Love Is A Many Blendered Thing

I've been wanting to try making a green smoothie for a while, but never seem to have any extra greens sitting around. What I do have are a lot of herbs in my garden… they're green, do they count? I even have beet greens... although the variety we planted are ruby red, I think they'll do.

Wandering through my front and back yards, I clipped a bit of this, snipped off a bit of that until I had a big handful of "greens"...
 

Also intriguing me has been the idea of the whole-citrus vinaigrette. I just love the idea of pulverizing and consuming the whole fruit. Maybe I'm just excited about not having to slice, squeeze, zest, or otherwise fuss with it. It is simplicity and laziness together at their beautiful best. Why not try it in a smoothie?

I picked a small ripe lemon from our dwarf Meyer tree on the back patio and headed into the kitchen...

The smoothie I created is entirely experimental and admittedly, a little bizarre. I basically shopped from my garden and my freezer with a "let's see what happens" attitude. What happened was a surprising combination of flavors and a smoothie like no other. It's very lemon-forward due to the whole lemon of course, but also to all the lemon-scented herbs I used. Each one lemony, but in slightly different ways.

I've included the recipe here, not because I think anyone else would want to recreate it, so much as to show just how completely crazy you can get when making smoothies, and still end up with something really tasty....


Ruby Blue Lemon-Herbalicious Smoothie
1/2 cup kefir juice (or other liquid)
2 cubes frozen pumpkin water (or ice cubes)
6 smallish Ruby beet leaves
1 frozen banana
1 cup of frozen blueberries
1 small Meyer lemon, cut into quarters, seeds removed
1 sprig each of:
   lemon thyme
   lemon verbena
   lemon balm
   peppermint
   cilantro
   parsley
   tarragon
   basil

Throw all of it into a blender and puree it into oblivion. Then add:

1/4 tsp of cinnamon
1/8 tsp ground ginger
1/8 tsp cardamom

Taste, and add 1 Tbsp or so of honey, if needed. Then blend, blend, blend some more and divide into two glasses.

My Notes: This tasted amazingly fresh and vibrant... and good! It was just the slightest bit too acid-y for me, but Hubs thought it was just right. I didn't add the honey which might have softened that edge a bit. Maybe a Tbsp of coconut oil would do the trick also. I wouldn't try this with a regular Eureka lemon (way too tart). A small orange or even a key lime might be a better substitution if Meyers aren't available. Otherwise, just use the lemon peel. The big question is of course, will I make this again? The answer is yes!