Smoothies

Yum... I have been craving fruit smoothies for a long time now. Especially since I saw the tropical fruit shake Mimi made! Mine isn't as colorful (or probably as tasteful, but...) I didn't really want to make my own. But I couldn't find any smoothie place around here. And I know they are probably super expensive, anyway. When we went grocery shopping, I looked at Odowalla (sp?) smoothies, for a small 8 or maybe 12 oz. bottle it was $2.98!!! At WalMart! We did buy a 64 oz. jug of V8 Fruit smoothie, strawberry banana. Probably also a ridiculous price, but not as bad as the Odowalla one. When we got home, I poured a glass. Looked at the back of the jug, '10% Fruit Juice'!! Ugh... So, I made my own. I remember when I was pregnant with our second son, I got a pregnancy magzine (my Mom also bought me a couple, too). In one of them was a recipe for a banana smoothie. I liked it. (My husband says it sounds disgusting...) I said 'It's not supposed to taste like a shake. It's fruit.' This is how I made the one above: 1 banana (I would have used a frozen one, but I didn't have one in the freezer), 1 cup milk (I used light soymilk), 1/2 tsp vanilla, 1 Tbsp sugar (probably shouldn't have added that, but... oh well. :P) And, about three ice cubes. You could add more. Really ice cold things hurt my teeth since I had all that work done recently. :( It was pretty good. And I wasn't hungry until dinner time. (I didn't eat any lunch, just the smoothie.) We also make what tastes (to me) like an Orange Julius. Probably not *just* like, but...we make a lot of this one: 16 oz. container of orange juice concentrate, 1 cup milk, 1 tsp. vanilla, a bunch of ice cubes, and 2 Tbsp (I think, might want to just use one to start with) sugar. Blend... :) Here is a recipe for a banana smoothie that sounds a little more flavorful than the one I made today. There's lots of other smoothie recipes there, too.(Not all are just fruit, though...) Well that is all for now. Til next time~~ :)