this being an easy way to get in some more veg. Over the past month I have really been eating more "cleanly"; however, in taking stock of what I have been eating, I found that green vegetables seem to be lacking. Not that I DON'T eat them, I think in terms of food that I can tote around with me, fruits and carrots are more of the go to items. Today was the day I decided to put it to the test. Granted, I was starving when I got home so ANYTHING might have tasted good but it really hit the spot. (Literally starving, I am pretty sure there was a Feed Karen telethon or other charity in the works...)

My smoothie contained:

1 c milk
1 c ice
1/4 cup pineapple chunks
1 small banana
1/2 scoop vanilla protein powder
2 cups RAW SPINACH!

I am not going to lie, the sight of it in a blender made me doubt. CR was buzzing about the kitchen as I was throwing it together and turned his nose up at it although lets face it, he just started eating broccoli in the last year so his veggie tolerance isn't as finely tuned as mine. I secretly think if I put some chocolate powder in there he would love it. (Right now, CR is making a note to himself to not accept any suspicious chocolate shakes from me.)



Whirl it all up for a little bit and drink up. You absolutely cannot taste the spinach. You can't. I will say next time I might try strawberries in there as I like my smoothies to be slightly tart. Overall, it is worth a try even if you think it might not be your thing. Ignore the color and drink your veggies!

Side note on taking stock of what you are eating... I have been using the daily plate link on livestrong.com to sort of journal my eats. I am not really one to count calories but I do like to track from time to time to get a better picture of what I am eating. I find I tend to snack less when I am logging it as I don't want to see a box of girl scout cookies on my list as interesting as it might be to see the calorie count for that sort of indulgence. Samoas, I love thee... :)

***update***
CR just sampled a chocolate-banana version of the green monster. He was fully aware going in that there would be spinach in his smoothie. His only request was that I stay nearby "in case he gagged" :) He proclaimed it to be "not bad" and couldn't finish it because he was cleaning his motorcycle but asked me to save it for later. If he could manage to drink it, we all can. Trust me on that one.