Basic components of a smoothie

What is a shake?

A shake is the general term for any of a variety of different mixed drinks that usually contain fruits and other ingredients.

There are as many smoothies as there are smoothie makers, because the sky’s the limit when it comes to improvisation, variation, and innovation within the smoothie universe. The shakes range from the very traditional (the medium strawberry banana shake) to the very unorthodox and experimental. And it’s not uncommon for even the most seasoned smoothie maker to drift into dangerously disgusting territory during particularly wild improv smoothie making sessions.

If you are going to try to make your own smoothies, there are a few things you need to know. Smoothie ingredients fall into three categories: fruits, liquids, and additions. Let’s look at each of these in turn.

First, let’s talk about fruits. The fruit forms the base of your smoothie. Fruit flavors will generally dominate, so you can choose your favorite fruits to give your smoothie its main flavor identity. Now, not all fruits actually work in smoothies. Some fruits do well, others do horribly.

Creamy fruits, berries, and stone fruits like peaches work well in smoothies. Melons can work well in small amounts (or you can mix a bunch of melon with other ingredients for one of your wildest smoothie experiments). However, many popular fruits don’t work particularly well in smoothies. Apples, for example, aren’t really a great base material for smoothies. Use apple cider as a liquid base instead of an apple-flavored smoothie.

Since there are so many different types of fruits, I can’t tell you which ones will work and which ones won’t on a case-by-case basis. Just keep in mind that some of the fruits you add to your smoothies might not end up working well. And that’s totally fine.

Once you have chosen your fruit, you need to add a liquid. Juices work great. Water tends to be a bit tricky because your smoothie can easily end up tasteless. It’s weird how you can eat tons of fruits and other ingredients, but the diluting power of the water just takes out all the flavors. My (current) favorite liquid smoothie is coconut water. You can find some at health food stores or do what I do and order them directly from Amazon for a discount.

Finally, no shake would be complete without some additional ingredients. This is where the sky really is the limit. You can add nutritional supplements (particularly the powdered kind), walnuts (use raw walnuts or be prepared to regret your addition of walnuts), and leafy greens (spinach, kale, and parsley are great, but use them carefully so that your shake is not more nutritious than it actually is. tasty).

Since each of those three categories contains almost infinite potential for variation, you can see that the total number of shakes is basically infinite. Don’t be afraid to mix up something strange! Instead, be brave, get out the blender and get down to business – it’s time to whisk!

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