What's a Loaded Smoothie? (+ How to Make One)

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Hey, this is JJ Virgin. Thanks so much for joining me. This is Ask the Health Expert. In each episode, I put the power of health in your hands and share ways to get healthy, lose weight, heal your gut, detox, and lots more so you can look and feel better fast. If you'd rather watch the video, hey, I did put on my makeup and do my hair, so check it out.

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Hey, it's jj. So I'm going to show you how.

To make a loaded virgin anti diet smoothie. And I say loaded smoothie because we are going to load it with clean protein powder. Remember the plate? Healthy fats from unsweetened nut milk and some other goodies I'll show you. And then fiber from non starchy vegetables and fruit and some extra fiber. So I'm going to put that all together. I'm going to show you a way to do it. Remember, we have a guidebook with loads of different recipes and I want you to be creative here. So I'm going to show you what I do and then like live it up. Okay, so here's the first important hack. Put a little bit of your unsweetened nut milk in there first because it keeps it from sticking. So that's really important. Now you can use flax milk, cashew milk, coconut milk. Key thing here is unsweetened or one of the oat milks, but make sure they don't have any of the crappy vegetable oils in it. Next thing I'm going to do is put my protein powder in. So here I'm using vanilla.

One of the things I love to.

Do is use half plant and half paleo. I like the texture of that, so that's something you can try too. Or I'll do half chocolate, half vanilla, half vanilla, half caramel. I'm always switching things up. I'm also going to add some of my extra fiber in here because I'm always looking for ways to add more fiber. So you're going to see me do fiber a couple different ways in this smoothie.

And even though the paleo inspired shake.

Is made from concentrated bone broth protein.

I like to add more collagen because.

Collagen helps heal your gut and is great for anti aging, great for your hair, skin and nails. So that sort of step one there. Now next thing I'm going to do is I freeze bananas just as they're starting to get ripe. Remember, super ripe, super high sugar impact, but a barely ripe banana is rich in resistant starch which resists digestion and can help you burn fat. So that is what I like to do. Now, my hubby loves dark cherries and blueberries, so for him I pulled these out to show you.

We'll do a cup of cherries and berry blend.

That's his favorite. But me, I like a little bit of this barely ripe banana. Okay, next thing, I'm going to put a little bit of avocado in. Now this is a big avocado, but I'll generally do a fourth of a small or this one, I'm doing about a sixth of it, so it's about two tablespoons of an avocado.

Why do I love avocado?

Healthy fat and loads of fiber, too. And also it's rich in an antioxidant called glutathione oxygen. What I don't have here right now is any kind of deep green leafies.

But you could throw in kale or.

Chard or spinach and you can keep those frozen too. So bonus points for adding in some non starchy vegetables. And if you don't have extra fiber or you want to add in a little extra fiber or you didn't have an avocado, Chia or flax can work well here too. If you've got a nutribullet, you do not need to grind your flax. It will do it. But if you don't, you might need to grind that ahead of time. But chia flax or using a little bit of a nut butter or coconut butter for some healthy fats and some fiber is great. Then I'm going to add in ice. Now, I add in a ton of ice because I will show you what I do. I like to do a very, very thick smoothie. So where I tell people to do 10 ounces of liquid, I don't do that much because I make it super thick. I actually like to eat it in.

A large coffee cup with a spoon.

Notice I said eat, not drink. Whereas my hubby, I make it like an actual smoothie and he has a straw. Okay, here we go. Ready? Now here's one of the things that you will find when you're using my paleo powders is they tend to be much more whippy. So the longer you whip them, the more foamy and frothy they get. But when I said I like to make them thicker, see how thick this is? So I'm going to put this right in here. And sometimes I will even put like some sliced almonds on top. But I literally eat my smoothie, even though it's a lotus smoothie, I eat it more like a stew. Like smoothie stew. That sounds kind of gross, doesn't it? But here's the bottom line. You can make these all different ways so you're never going to get bored. Switch up your nut milks. You can also try the oat milk, just don't do one with the bad oils. Switch up the fruits, switch up the veggies, switch up the different types of your protein powders so so that you never get bored. But start every day breaking your fast with a loaded smoothie with that clean protein from the protein powders, healthy fats and fiber from non starchy veggies, fruit and the extra fiber. There you go. Enjoy your loaded smoothies.

For more info on this and other health topics I cover or to rate and review, find me on Instagram, Facebook and my website jjvirgin.com and don't forget to subscribe to my show so you won't miss a single episode. Go to subscribetoj.com thanks again for being.

With me this week.

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