Try this green smoothie for a breakfast or post workout smoothie to start your day off with 3 servings of fruits and vegetables.
Gym Call Green Smoothie
- 2 Cups Filtered Water
- 1 Cup Spinach, Kale or 1 scoop greens supplement
- 1 Frozen Banana
- 1 Cup Frozen Pineapple
- 1/2 Avocado OR 1/2 dairy free yogurt (OPTIONAL)
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Add all ingredients into a blender and blend until smooth!
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You can add protein powder or another supplement powder to the smoothie if it’s a post workout smoothie, or you need more protein etc.
Healthy Breakfast Options
Smoothies are one of my favorite ways to get more fruits and vegetables into my routine. I usually get enough protein and fat in my morning, but if I haven’t meal prepped veggies due to a busy weekend, I don’t always get enough plant based carbohydrates into my morning. Smoothies, especially during the summer, are one of the best ways to increase your intake of more vegetables.
How Much Should I Eat in a Day?
Typically, we should be consuming about 9-12 servings of fruits and vegetables in our day. Generally, 1 serving is equal to 1 cup.
This is based off of research showing that increasing your fruit and vegetable intake to 7-8 servings a day improves, mood and overall feelings of well-being and happiness (1).
In addition, there are many aspects of eating “whole food” to get all of your nutrition needs that are much better than getting them in supplement form. For example, fruits and vegetables often also contain enzymes that help our body and digestive system break down valuable vitamins and minerals for us to be able to absorb them.
5 Tips to Get in More Fruits and Vegetables
- Go Slow. For many of my patients, 9-12 servings is a very large increase in fruits/veggies and more importantly fiber. If they increase their vegetable/fruit intake by too much too quickly, their gut isn’t used to it and can cause gas, bloating and discomfort. Since most of my patients come to me to reduce GI symptoms, bloating and gas… this isn’t exactly an ideal situation and it’s definitely not what we want. So, go slow. Use smoothies, juicing, or a greens supplement to help increase your vegetable/fruit intake in the morning.
- Steam or cook your vegetables. Eating raw vegetables does have it’s benefits, but many times it’s very dense in fiber and very hard on the digestion. Steaming vegetables is one of the best ways to unlock valuable nutrients from the plant for us to absorb.
- Meal Prep – it doesn’t have to take you three hours on the weekend to cook all of your meals. Just dicing and doing some of the brunt work for the week, turns cooking into 20 minutes or less in the morning/evenings, so that you have more time to eat healthy and also spend time doing what you like.
- Add healthy fats with your fruits. For example, almond butter and banana or avocado in a smoothie. The extra fat will help with long term energy and will also help balance out the increase in blood sugar from the fruit.
- Fill up your plate with 1/2 vegetables at every meal. This can include sweet potatoes/yams/purple potatoes, but make sure you can see a rainbow of colors on your plate. From greens, to yellows, to oranges, reds… the more colors, the more variety, the more nutrition = healthy.
Give This Recipe a Try!
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Did you check out this recent blog on fatigue and hypothyroidism?
