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A healthy alternative: Green smoothies

Lean, mean and green: drinks to put spring in your glass and in your step.

Jill Dupleix
Jill Dupleix

Healthy alternative: Great for breakfast on the run or for upping your leafy-green intake.
Healthy alternative: Great for breakfast on the run or for upping your leafy-green intake.Steven Siewert

What are they?

Bright green blends of green leafy vegetables such as kale and spinach. Nutrient-rich, high in fibre and charged with antioxidants, they're fast muscling those wussy fruit smoothies out of the way in cafes, juice bars, and health-oriented restaurants.

Regular consumption will knock 10 years off your age and add 10 years to your life. So they say.

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Where are they?

NSW

At Sydney's Bread & Circus Wholefoods Canteen in Alexandria, gorgeous young things gather over ''daily green'' smoothies that combine kale, spinach, cucumber, lemon and mint gathered from the wooden boxes of organic fruit and vegetables that line the open kitchen.

"You feel amazing literally five minutes after drinking it," says co-founder Amanda Bechara. "It's also good to rotate your greens so you don't get too much of one thing."

Rozelle's new Egg of The Universe cafe does a smashing green smoothie, rich with spinach, avocado, coconut oil and soaked chia seeds.

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Co-owner Harry Lancaster says: "The key to a green smoothie is that it actually has to taste good, or you're doing something wrong."

Victoria

Office workers queue for the freshly made, organic green smoothies at TOFWD (The Organic Food and Wine Deli) in Degraves Street in the city.

“It might be a fad, but it’s a great way to get more greens into people,” says owner Jeanette Taylor.

You can even stay home and do-it-yourself with a weekly delivery of an Organic Empire’s Green Smoothie Box ($49), which contains sufficient organic produce for two smoothies a day for seven days.

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“People will do what’s good for them if you make it convenient,” says Organic Empire’s nutritionist-turned-farmer Angela Gioffre.

“So I wanted to make it easy for them to be healthy.”

Why do I care?

They're thick, creamy and delicious; great for breakfast on the run and brilliant for sneaking green vegies into both kids and adults.

Can I do this at home?

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Of course, just don't overdo it. Sip slowly and allow the body time to digest what is essentially raw food.

Sourcing

NSW

Egg of The Universe, 711 Darling Street, Rozelle, 9810 3146

Bread and Circus, Shop 2, 21 Fountain Street, Alexandria, 9698 2939

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Victoria

TOFWD, 28 Degraves Street, city, Melbourne, 96545157

The Organic Empire, 138 Monbulk Road, Mt Evelyn, 97379677

Green smoothie

Use this as your base recipe and juggle accordingly - you might prefer avocado to banana, orange to apple - to suit your own taste.

1 cup tightly packed curly kale or spinach, washed

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2 tbsp parsley leaves

Half a green apple, chopped

1 banana, peeled and chopped

Quarter avocado, peeled and chopped

100g cucumber or 1 celery stalk, chopped

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300ml cold filtered water or coconut water

1. Place the kale or spinach and parsley, apple, banana, avocado and cucumber or celery in the blender.

2. Add the water or coconut water and 4 or 5 ice cubes and blend well for 60 seconds until thick and green.

Tip: Feel free to add one or two of the following as you go: cos lettuce, orange, green melon, yoghurt, organic milk, almond milk, ginger, almonds, chia seeds (soaked), coconut oil, whey protein powder, peanut butter, bee pollen, lecithin.

Makes 1 or 2

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Jill DupleixJill Dupleix is a Good Food contributor and reviewer who writes the Know-How column.

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