Green Monster Smoothie

My friend Jess drinks green smoothies. Like with spinach in them. Being a spinach lover, I was intrigued by the idea, but it wasn't until a month or so ago that I got her recipe. And then it wasn't until today that I finally tried one for myself.

I just got back from a class at the YMCA called "total strength," and after biking home from it (only 1.1 miles), I was left with "total LACK of strength." And I thought to myself "now is the time to try this protein smoothie for a quick lunch!" I was especially excited to make it since the boys are away mountain biking and I don't have to make any lunch for them -- they took almost all the pumpkin muffins I made as snacks apparently.

I adapted her recipe (shared below with links to the original) to what I had on hand:
- two handfuls of fresh spinach
- 1/2 of a banana
- a handful of frozen strawberries
- 2 TB powdered peanut butter (kind of weird stuff but supposedly less calories than real PB)
- 1/2 cup greek yogurt (mine was honey flavored)
- 3/4 cup milk

Hmm...spinach, banana, greek yogurt, strawberries...

This is sure to be one of the more interesting smoothies I have ever had.

Our blender isn't that powerful and so the frozen strawberries didn't really get blended at all. It turned out to be a weird light greenish brown color.

Does that look appetizing?

But it tasted really delicious! I couldn't taste the spinach at all, and will put more in it when I make it next time. It was definitely peanut buttery with 2 TB of that powder. I need to get some flax or chia seeds for a real protein punch.

Jess's version (which was adapted from this blog post):

2 handfuls of spinach
2 TBS PB2 powder
1 TBS ground flax, or chia seeds, or Amazing Grass - Green Superfood
1/2 cup plain nonfat greek yogurt
3/4 cup vanilla almond milk
1/2 frozen banana handful frozen fruit (mangoes, peaches, strawberry, pears)

Would anyone else try one of these?

Also on a side note, I had to change my blog layout because the old one was no longer working correctly. This one is okay, but I don't like how subtle the difference in color is for links, you can hardly tell they are links at all! Will try to change that, but I'm worried any customization will make other things go screwy...