April 10, 2015

Spring Celebration Layered Smoothies

If you’ve been hanging around these parts for a while, then you know I have a slight obsession with smoothies. Because what’s not to love. Smoothies are easy, delicious, healthy, colorful and the best way I know to clean out my refrigerator at the end of the week.

Yes, I’m admitting to often treating my blender kind of like a garbage disposal. My smoothies are usually a mash-up (errr…blend-up) of over-ripe fruits, leftover herbs, almost wilted greens, half containers of yogurt and the dregs at the bottom of the juice container. I could go on. But I won’t. Because I’m not making this sound very appealing. Sorry.

But don’t worry. Because today is different. Today I decided our smoothie should be all fancy pants. Because even a smoothie deserves to get dressed up and taken out on the town every once in a while.

What the heck am I saying? Just stop me, please. Before I further embarrass myself.

So layers. We’ve go two of them. The bottom layer gets it’s lovely green hue from some romaine lettuce, parsley and a granny smith apple. While the top layer is that classic Spring combo we all know and love: strawberries and rhubarb. Both layers are sweetened naturally with ripe bananas and dates. But I definitely wouldn’t call this smoothie overly sweet. In fact, if you are used to drinking something on the sweeter side, you might even want to add a little agave or maple syrup.

My neighbor and I enjoyed these Spring Celebration Layered Smoothies together and she summed them up perfectly: “it’s like eating a bowl of fruit and a salad all at the time”. Yup. Pretty much.

Cheers,

Liz

Spring Celebration Layered Smoothies

Yield: Makes 2 large smoothies

Ingredients

• For the Romaine-Apple Layer
• 1 heart of romaine lettuce, chopped
• 1 Granny Smith apple, cored and chopped
• 1 peeled and frozen banana, cut into chunks
• 2 dates, pitted and chopped
• 2 tablespoons parsley
• 1/2 cup orange juice
• Juice from 1 lime

• For the Strawberry-Rhubarb Layer
• 2 cups strawberries, sliced
• 1 cup rhubarb, chopped
• 1 peeled and frozen banana, cut into chunks
• 2 dates, pitted and chopped
• 5 ounces yogurt (I used non-fat vanilla yogurt)
• 1/2 cup orange juice

Instructions

1. Make the romaine-apple layer. Add all of the ingredients for the romaine-apple layer to your blender. Blend on high until smooth. Divide the mixture evenly between two glasses. Rinse out the blender.
2. Make the strawberry-rhubarb layer. Add all of the ingredients for the strawberry-rhubarb layer to your blender. Blend on high until smooth. Slowly pour the strawberry-rhubarb layer over the romaine-apple layer.
3. If you want to make some designs, simply insert a straw (or something else long and thin) all the way to the bottom of your glass. Then draw the straw upwards against the side of the glass, moving through both the layers.
4. Enjoy immediately.

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https://www.floatingkitchen.net/spring-celebration-layered-smoothies/