One of the best parts of escaping to warmer climates during the brutal New England winters is all the mouth-wateringly fresh, in-season produce. You’re more likely to get struck by lightening than find a ripe avocado in a Boston grocery store right now, but when I was in Australia last month, all we ate was juicy, ripe fruits and fresh veggies. Take me back!

Even though the 10-foot-high snowdrifts stand as a brutal reminder that I am no longer Down Under, I’ve been on a bit of a smoothie kick ever since my trip. Smoothies are filling as-is, but sometimes I like to eat them with a spoon topped with granola, muesli, chopped fruit or other crunchy goodie to make them feel more like a meal. This smoothie bowl is super refreshing, especially on warm summer days…or for those of us who are in denial that it’s still winter.

If you’ve been reading my blog for a while, you know that I eat dairy sparingly. The easiest dairy product to eliminate from a diet (in my opinion) is cow’s milk because there are so many delicious alternatives. When I got the chance to try out Silk Cashewmilk, I immediately thought to put it in a smoothie bowl because of the irresistible creaminess of cashews. 

I love the crunch of the cashews and shredded coconut on top, but if chewing isn’t your thing, slurp it up in traditional smoothie form! Just make sure to add more cashew milk so that it’s not as thick. You can also sub out the flaxseeds for chia seeds or any other boost—the best thing about smoothies is they’re so easily customizable.

Disclosure: This post was sponsored by Silk through their partnership with POPSUGAR. While I was compensated to write a post about Silk, all opinions are my own.

Hello from California! I’m actually writing this yesterday on the plane so no updates on the Stitch Fix & LUNA blogger vacay—if I were to take a stab at foreseeing the future though, I’d say I’m having a blast today! And now that I’ve totally confused you…

I don’t regularly supplement my diet, but after a particularly long or intense workout (for example, when I take back-to-back megaformer and spinning classes), I do pay more attention to my post-exercise nutrition. In general, I don’t think of diet/nutrition as a science or numbers game, I just make an effort to put more of the good stuff and less of the junk into my body each day. It works for me. But that being said, if you’re working out regularly, you absolutely need to be getting enough protein so that your muscles can repair themselves and strengthen (grow).

Within 30(ish) minutes of finishing a tough workout, I try to have a snack or meal that’s high in protein—and I like to keep it easy. If I workout before breakfast, that might mean I’ll have a couple scrambled eggs or a smoothie packed with protein as my morning meal. If it’s later in the day, I’ll grab a piece of toast with almond butter and bananas, or maybe a quinoa salad topped with nuts.

If I’m going the smoothie route, I’ll typically just put protein-rich foods into the blender—spirulina, hemp seeds/protein, a handful of nuts, peanut butter, etc. Don’t get me wrong, I love spirulina and hemp protein, but unless you’re making a green smoothie, it turns everything brown. When my friends at Game Plan Nutrition sent me a sample of their vanilla whey protein powder, I couldn’t wait to make a strawberry smoothie that actually looked like a strawberry smoothie. Beautiful, right??

Not only is it beautifully pink, but it’s SO GOOD–I really loved the taste of Game Plan’s vanilla protein with the almond and berry flavors. Also super important to me, Game Plan doesn’t use any chemicals or hormones in their protein powder.

This smoothie is also super filling. I made this thinking it’d be a single-serving but I had to split it into two. And I think I’m going to start topping all my smoothies with crushed nuts from now on because the texture added by the almonds was unreal.

You will fall in love with this smoothie! Let me know if you try it out. And you can check out Game Plan HERE.

Granted, I’m not a mother, but in recent years I have developed this love for kitchen appliances that I can only imagine is what one would feel for their firstborn child. I’m exaggerating (Mom, you better love me more than your crock pot!!), but honestly, the excitement I felt when Ninja sent me their Ultima Dual Stage Blender is only rivaled by that which I felt upon opening up Samantha’s bedroom collection on Christmas morning 1995 (it’s an American Girl Doll thing, for all you straight men without daughters or sisters reading this).

It was perfect timing because I had just about had it with my previous blender. I really hate to give any sort of bad review on here (it makes me so uncomfortable), but I would not recommend the Breville Hemisphere if you guys are in the market for a new blender. I had mine just over a year and had consistent problems with it leaking (the bottom would come unscrewed whenever I’d turn it on), and getting it to blend solids into my smoothies was always a long process of turning it off, poking/stirring it with a spoon, adding more liquid—you know that game. For how much I paid for it, this was really frustrating.

In walk Ninja…

NIGHT AND DAY. I love this blender! I have the Ultima 8L810 model, and it comes with a 72oz blender jar, two single-serve jars with sippie lids (love these for making a smoothie to take with me to the studio!), and a 10-speed variable dial. There’s a double blade (one down low like other blenders and another up higher in the jar) so that you don’t have to worry about strategically layering your ingredients to get things flowing. I wouldn’t say I love this blender more than my dog, but I wouldn’t not say I love this blender more than my dog.

Ok, I don’t have a dog, but you guys get the point.

Get excited because I am going to be able to create so many new delicious, healthy, fun recipes for P&I now. I’m starting off with a smoothie today, but my new Ninja can do soups, hummuses (hummi?), sauces, nut butters, dips—the works. I can’t wait to get creative!

Tropical Green Avocado Smoothie

Adding avocado to smoothies gives them a boost of healthy fats and a smooth, creamy texture. Lately I’ve been loving pineapple, and this made for a delicious smoothie combo the other morning!

Phew. Ok, that post was way longer than it needed to be. Somebody drank too much coffee this morning… 

What kind of blender do you use?

Have you ever added avocado to your smoothies?

Ninja sent me the blender free of charge, but I was not otherwise compensated for this post and all opinions are my own. The Ultima rocks—thank you, Ninja!

Last week I went in for my annual checkup (which is more like a once-a-decade checkup because I’ve convinced myself I’m allergic to doctors and hospitals and western medicine), and after getting some blood drawn discovered I’m anemic (I have low iron levels in my blood). I’m not surprised because it runs in one side of my family, and I’m honestly not at all fazed by it either. The main side effect of anemia is fatigue, and I have always had abnormally high levels of energy, so anemia shmanemia.

While I don’t feel the need to take iron supplements (as recommended by doctors), I am going to make a conscious effort to eat more iron-rich foods. When you think of food that’s high in iron, you probably think red meat, white meat, meat, meat and more meat. I … barely eat any meat with the exception of fish. Oysters and clams are packed with iron, which is great for me because I ADORE shellfish, but ultimately, I need to look elsewhere for iron.

Lucky for me, there are lots of vegetarian/vegan options (not that I’m either). Among the superstars are spinach, beet greens, dandelion greens, collards, kale, chard, strawberries, watermelon, sesame seeds, lentils and blackstrap molasses. I also learned that iron is more easily and effectively digested if eaten with Vitamin C. Convenient because the majority of foods I just listed are high in C as well.

Iron-Rich Green Smoothie

I debated whether or not to call this a “juice” or a “smoothie” because it doesn’t have the thick consistency you might expect from a smoothie, but it’s also got more body than juice. Just think of it as an iron-rich green concoction. And if the thought of putting blackstrap molasses in a smoothie sounds crazy, don’t worry—you can’t even taste it aside from a hint of sweetness.

Ingredients

• 2 cup packed spinach
• 1 cup packed kale
• 2 heaping cups chopped watermelon
• 1 banana
• 1 tbsp sesame seeds
• ½ tbsp blackstrap molasses

Throw it in a blender and enjoy!

Just how much iron is packed into this green smoothie? 41% of your daily iron needs. The percentage is based on a 2,000-calorie diet, and because I need fewer calories each day, the percentage is actually probably a little higher than that for me. So I’m pretty much getting half of my daily iron needs from this one smoothie.

How does that compare to red meat, often touted as the most iron-rich food out there? One strip steak of grass-fed beef, lean-only and raw (you’d never eat a raw steak, but there are more nutrients pre-cooking, so I’m trying to make this as much of an apples-to-apples comparison as  I can) has 22% of your daily iron needs. Half of what was in this smoothie. Whoop! Plants win again.

Not that I think there’s anything wrong with enjoying a steak now and then, but it’s nice to know you don’t need meat to get the minerals you need—especially since I’ve never liked the taste of red meat.

Nutrition Facts

Calories: 315
—Calories from Fat: 48
Total Fat: 9.5g
—Saturated Fat: .5g
Cholesterol: 0mg
Sodium: 87mg
Carbohydrates: 65g
—Dietary Fiber: 9g
—Sugar: 37g
Protein: 9g
Iron: 41%

Woof. What a long-winded post. Gold star for everyone who actually read the whole thing. Have a great weekend!

I haven’t been very inventive in the kitchen lately because of a super busy schedule and back-to-back weekend trips to Maine, but one culinary delight to come out of a caffeine-fueled, jam-packed calendar is this banana-hazelnut coffee protein smoothie. I don’t drink coffee regularly because I hate the feeling of being dependent on caffeine to function in the morning (there was a dark time in my life when I was fully addicted to coffee for a solid month and had to endure splitting withdrawal headaches for two days to break the habit), but I do enjoy a nice iced coffee here and there.

My go-to for coffee is P.S. Gourmet which, in true Southie fashion, is an absolutely hilarious establishment without even realizing it’s hilarious. It’s just so….so “Southie.” They mark any bill over a $10 to make sure it’s not counterfeit—even if you’ve clearly just taken the $20 bill out of their ATM. Every morning I walk in, I overhear bits of conversation like, “Yeah, I’ve been goin’ tannin’ because Robbie likes it when I’m wicked dahk.” And they have a sign on the door warning you not to sell drugs inside. I fucking love that place.

Anyway, the other day, I had half of a large banana hazelnut iced coffee left, so I decided to pour it into an ice cube tray and turn it into smoothie fuel. (As a side note, freezing coffee in ice cube trays is also a great way to keep (unfrozen) cups of iced coffee cold without watering them down with regular ice cubes.) I added in a banana, rice milk, some vanilla protein powder and flax seeds and blended it together into a perfect post-workout breakfast smoothie. It wakes you up and gets you the protein fuel your body needs.

Ingredients

This will make one glass, on the smaller side.

• 1 cup banana hazelnut coffee ice cubes
• 1 banana
• ¼ cup vanilla rice milk
• 2 tbsp vanilla hemp protein powder
• 1 tbsp flax seeds

Nutrition Facts

Calories: 259
–Calories from Fat: 54
Total Fat: 5g
–Saturated Fat: 0g
Cholesterol: 0mg
Sodium: 39mg
Total Carbohydrate: 44g
–Dietary Fiber: 11g
–Sugars: 19g
Protein: 8g

I’ll end with P.S. Gourmet’s television commercial for those of you who don’t live in the Boston area and haven’t had the pleasure of watching it. I can’t decide if it’s the worst commercial ever or…the best.

When I’m planning to host a get-together, I have a neurotic fear that there won’t be enough food or enough alcohol for my guests. So I always end up planning this entirely ridiculous menu of foods and doing like 18 trips to Whole Foods in the upcoming days and force-feeding everyone snacks they don’t want like the overbearing Italian mother I am destined to become.

My book club last month was no different. Luckily, about halfway through my cooking frenzy, one of my friends was like “dude, enough.” It saved me from making too many snacks, but left me with a bunch of pears, melons and cantaloupe that I had been planning to grill, wrap in goat cheese and prosciutto, and drizzle with honey (delicious—try it!). Since making hors d’oeuvres for yourself is…awkward…I decided the next best use for the melon was clearly a smoothie.

Now, I almost didn’t post this recipe because I found the texture a little…different. The avocado makes this a creamy smoothie, and I’m not entirely sure what I think about that. If you’re into that thick, creamy texture though, then this is the smoothie for you.

Melon Avocado Super Seed Smoothie

Ingredients

This will make 1 large smoothie or 2 smaller ones.

• ½ an avocado
• 1 cup chopped melon
• 1 cup frozen pineapple chunks
• Juice from ½ a lemon
• ½ a banana
• 1 tsp chia seeds
• 1 tsp flax seeds
• 1 tsp hemp seeds

If you try it out, let me know what you think about the texture of the smoothie.

Nutrition Facts

Calories: 395
—Calories from Fat: 156
Total Fat: 17 g
—Saturated Fat: 2 g
Cholesterol: 0 mg
Sodium: 41.5 mg
Total Carbohydrate: 61 g
—Dietary Fiber: 13 g
—Sugars: 37 g
Protein: 7 g

Normally, I don’t keep peanut butter in my kitchen because, like with ice cream, I can’t eat that shit responsibly. Fool me once, shame on you, Peanut Butter. Fool me twice, shame on me. Down a jar with a spoon in under two days for the twentieth time, and I GIVE UP DAMNIT. (That’s how the saying goes, right?)

But, in the spirit of Thanksgiving binging, I decided to indulge myself at the grocery store. And, shockingly, I’ve been putting it to use in a healthy way, save for the occasional finger dip-and-swoosh move. (Don’t judge me; food tastes better when you eat it with your fingers.)

If you’ve never added peanut butter to your smoothies, you’re not doing it right. This peanut butter berry smoothie is delicious, refreshing and filling. A perfect breakfast option.

 INGREDIENTS

This will make 2 servings:

• 2 cups frozen mixed berries (Whole Foods sells a frozen berry mix of strawberries, raspberries, blueberries and blackberries)
• 1 handful fresh raspberries
• 1 handful fresh blackberries
• 1 banana, chopped
• ½ cup low-fat 1% milk
• 2 tbsp peanut butter
• 1 tbsp flax seeds (optional)

What’s your favorite smoothie ingredient?

Nutrition Facts

Calories: 314
–Calories from Fat: 79
Total Fat: 6g
–Saturated Fat: 1g
Cholesterol: 3mg
Sodium: 101mg
Total Carbohydrate: 49g
–Dietary Fiber: 13g
–Sugars: 22g
Protein: 10g

This smoothie took me out of my comfort zone. Normally, when I think “smoothie,” I think “fruit.” And with fruit comes a certain level of sweetness. While this pumpkin smoothie does contain banana, it struck me as a little flat at first sip. And I don’t necessarily mean that in a bad way—you just need to go into this wanting a healthy, pumpkin breakfast drink, and not a summery fruit smoothie.

Taking inspiration from the countless Shipyard Pumpkin Head beers with cinnamon-sugar rims I’ve already consumed this fall at various Boston bars, I decided to add a pumpkin butter and cinnamon rim to this smoothie. BOOM. Talk about a taste improvement. Healthy pumpkin breakfast beverage turned into delicious, lip-licking autumn smoothie.

INGREDIENTS

• ½ cup canned pumpkin puree (or puree fresh pumpkin yourself if you enjoy overachieving and annoying others)
• ½ cup low-fat plain Greek yogurt
• 1 tbsp pumpkin butter
• 1 banana
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• ¼ tsp pumpkin pie spice
• ¼ tsp cinnamon
• For the rim: a smidge of pumpkin butter (smidge is a technical term) and a pinch of cinnamon

Mix everything together in a blender.

Invert a glass in pumpkin butter to coat the rim. Alternatively, just dip your finger in the pumpkin butter jar and smear it around the rim. I did the latter because I am a Neanderthal. Next, dip the rim in cinnamon, or just sprinkle it around the edge on top of the pumpkin butter.

Pour in the smoothie and enjoy!

This cherry kale smoothie is one of my favorite ways to start off the week (especially if I’ve been blowing off working out and enjoying a beer or two or ten all weekend). It’s delicious, but not so overwhelming fruity that you forget it’s healthy. Every time I make it I feel like I’m restarting myself for the week.

Here’s what you’ll need for this cherry kale smoothie:

• 1 heaping cup pitted cherries
• 1 banana (put it in your freezer over night to bring down the temperature of your smoothie)
• 2 handfuls kale
• ½ cup orange juice
• 1 tbsp. flax seed

This green smoothie is filling and makes for the perfect breakfast. Even better, it takes advantage of cherries, which will only be in-season for a little while longer. It’s depressing how quickly summer is coming to an end, but I’m not going to lie, I’m pretty dang excited for fall foods. COME TO ME, HONEYCRISP APPLES!

The amount of excitement I feel every time I look at my new blender makes me feel really, really old. Using extra spending money on a kitchen appliance? Next thing you know, I’ll be asking for a vacuum cleaner for Christmas. (I do actually need a vacuum cleaner though…damnit.)

So you all can share in some of my new-blender joy, I wanted to post a delicious smoothie I made the other day. Now I’m a firm believer that you don’t need a recipe to make a fruit smoothie—literally 99.9% of combinations will taste good. Toss fruit in there, add some yogurt or a banana for texture, mix in some fruit juice if desired, and you’ve got yourself a winner. But if you need some inspiration, this blueberry lime smoothie is uh-mazing. And the flax seeds add a hint of nuttiness and texture I love (not to mention a bazillion health bonuses).

Here’s what you’ll be blending:

• 1 cup fresh blueberries
• 1 cup frozen blueberries
• 1 individual container of blueberry Greek yogurt (about ¾ cup)
• Juice from 1 lime
• 1 tbsp flax seeds

So simple, but it makes for the perfect summertime breakfast or snack.