Some days I can’t believe how lucky I am. Not only do I get to communicate with a growing audience, but many of you visit my blog, EverydayCheapskate.com, sign up to receive my emails every morning, and respond with beautiful replies. Every day I open my inbox to a flood of wonderful notes and letters, some several pages long. Mostly questions, but occasionally a wonderful thank you note. I’m always grateful for your feedback.
Dear Stingy: I’m joining your green smoothie breakfast brigade! Is your recipe (see my last column, “Being Green Is Actually Easy”) for one or two servings? (I asked because she graciously drank it all up, and it seemed to be enough!) — Kristin
Dear Christine: I couldn’t help but laugh out loud when I thought of you marching in your green uniform with a smoothie in hand. This recipe is for one 16-ounce smoothie, but it certainly makes a substantial and healthy breakfast. It can easily be divided to serve two, but I love your style. And by the way, I’m glad you joined the military. (For curious readers who missed that column, here’s a reprint of the column Nancy mentioned:)
Living an eco-friendly life is actually easy
I have a story to share with you. I hate to think that my husband and I are so easily persuaded by peer pressure, but it seems that we are.
We have friends who are crazy about a healthy lifestyle – clean eating and extreme exercise. I call anything with the words “running,” “jogging,” or “cycling” in it crazy. They are so into these things that they don’t even think about taking a break when we come over. Nope, we all drink green smoothies every morning. No questions asked, no excuses.
Let me state here that my husband has never met anyone who likes vegetables. He just doesn’t like vegetables. Ever. But he’s more sweet than picky, so every time we visited our friends Carol and Steve, for the sake of friendship, he (and I) ate his veggies with a smile on his face. And Harold, I’ve only ever noticed, would cringe a little, the way a kid does when they have to eat something they find really gross. It always made me laugh, but I really tried not to show it.
I can’t fully explain it, but after a few occasions like this, something shifted within both of us that made us think, maybe, we should try this for ourselves.
One thing led to another: we started with a banana, an apple, and a tiny leaf of baby spinach, and before we knew it, we were making smoothies the color of wet concrete every morning.
We decided to gradually increase the spinach until we had a little less than we could actually taste, and then we added some cucumber to see if the color was a little more green.
Long story short, it’s been over a year now, and we’ve succumbed to the power of habit again. Drinking a green smoothie every morning has become a real habit. It’s our new lifestyle.
I’ve come up with a way to do all of this in advance, like an assembly line, once every two weeks, so it’s super easy.
First, open up some bread bags (I bought a box of 1,000 on Amazon to show my enthusiasm) and shape them into “bowls” on your counter. In each bag, add 1 chopped banana, a handful of baby spinach leaves, 4 baby carrots, 4 large slices of cucumber, and half a chopped apple. Done.
Twist the bag into a loose knot and place in the freezer. Done.
Every morning, you take one bag, slam it on the counter a few times, dump the contents into your blender, add about 3/4 cup of water (juice, kefir, or whatever you have), and press the “smoothie” button. In less than 3 minutes, voila! You have a lovely green smoothie that’s healthy and totally delicious.
Don’t tell anyone, but I always add more spinach because I want that beautiful green smoothie color.
Mary invites you to visit EverydayCheapskate.com, where this column is archived and also contains links and resources to all the products and services recommended. Mary invites questions and comments at “Ask Mary.” This column answers general questions but cannot respond to letters individually. Mary Hunt is the founder of the frugal living blog EverydayCheapskate.com and author of the book “Debt-Proof Living.”
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