Give Up The Coffee. Start Your Day With A Smoothie.

You read that right. That’s what my husband said to me when we first started our clean eating lifestyle. I thought he’d lost his mind. Give up my daily cappuccino!? Surely our new lifestyle doesn’t require that much of a sacrifice. It did. He wasn’t joking. “Give up the coffee. Start your day with a smoothie,” he repeated.

Why did he insist that I must give up my coffee? Because I didn’t just drink black coffee. I drank a venti-sized homemade cappuccino every morning. Full of delicious whole milk and four stevia packets. Sometimes honey if I was feeling a little flavor. He said I could drink just the espresso shot without the milk if I wanted, but who really wants to give up the milk and sugar? Not this girl. So, the whole kit-and-kaboodle was eliminated. Its replacement? A daily smoothie.

Our Smoothie Recipe

1 frozen banana
4 oz. frozen blueberries
4 oz. frozen strawberries or mangos
4 oz. nut milk or soy milk
4 oz. green tea (cold)

Compile your smoothie ingredients the night before. Do not blend. Place in the refrigerator overnight to allow it to partially thaw. The next morning, blend and enjoy your smoothie. 

Sounds good, right? I’ll admit it is pretty tasty. We based our recipe off of Alton Brown’s smoothie recipe, with a couple tweaks. He says just to make sure your smoothie is purple. Simple enough.

The only problem with this new plan… was the lack of caffeine. I thought my head was going to explode the first day. I called husband, “I can’t do this! I have a headache from hell. I miss my coffee!” As always, he came up with a solution. Zipfizz.

A vitamin enhanced, loaded with antioxidants and electrolytes, low carb, zero sugar, energy powder containing… caffeine from natural sources. I only put half a tube of it in each smoothie, and this stuff is a miracle worker. I have energy literally all day long. I used to get sleepy around 2:00-3:00 pm. I used to jump on the opportunity to take afternoon naps. Now, I get on the treadmill at 2:00-3:00 pm. It doesn’t make your mind race or your heart accelerate. It’s like a slow release of energy all day long. Without the zipfizz, I don’t know if I could have adopted the smoothie instead of coffee policy. With zipfizz, I have gladly accepted our new morning staple. In the winter months, it’s hard to drink something chilly on a cold morning. We just leave the blended smoothie on the counter for a little while to warm up, and it’s good to go.

I believe that Alton does say that you can drink as much coffee as you want as long as it’s black. I’m not sure I’ll ever get to the enjoying black coffee stage in life… so, there’s that.
[ If you missed our clean eating lifestyle post How I Lost 25 lbs Without Dieting, click here. ]

P.S. I hate not supporting diary farmers as much as we were even if it was just by buying milk weekly. We’re trying to find other ways we can help support those brave, dedicated individuals.