Smoothie Supreme

We're in to smoothies lately- mainly because I can hide at least one vegetable and three fruits into a smoothie that my kids may or may not eat otherwise. (The vegetable you can probably bet that Claire wouldn't eat it if not hidden in a smoothie and the fruit is a fifty-fifty, depending on her mood.) I make these recipes up with whatever I have, but thought it was time to write down two of the better ones we've come up with. Taste-wise the peach-carrot is my favorite and only recently discovered. But the spinach-grape smoothie is surprisingly good as well and you wouldn't guess you were eating spinach (if you were blind that is - the dark green color does kind of give it away, but my kids haven't figured that out yet)

Peach-Carrot Smoothie

1 1/2 ripe banana, can buy them when reduced because they are too ripe and freeze them, putting the frozen banana straight in the blender

1 cup carrot puree - I puree the carrots in large batches and then freeze them in about one cup portions. I also use this as a substitute for oil in my waffle recipe and the kids never know

2 cups frozen peaches - we bought them in season last year and froze them ourselves

1/2 - 1 cup apple juice

1 cup pineapple with juice

1 cup frozen pear if you have it and want to add it in

Mix all ingredients in a blender. Enjoy

Spinach-Grape Smoothie

1 cup raw spinach leaves

2 frozen bananas

1/3 cup grape juice concentrate

2 cup frozen peach OR pear

1 cup pineapple with juice

Blend and enjoy. Add more grape juice concentrate if you can still taste the spinach. I've also added 1 cup of butternut squash puree and/or one cup of carrot puree to this smoothie. Just add more grape juice concentrate to mask the flavor. We have the concentrate in abundance because the family I nanny for grows grapes and we made free grape juice from their grapes, so it's become a staple in our smoothies.