Banana coffee smoothie.

 As you know from previous recipes, I love a good smoothie for breakfast in the mornings. I also love sipping a coffee or two in the mornings too. Yesterday whilst making my smoothie, I thought why not just combine the two? And I'm glad I did, as it was absolutely delicious! I just wish I used a little more ice cubes or used a frozen banana to make it even colder. I used half a cup of my favourite instant coffee inside of my smoothie, which is Douwe Egberts The Flavour Collective, Enticing Chocolate flavour. It smells very chocolaty and has a subtle chocolaty taste. Although it's chocolate flavoured, each cup, black, is only about 2 calories! You could use any instant coffee though, it'd be just as delicious.

Ingredients:
- 200ml unsweetened almond milk
- 1/2 cup of your favourite instant coffee, black
- 1 banana, fresh or frozen
- 1 tbsp low-fat peanut butter
- Big handful of ice cubes

Method:
1. Place the almond milk, coffee, banana and peanut butter into the blender. Whizz until smooth and well combined.
2. Now add in the ice cubes and blend again, until smooth. Pour into a pint glass and enjoy!

Graze guilt-free high tea!

Got my first Graze box since coming back from Turkey yesterday, and to my delight there was one of their new 'guilt-free high tea' punnets inside of it! I've been wanting to try on of these since I found out they'd brought them out - mainly for the cuppa! I never thought I'd actually end up getting one though, as you can't select 'send soon' on any of them. So I was a very happy girly when I opened my graze box! I got the "carrot cake with an afternoon infusion". It was delicious - especially the tea! And only 102 kcal for the whole punnet! Yuuum!

The carrot cake is sweet and you can really taste the carrot in it. It has seeds on top and inside of it too, which is different, but very tasty! It's very moist and sticky, which I like (so probably best to eat it on the day you get your graze box, for max. freshness)! I hate dry cakes.. The tea has a very unique taste. I can't really explain it.. But it tastes completely different to any other cuppa I've ever had. I wish I could buy the afternoon infusion tea bags in supermarkets - they taste amazing! I know I'd definitely buy them if they did! If I had to point any bad points out about the punnet as a whole, it would be the size of the cake.. It is very small. I think it could probably do with being a tad bit bigger!

My cat, Muesli, decided to sit all over my graze box and rip the lid, so now it doesn't stay closed.. She's strange when it comes to cardboard and things similar (like paper carrier bags, newspapers and boxes). She likes to sit on them, then play with them, and of course eventually rip them to shreds. I have a weird cat.. But I wouldn't have her any other way. Speak of the devil, she's just come and jumped on my lap. Cute! 

Sweet smoothie surprise.

I fancied a smoothie for lunch today and decided to experiment, and this is what I came up with! I've called it 'Sweet Smoothie Surprise'. It is the sweetest drink I have ever tasted (definitely not exaggerating) and the after taste is incredible! If you don't like really sweet things, I wouldn't try this. But this is excellent for anyone with a sweet tooth or a sugary craving! This is probably a smoothie that's a bit like Marmite - you'll either really love or really hate it. The first little sip I wasn't too sure of.. But the more I drank the more I loved the taste! It is approx. 252kcal for the whole lot - so not too bad considering how sweet and sugary it tastes! Yummm!

Ingredients:
- 1 frozen banana
- 1 small pear
- 1 small squirt of honey (this is what makes very very sweet, it's strong so I wouldn't add too much)
- 1 cup of Alpro almond milk
- a small handful of ice cubes

Method:
1. Chop the pear up into small pieces.
2. Add all the ingredients into the blender and whiz it up until smooth!
3. Pour into a half-pint glass and enjoy!

Green tea!

GREEN TEA IS A DIETER'S BEST FRIEND!!!

Green tea has lots of health benefits! It is full of antioxidants and helps aid weight loss (thermogenesis, keeps fats from oxidising). It is also thought to give you a lower possibility of getting certain cancers and improves cholesterol levels.

You can get lots of different brands and flavours of green tea, but my favourite is most definitely 'Tetley Decaf Green Tea'. It's not very bitter compared to a lot of the other green teas I've tried before. Also I can drink it any time of the day, even just before I go to bed, because it has no caffeine in! I don't mind the non-decaf Tetley green tea, but it is a little bit too bitter for my liking, so I only have it if I feel I need the caffeine/energy. I barely brew my cuppa at all.. I literally just pour the boiling water over the teabag, use the spoon to squeeze the bag to death against the side of the cup and then take it out and stir.

I always have mine with 2 teaspoons of 'granulated Splenda sweetener'. I do love a sweet cuppa! And this sweetener is calorie free and is so much sweeter than actual sugar, which is why I love it so much! I've tried tea, even normal tea, with no sugar/sweetener many of times but I just can't drink it. I end up drinking a sip and then leaving it to go cold. I can have between 1 and 5 green teas a day. I think the most I've had in a day is about 7/8, I think..? I love the stuff! And the fact it helps weight loss is a mega-bonus!

Heavenly fruit slushie!

I improvised a smoothie with a choice of my own ingredients this morning. But it went wrong.. Well not actually wrong - cos it tasted amazing! ..But wrong as in it was suppose to be a smoothie but turned out to be more like a slushie. But it was absolutely DELICIOUS! I will definitely be making it again! Hopefully if I do make it a second time it'll turn out slushie-like again - hoping this wasn't just a one off. But if it does turn out like a smoothie that's fine, cos the flavour is amazing! It turned out soo thick that I had to use a spoon to eat it! It's 283 kcal and it pretty much makes a whole pint.

I have named my creation 'Heavenly Fruit Slushie', simply because it tastes heavenly!

If you'd like to make it, here's what I did:

Ingredients:

- 1 cup of frozen strawberries.

- 2 cups of frozen pineapple.

- 1 fresh kiwi.

- 1 cup/200ml of Alpro almond milk.

Method:

- Stick all the ingredients in a blender and whiz it up.

- Pour into a pint glass and enjoy!

(If you do try this, comment and tell me if yours turned out like a smoothie or a slushie! I'd love to know!)

Smoothie time!

It's that time in the morning again - smoothie timeee!

I've made another smoothie from http://www.hellifignaw.com.  This smoothie is called 'Killer Strawberry Kiwi Green Smoothie'. The ingredients I used are in the photo above.. But I had to miss a few of the ingredients out - the wheatgrass and flaxseeds - because I have no idea what they are or where to get them from! This makes one pint sized serving (I drank quite a bit before I took the photo - sorry) and is approx. 246 kcal (that is without the wheatgrass and flaxseeds in).



To begin with I found the colour of the smoothie really off putting (it looks quite a lot darker in person than it does in the photo) but the taste is incredible! The kiwi and strawberry are very strong. You can't even taste the spinach or almond milk. I added 1 tsp of splenda sweetener to the smoothie, because I do like my smoothies sweet to taste. I let my mum and sister try a sip, my sister didn't like it cos she
thought the kiwi was too strong but my mum loved it too!

I will definitely be making this smoothie again soon - it's far too tasty not to!

My first ever homemade smoothie!

For my breakfast this morning I made my first ever homemade smoothie - it was delicious! I don't know why I've never made them before.


I got the recipe for this smoothie from http://www.hellifignaw.com/. This particular smoothie is called 'Peanut Butter Delight' (ingredients shown in the photo above). I've worked it out to be 308 kcal per serving (and 361 kcal if you add 1 tbsp of cocoa powder). It's pretty filling and quite a big serving too - makes just under a pint!

I originally made it without the cocoa powder but when I tried it I thought the banana was a little too overpowering, so I blended in the cocoa powder afterwards. I may have put a bit too much in though, so next time I'll probably only use 1 tsp of cocoa powder instead of 1 tbsp.

I highly recommend you all try this smoothie! It's great for people who have a sweet tooth but don't want to pig out on fatty, chocolaty treats. I shall definitely be making many more smoothies from http://www.hellifignaw.com! There's loads on there and they all sound delicious!