Super-Food Smoothie

How was your weekend?!!!

Ours was filled with doing busy work here at home along with just relaxing a bit.  Good thing, because I am about to go into overdrive with photo shoots.  Back in the summer I posted a notice on Face**Book for Christmas Mini-Shoots that I'd be doing in the fall so people could sign up for something fun and chilly-sounding while baking in the 114 degree weather we were enduring through the dog days of summer.  It filled up with 23 thirty minute mini-shoots!! Yay!! Then last month I did a three-people-only post for a full family session at a super-UBER discount and it filled in less than half an hour.  This weekend I posted another great deal for three full family sessions and it filled up (plus I allowed one more!).  Plus I have several other shoots that will take time as well. How's this for fun?!!--I was asked to do a special shoot of a local high school choir, architecture shots of their campus and choir faculty.  Woot! Cha-ching$$$! That gig is in full gratitude to my friend who is a graphic designer and is starting to hook me up with commercial business shoots.

I think it came down to me realizing this weekend that I really do have a photography business.

The list of things I need to learn about my camera, photography, editing and plain old business sense is endless, but.....right here-right now......I have a business.  And I need to work it as such.

Procrastination is going to have to wait. (pun fully intended...haha)

What in the world does this information have to do with a smoothie, you ask?

Nothing.

I just wanted to share with you this Super-Food Smoothie recipe that one of my BFFs from this little shindig gave to me.  It is very clean and healthy.  According to her, everyone has boasted about her skin looking so much younger.  That was within days of having one every day.

Let's be totally honest, though.  My friend happens to be of Latin descent (ie....Mexican) and she loves to rub it in our gringa faces that her skin hasn't really started wrinkling like ours has.  Gracias, chica. 

BUT.....the point is, is that the spirulina algae powder and the bee pollen granules truly are considered super-foods and uber healthy.

Is uber really a word?  The little red dotted line keeps coming up under it as if I made it up.  Any clue?

PandaPop was watching a freebie documentary on Net*flix yesterday about this guy who lost a lot of weight by doing a juice detox.  Basically, he drank raw fruits & veggies for so many days.  We want to try it just to get some energy back into our 40-something bodies, but we don't yet own a juicer.  Maybe next paycheck.

This recipe is so yummy that my PandaGirl (Miss Picky!!!!) loves it!! PandaJOY just says, "No sank-you" while curling her lip up and shaking her head. The spirulina (found at our health food market) does have a tinge of algae/grassy taste, but all the flavors of the fruit overpower it.  That's just fair warning so you don't make the thing and gag because it didn't taste like a chocolate malt or something.  The original recipe calls for apple juice, but all we had yesterday was grape, so grape it was. Not as good as the apple and it changed the color.  When using apple juice it is vibrant green.  Yesterday's was grayish-purple and not quite the same flavor.

You can get the bee pollen at the health food store, as well.  Bee pollen is supposed to be the end-all, do-all greatest thing on the planet.  Not quite sure why the whole world has not taken hold of this phenomenon. Maybe it really, really is good for us and the billion dollar crap-food industry doesn't allow for it's promotion.

 Here are just a few of the benefits of bee pollen: click here for a great site.


Here's the recipe:

1/2 banana
5 strawberries
10 blueberries (Please don't sneak in another blueberry.  You might spontaneously combust)
2 heaping tablespoons of plain organic yogurt (I prefer Greek because it is thick and much better for you than any other kind)
1 scoop whey protein powder (I use vanilla flavored)
1 tsp spirulina
1 tsp bee pollen granules
1/2 to 1 cup of organic apple juice (I'm sure organic everything is better.....but I can't afford all organic!!)
two handfuls of ice (unless the fruit is frozen, then I only use one handful)
 Put everything in the blender and blend away!! It makes about a 16-20 oz cup of healthy goodness and is quite filling.

I'd love to know if you try this and if you use any other fruit variations!! I used frozen peaches instead of blueberries a couple of times and it makes for a great flavor change and makes the green a yellowy green.  In case you wanted to color coordinate that day.