Nayu's Craft Time #133 Scrummy green smoothie & Craft this week

This is a yummy looking banana, mango and greek yogurt smoothie - picture source includes the recipe!

So on Sunday I was going to try a yummy sounding new breakfast: a banana and mango green smoothie using some frozen fruit I bought this week, not using the recipe of the picture since I prefer milk and add other stuff which will change the colour drastically. Last week I had bananas in my organic box, so I broke them into chunks using my hand because I couldn't be bothered to use a knife. Then while shopping this week I discovered Aldi's bargain frozen food: 500g/17oz of mango or pineapple or strawberries for £1.09!!! Bargain! Mixed fruit (grapes, some berries and cherries) are from about £1.49 (if my memory serves correctly), which is currently cheaper than Sainsbury's basic frozen berry mix which used to be closer to the £1 mark. 

Love my local store!

I normally don't blog about how much things cost, but I must wax lyrical over Aldi's frozen fruit (possibly just a summer range) because it is that good. I bought a packet of each, and since I don't have much room in the freezer I decanted each packet into a biodegradable plastic bag. Naturally I had to sample one of each and I was shocked at just how tasty it was. Way cheaper than fresh fruit, which is expensive if you use exotic fresh fruit, and far less messy too (& minus the inevitable extra sugar which you get in canned fruit. I know some may be in water, but the cheaper brands tend to stick with sugar). 

All 3 fruit come in very sturdy containers which my family are now using in the garden for gardening stuff! Picture source

However, I haven't been quite 100% lately so I didn't want extra work of preparing a smoothie (Sunday onwards) so I stuck with a tasty bowl of granola ^o^ I hope to make the smoothie tomorrow, which will be the broken banana, frozen mango, 1 sheet of nori (small sheet of seaweed), some frozen spinach (handily pre-portioned by myself), some flax seed and some blueberries on top for texture (hate just a smoothie for breakfast, need something solid).  

A girly sewing corner (not mine) Picture source

Craft is possibly not happening until Thursday - I'm currently working on finishing a project by Thursday to create more time for writing and craft. So please bear with me while I'm a non-crafty blogger. I'll do my best to chat about other things! (Shouldn't be hard, I'm already going to pre-schedule tomorrow's post).

Nayu's Recipes #2 Blueberry Green Smoothie

 

 The second day of my mini vacation has involved reading, anime watching, and my family plying me with chocolate and sweets (never a bad thing!). Apart from writing this post and scheduling a book blog tour for tomorrow on Nayu's Reading Corner, the only other thing I've made today is a tasty smoothie!

You may be wondering why the word green is in it, considering the colour is not green. Green smoothies are ones which have vegetables in. I'm fond of them, and you can make it in a way that you don't taste the veg (depending on the type and amount of fruit you use). All I can taste is blueberries, but read on for today's green veg ingredient! 

Using the bunny cup I took 1 cup of frozen blueberries, which are full of vitamin K, antioxidents, and allegedly improve memory (which I'm in desperate need!) Picture source

Chopped and used a third of 1 courgette, one of my favourite vegetables which is full of potassium, soluable fibre, Vitamin C and other nutrients. Picture source

Using the same bunny cup I poured 1 and a half cups of water, which is vital since our bodies are 60% water.

Whizzed all these ingredients in my family's beloved speed blender to get...

...a refreshing healthy drink!

Were you surprised by my choice of green veg? I have to say my body loves green smoothies, they perks me up for longer than chocolate (which delicious but not the most nutritious food in the world, sadly), and are super easy to make. I make mine to a juice like consistency (but not a juice as it uses all the parts of the fruit and veg).  Here's the recipe without pictures. Experiment with different quantities of the ingredients to personalise your own Blueberry Green Smoothie!

Blueberry Green Smoothie Recipe

Ingredients 

some frozen blueberries 

similar amount of water (depending whether you want a thin or thick smoothie) 

1/3 of a courgette, roughly chopped (you could probably put it in whole in a high speed blender like the Vitamix I use, but out of habit I chop mine) 

Method

Mix it all up and enjoy!