Milkshakes and Smoothies

Health Drink

2006-11-26T17:50:00.000+11:00

On a plane a long time ago, I was served a most perplexing drink. It clearly contained orange juice, yet was also milky. So why didn't it curdle? I found out the answer recently in a recipe for Bircher Muesli involving yoghurt and apple juice; it seems that yoghurt doesn't behave in the same way as milk.

I've since managed to recreate the drink I had on the plane, which they offered to me as a "health drink".

Ingredients

1 orange
100ml strawberry yoghurt

Strawberry Yoghurt

1. Juice the orange.
2. Stir the yoghurt into the orange juice.

"Health Drink"

Pineapple and Grapefruit Crush

2006-10-24T18:34:00.000+10:00

I've been desperate to make this smoothie for a long time. For those who haven't guessed, it is in fact Lilt but created entirely from fruit. Fantastic. The pineapple makes it go all excitingly fluffy although it has a tendency to separate. The orange and apple juice have been added to stop the grapefruit being overpoweringly sour.

Ingredients (serves 2)

1/4 pineapple
1 grapefruit
1 orange
100 ml apple juice
a handful of ice cubes

1. Dice the pineapple and add it to the blender.
2. Squeeze the orange and grapefruit and add the orange, grapefruit and apple juice to the blender.
3. Add the ice cubes and blend until incorporated.

Pineapple and Grapefruit Crush

Plain Strawberry Milkshake

2006-10-17T18:28:00.000+10:00

For some reason I never considered making a milkshake just out of strawberries and milk. However I've got a freezer-full of frozen strawberries at the moment and this seemed like a good way to use them. I considered adding some yoghurt for thickness but I remembered how thick frozen fruit can get and left it out. This was wise in the end, although I might try again one day with fewer strawberries and some added yoghurt.

As it is, this milkshake is very light and refreshing.

Ingredients (serves 2)

Ingredients

10 frozen strawberries
500 ml milk

1. Add strawberries to the blender.
2. Pour in milk and blend.

Strawberry milkshake

Passionfruit, Banana and Coconut milkshake

2006-10-08T10:54:00.000+10:00

Passionfruit are quite distinctive and not overly sweet, so mixing them with some ripe banana works quite well. I added some coconut to contribute to the tropical flavour.

Ingredients

Passionfruit

1 banana (very ripe)
1 large or 2 small passionfruit
100 ml milk
2 tablespoons coconut milk

1. Cut the banana in half and add to the blender.
2. Slice the passionfruit in half and empty on top of the banana.
3. Add the milk and coconut milk.
4. Blend.

Passionfruit, Banana and Coconut milkshake

Innocent Style Strawberry and Banana smoothie

2006-05-11T18:42:00.000+10:00

As I live in Sydney, I am no longer able to buy Innocent smoothies, which are quite simply the best shop-bought smoothies in the world. They have started their plan for world domination by expanding from the UK to France and Holland but have yet to make it to Australia.

In order to salve my innocent cravings, I have tried to create their ultimate smoothie - the original strawberry and banana. I don't know whether my quantities are exactly the same as I can't buy a bottle and check, but it tastes almost identical.

If you want to make this smoothie the true Innocent way you should juice your own apples, they certainly wouldn't approve of using shop bought juice like I do.

Ingredients

1 banana (very ripe)
9 strawberries
100 ml apple juice (roughly two juiced apples)
2 oranges

1. Cut the banana in half and add to the blender.
2. Wash and hull the strawberries and add to the blender.
3. Juice the oranges using a citrus squeezer.
4. Juice the apples (if using) using a proper juicer.
5. Add all the juice to the blender and whizz.

Stawberry and banana smoothie

Note: If you live in the UK, Holland or France, you can substitute about 600ml of Innocent's Strawberry and Banana smoothie for the above recipe.

Classic Mango Milkshake

2006-05-09T18:32:00.000+10:00

I looked up several recipes for Mango Lassi. They all used different quantities of mango, milk and yoghurt (one used water instead of milk) but I found the quantities below to create a good consistency - possibly more milkshake than lassi.

All the recipes also included some kind of sweetner i.e. sugar or honey but I left this out as I am slightly averse to sweetening things unnecessarily. If you prefer your drinks sweet you can add honey to taste.

The other thing that several recipes included was some kind of spicing (mainly cardamom). I might try this as a variation next time.

Mango

Ingredients

1 mango
4 tablespoons yoghurt
150ml milk

1. Peel mango and cut flesh away from the stone into the blender.
2. Add the yoghurt and top up with milk.
3. Blend.

Mango Lassi

Pomegranate, Strawberry, Banana and Orange smoothie

2006-05-07T09:45:00.000+10:00

This smoothie came out very similar in texture to the innocent strawberry and banana smoothie, but with a nice hint of pomegranate.

Ingredients
1 pomegranate
1 banana
10 strawberries
2 oranges

1. Peel the banana and slice it into the blender.
2. Add the strawberries to the blender.
3. Juice the oranges and pomegranate using a citrus juicer.
4 Add the juice to the blender and blend until smooth.

Pomegranate, Strawberry, Banana and Orange smoothie

Passionfruit and Peach smoothie

2006-05-06T21:08:00.000+10:00

I think passionfruit are great, but they are so distinctive it is hard to find sweet things that they will blend well with. I choose to use peach, mango and orange for this smoothie, which are all pretty innocuous.

Ingredients

1 peach
1/2 mango
2 passionfruit
1 orange

Extracting the tasty bit from the passionfruit

1. Peel the mango, slice and add to the blender.
2. Slice the peach and add.
3. Cut the passionfruit in half and scoop the flesh and seeds into the blender.
4. Squeeze the orange, add and blend.

Smoothie

Guava, Banana and Orange smoothie

2006-05-02T18:19:00.000+10:00

Guavas are good for thickening up smoothies, like bananas. Consequently, this is a thick, rich smoothie. The recipe makes 1 small glass; if you are hungry, double it!

Inside a guava

Ingredients

1 guava
1 banana
1 orange

1. Cut the guava in half and scoop the flesh into the blender.
2. Slice the banana into the blender.
3. Squeeze the orange and add the juice to the blender.
4. Whizz until it is a nice thick consistency.

Guava, Banana and Orange smoothie

Melon, Blackberry and Ginger smoothie

2006-05-01T17:41:00.000+10:00

When I made this smoothie I used twice as much ginger, which made it crazy hot. Try this at your peril.

Ingredients

1/4 large melon
Large handful blackberries
1cm x 1cm x 2cm piece of ginger
100ml apple juice

1. Grate the ginger and cut the melon into large chunks.

Grating ginger

2. Add everything to the blender.

3. Blend until there are no lumps left.

Melon, Blackberry and Ginger smoothie

Peach, Cranberry, Banana and Orange smoothie

2006-04-26T19:21:00.000+10:00

This is a very balanced smoothie - it contains lots of sweet things to support the sharpness of the cranberries. It is also quite thick for a smoothie without yoghurt.

Ingredients

1 peach or half a 410g tin
1 large handful cranberries
1 banana
2 oranges

Cranberries

1. Add the banana, sliced peach and cranberries to the blender.
2. Juice the oranges and add the juice to the blender.
3. Blend until smooth.

Peach, Cranberry, Banana and Orange smoothie

Guava, Passionfruit, Coconut and Lime smoothie

2006-04-24T17:33:00.000+10:00

This is a very interesting smoothie. The lime adds a pleasant tartness and the guava and passionfruit make it taste confusingly exotic.

Guavas are a bit like kiwi-fruit - you can either get the tasty bit of out the middle by using a teaspoon or you can peel from the outside and eat what's left. Either works well.

Ingredients

Ingredients

1 guava
1 passionfruit
1 banana
1/2 mango
1 lime
100ml coconut milk
100ml apple juice

Ingredients in the blender

1. Slice the mango and banana into the blender.
2. Cut open the passionfruit. If it is really ripe, the seeds will fall straight out into the blender, if not help them with a spoon.
3. Add the flesh of the guava.
4. Halve the lime and squeeze into the blender.
5. Add the coconut milk and apple juice.
6. Blend.

Guava, Passionfruit, Coconut and Lime smoothie

Melon, peach and raspberry smoothie

2006-04-24T17:26:00.000+10:00

Using tinned peaches works quite well for this smoothie as both the melon and raspberries are quite strong tasting and balance the flavour out.

Ingredients

1/2 melon
2 peaches or half a 410g tin
Large handful raspberries

1. Cut the melon into chunks and add to the blender.
2. Slice the peaches and add to the blender.
3. Add the raspberries and blend.

If you use a hand blender (like me), add the ingredients in reverse order. The melon will juice quickly, giving some lubrication for chopping up the other fruit.

The smoothie

Blueberry and Banana milkshake

2006-04-24T17:19:00.000+10:00

Blueberry and Banana milkshake

Here is the first variation on the classic banana milkshake. This is a great breakfast shake - a bit like a liquid blueberry muffin.

Ingredients

1 large or 2 small bananas
1 large handful of blueberries
2 tablespoons yoghurt
200 ml milk

1. Slice the banana and add it to the blender along with the blueberries.
2. Add the yoghurt.
3. Top up with milk and blend.

Adding the milk

Classic Banana Milkshake

2006-04-22T14:09:00.000+10:00

To my mind there are three classic milkshakes: banana, mango and avocado.

Here is the first of these.

I used ladyfinger bananas, which are very fat and slightly aromatic.

Ladyfinger bananas

Ingredients

1 large or 2 small bananas
2 tablespoons yoghurt
150ml milk

1. Slice the bananas into the blender.
2. Add the yoghurt.
3. Top up with milk and blend.

Classic Banana Milkshake

Remember this recipe well; there will be many variations on this theme to follow.

Melon, Blackberry and Raspberry smoothie

2006-04-19T18:21:00.000+10:00

Melons are almost all water, so smoothies made using a melon don't usually need any extra juice adding. This recipe is no exception.

Ingredients

1/2 a small or 1/4 large melon
A large handful of blackberries
A large handful of raspberries

1. Slice the flesh from the melon into the blender.
2. Add the berries.
3. Whizz together.

Melon, Blackberry and Raspberry smoothie

Peach, Raspberry and Pomegranate smoothie

2006-04-17T18:50:00.000+10:00

The easiest way to extract juice from a pomegranate is to cut it in half and use a citrus squeezer. I learnt how to do this in Antalya, Turkey where they sell freshly squeezed orange and pomegranate juice on the street.

Juicing a pomegranate

Ingredients

1 peach (or half a 410g tin)
A large handful of raspberries
2 pomegranates.

1. Slice the peach and add to the blender.
2. Add the raspberries.
3. Juice the pomegranates and add.
4. Blend.

Blackberry and Blueberry Milkshake

2006-04-17T18:38:00.000+10:00

This milkshake came out a bit more peachy than I really liked, I think that may have been because I was using tinned rather than fresh peaches (we've just come to the end of the peach season here). I'll try it again in the summer.

Ingedients

1 peach (or half a 410g tin of peaches)
1 handful blackberries
1 handful blueberries
2 tablespoons yoghurt
400ml milk

Ingredients

1. Slice the peach and add to the blender with the blackberries and blueberries.

2. Scoop in the yoghurt and add the milk.

3. Blend.

Custard Apple, Lime and Coconut smoothie

2006-04-12T17:37:00.000+10:00

Custard apples are one of those amazing fruits that seem to consist entirely of sugar. Last time I made a smoothie using custard apples, I also used peach and apple juice and it was a little on the sweet side even for me.

I've tried to balance the sweetness by using some lime in this recipe, but it is still very sweet. A good one for all dessert lovers.

Ingredients

1 ripe custard apple
1 lime
1/2 a mango
100ml coconut milk

Ingredients

1. Peel and deseed the custard apple and add to the blender.

2. Chop the mango and add.

3. Squeeze the lime into the blender and add the coconut milk.

4. Whizz until blended.

Smoothie

This is a very thick, almost custardy smoothie. I use frozen mangoes, which makes it ice cold and a little thicker.