I mentioned in my Goals Update that I was working with my doctor and nutritionist to get my high cholesterol under control. I’ll go more into that in another blog post, but I did want to talk about how my breakfast shake has changed to include more healthy foods.
Basically, I’ve been doing meal replacement shakes 3ish days a week as a way to get a healthy breakfast into me when I’m commuting to work in the morning. I did a protein shake comparison in this post and I’ve been drinking the Vega One Protein & Greens in Coconut Almond for a few months now. My go-to recipe has been the shake + 1 ¼ cups water + 1 TBSP peanut butter + 1 banana + ice.
When I met with my nutritionist, we talked a lot about the effects of dietary fats on inflammation and cholesterol. I decided to try adding some of the suggested foods into my morning shake to get them into my body without much thought or effort. I started with adding a handful of baby spinach, because I had a leftover salad bag in the fridge. I was shocked that even though the entire shake turned the color of Shrek…it didn’t change the taste at all!
So, I kept adding more and more healthy things into my shake until I came up with my new morning recipe. I actually added TOO many healthy things, so I had to back off of some of them so it didn’t taste like dirt. Also, I was adding ½ avocado but found it too wasteful because by time I’d go to use the other half it was all brown and gross.
Here’s what I’m doing now:
4 walnut halves (plant-based Omega-3 source)
1 ½ TBSP flaxseed meal (plant-based Omega-3 source)
½ banana (a whole banana was too high on the glycemic index for me)
1 handful baby spinach
1 ½ cups water
1 scoop Vega One Protein & Greens in Coconut Almond
I put all that in my Nutri Ninja and blend the bejesus out of it. Like for a full 60 seconds. It is a totally blended liquid at that point with no chunks or anything. If you don’t do this, it totally gives the shake a chewy consistency…which is kind of gross.
Next, I add:
1 TBSP chia gel (plant-based Omega-3 source)
Handful of ice
Then I pulse it a few times to give the whole shake a milkshake-like consistency. I was adding chia seeds, but read that making them into a gel is better. So, once a week I take about 3 TBSP of chia seeds and mix it with 2 cups of water. I stick it in a tupperware and shake it for a bit. Then, a minute later I shake it again and stick it in the fridge. They turn into a gel in about 15 minutes and then you can just scoop from that all week long.
Now, if you would have told me that my morning shake would contain chia seed gel and flaxseed I would have laughed so hard that I’d choke on my Krispy Kreme doughnut…BUT, this actually doesn’t taste very different than my original recipe. I’ve upped my shakes to 5+ days a week and I really like that it’s such an easy — and tasty — to get a whole bunch of good stuff into my body without really trying.
Do you have a shake recipe that you love? Feel free to share it in the comments!
