Buena Onda Smoothie
When you arrive at the farm (as surely you’ve been enticed in these pages), Geoff will greet you with an enthusiastic “welcome to paradise!” Here is where he, Yasmin and the Anamaya community are realizing their vision of a beautiful life. My impression of their vision is a rich combination of research, experience, and intuition. Work and pleasure intrinsically intertwine, and include everything from architecture to the healing and visual arts to food. “Green drinks” recipes are one of the sweet alternatives I will undoubtedly take back home.
Greens are high in vitamins, minerals and antioxidants, but generally raw greens contain more nutritious value than cooked ones. You can read up on the debate around what foods our bodies can and cannot digest (and why) ad nauseam, if you fancy it. In theory, “juicing” separates out indigestible fibers and breaks down the cellular structure of raw greens thereby releasing powerful enzymes. It also releases chlorophyll, which delivers oxygen to your glorious blood cells. Proper cell nourishment and alkalinity are vital to things like preventing cell mutation, maintaining weight, mood, and more. It’s not a shock to learn, then, that junk food has an acidic affect on our cells (womp womp). Some greens are particularly high in protein including semolina and wheatgrass. We’re not growing those here YET, but are great to juice in support of your músculos. I encourage readers and gardeners unfamiliar with purslane to learn about the benefits here.
Like many enthusiasts, Geoff’s green drink ritual involves a) “swishing” it around before swallowing, because mixing with saliva can improve assimilation and b) immediate consumption, before enzymes deactivate. So only make as much as you’ll drink straightaway, and save the rest of the greens for a salad later. An online search can yield a host of rules, but for me the most important is using organic produce. You be the judge. No one likes a green drink fascist.
Recipe
Our smoothie creation was worth the half hour in the greenhouse, hitch-hike into Delicias for coconut milk, and cleaning the juicer (it’s a pain, don’t let anyone tell you otherwise). Add juice ingredients to juicer; if using stems like we did, insert green stem-first. Add green juice, ice cubes, coconut milk, chia seeds and honey to blender. Serve immediately. Compost fiber content and any fruit peels, pits, etc. Buena onda loosely means “good vibes.” xxoo
Ingredients
Green drink
- 1 bunch spinach (we used a mix of Tatsoi and Bloomsdale-Long-Standing)
- 1 bunch kale, including stems (we used mix curly, lacinato “dino,” red Russian and rainbow chard)
- 1 small bunch purslane (precious vegetarian source of omega-3)
- 1 small bunch fresh basil
- Mint, a few sprigs
- 1 lemon, peeled and de-pitted
- 1 cucumber, with skin
- 1 small green pepper, without seeds and stem
- ½ green apple, with skin
- 1 ripe banana
- 1 kiwi
- 1/3 mango, peeled
Smoothie
- Green drink (see above)
- 1 tray ice cubes
- ½ cup coconut milk
- ½ avocado (optional)
- 1 tbsp honey
- 1 tbsp chia seeds (pre-soaked)
