Healthy Smoothies: How Healthy Are They?

Healthy Smoothies

Healthy Smoothies are advertised as a fruit drink with a variety of health benefits.

Well made healthy smoothies are invaluable for helping you meet your fruit and vegetable requirements and they can also help you lose weight; boost your energy levels, feed your skin, improve your health and so much more.

These delicious drinks have become the healthy response to the calorie filled milkshake.

However, many people do not truly understand smoothies or what makes them healthy and beneficial.

Because of this the market has been flooded with so many unhealthy smoothies and smoothie recipes, many people are being cheated into believing they are giving their body a nutritionally balanced and healthy drink when, in fact, they are not.

Healthy Smoothies Are Low In Calories

Though smoothies all have a fruit base, not all of them are necessarily healthy.

Many fruits are naturally low in calories and full of vitamins, but other fruits are high in calories. Some have as many calories as a whole meal!

When you consider that, plus all the other ingredients that are added to most smoothies, like yogurt, ice cream, honey, etc., you may be consuming an extremely high calorie and high fat drink.

In fact, some commercial smoothies have enough fat content for an entire day's serving.

If you are a fan of smoothies, and you want to reap the benefits of these delicious drinks, it is important that you understand what makes good and healthy smoothies.

What Makes Healthy Smoothies

Healthy smoothies are ones that use vegetables, fruit, or berries as a base. This is mixed with shaved ice, and a bit of water. If a dairy component is added, it should be non-fat milk, non-fat yogurt, or soy milk.

Healthy Smoothies Fruit

The fruits often used are ones that are low in fat, but high in nutrition, and have a natural sweetness.

Try Asian mangoes, cantaloupe, honeydew melon, watermelon, strawberries, bananas, blueberries, apples, and pears.

These naturally sweet fruit should stop you from adding sugar, honey, or fruit juice to the mix, which are all high in sugar and calories, but low in nutritional value.

Recognize and Avoid Unhealthy Smoothies

Unhealthy smoothies are the ones that are actually quite popular.

They are the smoothies that use honey, sugar, or fruit syrup as sweeteners.

They use fruit juice instead of water, and add other flavors such as chocolate, peanut butter, ice cream, whole milk, coconut cream, and protein powder.

Unless you know how to count calories, adding any of these ingredients can derail your recommended daily calorie intake and destroy your healthy eating intentions.

For example, a tablespoon of peanut butter is considered one protein serving. If your smoothie recipe calls for peanut butter, then you have to make sure you only eat three to four other protein servings throughout the day.

Some commercial smoothies have been known to pack as many as 950 calories, which is already about half to a third of an adult's daily calorie allowance.

Know What Goes Into Your Healthy Smoothies

Healthy Smoothies - Strawberries

So, whether you are ordering a smoothie from a store or making them yourself, knowing what goes into your healthy smoothies and how much it adds up in terms of your other meals is important to staying healthy.

If you are someone who enjoys following recipes and discovering new blends, grab a smoothie recipe book like “Sensational Smoothies: Drink Your Way to Health Deliciously”.

This ebook has sections for various kinds of smoothies, depending on your health goals - whether you want to drink smoothies in order to lose weight by making it replace a meal, or if you are using them to fulfill your vegetable and fruit intake.

Get to know the calorie content of a cup or half a cup of each of the fruits you plan on using often, and try not to use fruit juice, fruit syrup, honey, or sugar. If you do, be sure to calculate for these calories as well.

Remember, smoothies can be extremely healthy and good for you, but only if you make sure they are made using healthy ingredients.

If you are on the look out for healthy smoothies and smoothie recipes, do check out "Sensational Smoothies: Drink Your Way To Health Deliciously”.

This amazing ebook contains over 180 recipes for healthy smoothies designed to keep you fit and healthy. The recipes featured are kitchen tested and have been certified to taste as good as they are healthy.

Learn more about it here:

Sensational Smoothies: Drink Your Way To Health Deliciously

How are Smoothies Healthy?

Smoothies can be one of the healthiest drinks available. Not only does it quench thirst, but it's also a good way to get a healthy dose of fruit and vegetables everyday, providing essential nutrients and minerals that are often ignored and taken for granted.

The blending and liquification of the components makes it easy to digest while also helping the body's overall digestion. This means that healthy smoothies do not stress the stomach, and can help relieve stress from the digestion of other foods, making both body and metabolism more efficient. Apart from this, healthy smoothies provide fiber and anti-oxidants, which help cleanse the body, making it great for the purposes of detoxification.

These healthy drinks can help regulate your body weight because the fiber in smoothies can help keep you full for longer periods of time. The anti-oxidants can help skin problems, such as clear acne, and address other skin problems like aging, wrinkling, and certain allergies. They can also make your hair shinier.

Apart from these benefits, the natural vitamins and minerals found in the fruits and vegetables can help strengthen the immune system, increase your everyday energy and stamina, promote dental hygiene, stabilize glucose and cholesterol levels, regulate bowel movements, sharpen mental skills, elevate mood, and lessen the risk for major diseases such as cancer and diabetes because of the anti-oxidants and anti-carcinogens or free radical killers found in fruit and vegetables.

You can read more about the health benefits of making Healthy Smoothies by downloading this free 6 page report on what makes smoothies healthy and the report also includes 7 good and healthy smoothie recipes, you can try, written by Olivia Parker.

Download your free report by right clicking this link:

Super Duper Smoothies

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Enjoy your healthy smoothies.

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