How To Make A (Healthy) Protein Shake That Tastes Like Candy! | Healthy Recipes | JJ Virgin

Hey, it's J.J. virgin, author of the New York Times bestsellers the Virgin Diet, the Virgin Diet Cookbook and the Sugar Impact Diet. And whether you're following the Virgin Diet or the Sugar Impact Diet or just a basic health program, you probably are starting the day with a shake. Because let's face it, if you're not, you're probably starting the day with dessert. Yep. That muffin and a latte, that's a cupcake and a milkshake. So on all of my programs, that's what I teach people to do. So I'm going to pull back the curtain because one of the big questions I get asked is, jj, what do you put in your shake? And literally, this is something I've been doing now for 20 plus years, actually 25 plus years. I travel with a nutribullet. I travel with my shake mix. I even travel with coconut or almond milk. That's how serious and committed I am to this. And by the way, by doing that, I also save a lot of cash because I'm not getting sucked into room service breakfast. So I'm going to show you one of my favorite all time shakes. And it's sort of like I just made a candy bar just to give you a little heads up on it. Delicious. So the first thing I'm going to do is start with a little coconut milk. Now here's the deal. You can start with coconut milk, almond milk, cashew milk, flaxseed milk, or water. Someone asked me if they could use water. Absolutely, you can use water. But I find coconut milk and almond milk and cashew milk give it a much richer taste. And when you really look at what you want to put in your shake, you want to have good, healthy fats, you want to have a great source of protein that you're getting from your shake mix, and you want to have a load of fiber. That's your trifecta for having a great slow release of blood sugar and be able to burn off stored fat for fuel and not crash and burn in a couple hours. When you make your shake, you should be able to go four to six hours before you need it again. All right, so now going to add in some protein powder. Now what you want to look for in your shake mix, you want to make sure there's nothing artificial in here. No artificial sweeteners, artificial flavorings. You want to really get something that is low sugar as possible. So the shake mixes that I use are 1 gram of sweetener. I spent a lot of time working on these to get them to taste great with only one gram of sugar. And by the way, that sugar comes from plant compounds. And then if they've got vitamins and minerals and antioxidants and enzymes and probiotics, bonus. And same with fiber. Now, I noticed that I don't have a. My scooper is down here. And you will find this a lot of times with scoopers and shake mixes is that they get buried. So the best way to do it is not stick your grubby fingers in there. Right. All right, so I'm putting in two scoops. And this is chocolate defatted beef protein. It's amazing because it has the mouth feel of a milkshake of whey, but doesn't have all the issues with whey. I don't know if you're aware of it, but whey raises insulin. And insulin tells your body to store fat. Not really the way you want to store. Start your day, is it? All right, so I put that in. I'm going to also throw in a little bit of extra fiber because again, fiber, fat and protein are what is going to keep you fuller longer. So I do a heaping, heaping teaspoon. Actually, that was a tablespoon. Well, no, that's a teaspoon, but I do a big heaping one that added about 10 grams of fiber. There's 5 grams here. And then I'm going to add even more because I like to throw in either chia freshly ground flax or raw cacao nibs. Now, I'm actually going to. I'm going to go for it here. I'm going to throw in some raw cacao nibs. I love these. If you haven't tried these, first of all, loaded with fiber, but they just give you an amazing texture to your shake. Sometimes I'll throw them in at the very end and not even grind them up. The other thing I'm going to put in here is some avocado. What you might not know about avocado, of course, we know it's got great healthy fats. But the other thing that avocado has in it is a load of fiber. That's 11 grams of fiber right there. So we've now got. I'm going to do some math right here on the spot, about 30 grams of fiber here. Now, if you've not been eating much fiber, because the average person gets like 5 to 14 grams of fiber in a day, don't start here. This is advanced. You will not be happy. But build up to this because ideally you want to get in about 50 grams of fiber a day. Spread throughout the day because it's going to really help keep your blood sugar stable and lower. All right, so we've got all of that one more thing. Ice right behind me. I'm going to throw a little bit in. Now I do something differently here. Some people like their shakes nice and smooth and thin. Not me. I actually like to eat them with a spoon. And I'm going to show you my secret little addition at the end. See, it can be even thicker than that. Making a bit of a mess. Okay. All right. So now in the magic of tv, that's going to magically get cleaned up somehow, I'm going to pour this into my attitude is my gratitude is my attitude cup. But what I want to show you is my special technique. So wait for it. So see how thick that is? I dig it. Really. I like to make my shakes thick. Now here's what just puts me over the edge. So already this is yummy. It's chocolatey. I've got some raw cacao. I've got some coconut. Now I'm going to push it into like Almond Joy land with some raw almond butter. I'm telling you. And I have to be careful with this because I have been known to eat a jar of almond butter with a spoon. So I always have to put this away. But this is my favorite way to do this, is to swirl in some almond butter. So good. Literally. I mean that seriously about almond butter teeth. That seriously tastes like a candy bar. I mean, how delicious. And if you want to just like go over the top, you can do a little bit of that too. See? See that? But got a sweet tooth. This will calm it way down. But this is a great way to start the day. I've got great protein in here from the defatted beef protein. You can also go vegan. I love you. Whether you're vegan, paleo, or anywhere in between. With my plant based shake, I threw in a ton of fiber with my avocado, my extra fiber, my raw cacao nibs. And then and a little almond butter. And then I've got healthy fats from the almond butter and the avocado and the raw cacao nibs and the coconut. This will keep me full for hours. Hours. And it's absolutely delicious. No deprivation here. So try this one out. This is like a candy bar in a glass. That's good for you.