Saturday, February 11, 2012

Saturday Smoothie

Good morning, and happy weekend! I've got the morning all to myself while Carl is out fishing. He always amazes me with his eagerness to set an alarm for some obscene hour in the morning on a Saturday so that he can go fishing or surfing or hunting or whatever the man activity of the weekend is. He's crazy. I'll take my beauty rest, please! So I slept in till 8 and then went to the store to stock up on some smoothie fixings and other groceries for the upcoming week. I actually bought all organic except for two containers of strawberries that were buy one, get one free and two bottles of wine. Pretty good, right? Despite my schpeal last Sunday about the importance of organic foods I still have this mental block when it comes to the price of organics. Spending more money on healthy food shouldn't be a source of guilt, but I always leave the store cringing a little over my grocery bill. I'm working on getting past that, and hopefully buying organic food more consistently will make it easier for me.

Right now I am sipping on a pre-workout smoothie. I've got Jillian's Ripped in 30 today, and it's quite possible that I'm blogging right now in an effort to postpone that a little more. Ripped in 30 is tough stuff! Luckily I've got a yummy orange and strawberry smoothie to get me pumped up and ready for it. Up until recently I've never been a huge fan of oranges except for in juice form. Something about all the pulp and extra chewing and getting orange bits stuck in your teeth has always deterred me from eating them regularly. About a week ago it dawned on me that if I put one in my smoothie the Vitamix would blend it up enough so that I wouldn't notice any weird textures or pulp. Sure enough, oranges have been a delicious contribution to my smoothies, and a great way for me to take advantage of their fibrous benefits. Here's this morning's concoction:


From bottom to top:
-one orange
-a handful of sprouts
-a stalk of celery
-6 or 7 strawberries, I leave their leafy tops on to contribute to the greenness of the smoothie
-two collard leaves
-two kale leaves
-one frozen banana
-about a cup and a half of ice water (I took the picture before adding the water)
-somewhere in there is a heaping tablespoon each of ground flaxseed and hemp powder




And the final product:
The smaller jar on the left got put in the fridge for a post-workout recovery drink. I recently read this book, where I learned about the importance of what you eat/drink before and after your workouts:

I've developed a small crush on Brendan Brazier. He's a former Ironman triathlete who now lectures around the country about plant-based nutrition with a focus on environmental sustainability. He is also the creator of Vega, a line of whole foods products designed specifically for athletes. I ordered this book along with his newer book, Thrive Foods, and they were both pretty life-changing. He presents all of his information in such a logical way that I felt like an idiot for not figuring any of it out on my own. In the first book he focuses mainly on sports performance. As a triathlete he noticed that most of his peers had basically the same training program, and wondered what gave some athletes an edge over the rest. He found that it had a lot to do with recovery; the athletes who recovered quicker could train more and therefore enhance their performance quicker. The book outlines the foods to eat to help your body recover faster from stress and strain, and also function better in general. Thrive Foods focuses more on the environmental implications of what we choose to eat, and is equally good. I don't want to steal Brendan's thunder and give everything away, but I highly recommend both of them.

I'm off to conquer my workout video- wish me luck! I'll be back tomorrow to share my Week 7 ABC pick!

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