High Energy Breakfast Smoothie

I read about this on Medium from one of my fave fitness writers a couple of months back.

I'm not going to lie, it sounded weird, but I thought, what the heck, it's farmers market season, I'll give her a go.

We've never looked back...

If you want a kick of energy for the day, a chance to crush out your daily intake of vegetables by breakfast, and a mega dose of vitamins and nutrients, try having a vegetable smoothie for breakfast.

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I know, I know. It sounds strange as heck, but hear me out.

The benefits of this super charged breakfast smoothie include...

• You can get all your servings of vegetables in for the day by breakfast

• It's loaded with vitamins and nutrients that you probably need (because we all do).

• It's a malleable recipe you can change depending on your dietary restrictions, what's in your fridge, and also what's in season.

• It can be vegan, gluten free, whole 30, keto, or whatever diet floats your boat.

• No crappy processed foods. Only whole ingredients. Love.

My husband even loves having it for breakfast, even though he generally hates most of the ingredients I use (picky eaters, you know). He kept calling it "vegetable crack smoothies" because it gave him so much energy at work. He also does massage therapy, so energy is a must.

Here are things I've in my body noticed since I started making this my daily breakfast:

• I have not gone for my afternoon cup of coffee on days I drink this. I'm a caffeine addict. This is big.

• My focus is better, I get more done in the mornings (most of the time).

• It keeps me more full than your standard fruit and dairy (or nut milk) smoothies. I'm usually a little hungry by lunch, as I should be, but not keeling over in hunger pains by the time I get a lunch break.

Without further ado, here's the base recipe. Like I said, you can change it up depending upon what you have and your personal preferences.

Vegetable Smoothie for Breakfast.

Step one. Grab your blender, a cutting board, and knife.

Step two. Add ingredients:

Carrots Throw one or two in chopped up.

Celery One or two stalks.

Cucumber I get the smaller ones from the farmer's market and add one per person, or you can do half of a big one per person.

Greens I add a bunch of these. I sometimes even have to use the blender's chop mode to squish them down so I can add more things. Whatever greens you like will work. I typically do kale and swiss chard (because I grew it in my garden this year and am therefore up to my ears in chard). You can also do spinach, microgreens, dandelion greens... heck, lettuce would probably even work. It's your choice!

Ginger Just a couple of little bits for gut health. It gives it a good kick and supports your gut health and immune system. This is the part my husband does not like though.

Seeds I love seeds. Certain seeds are chocked full of magnesium, zinc, selenium, and omega-3 fatty acids. I use whatever I have, which lately has been chia seeds and pumpkin seeds. If you're female and want to get fancy with it, you can try seed cycling to support your menstrual health. Other good seeds include flax, hemp, and sunflower seeds. Again, whatever floats your boat.

Fruit It's almost fall now, so I've been doing apples. Core and all. I also usually do one banana for two of us, and sometimes throw a couple of berries in.

Lemon Half a lemon, or a whole. Rind and all.

Get Herbalicious I have been using parsley, as that was in the original recipe I read and I'm growing it in my garden this year, but whatever you love.

Your Liquid Most mornings I just use cold, filtered water. My husband says he does not like it warm, so ice cold water, perhaps with a couple of ice cubes, is great. I also once used Milkademia nut milk which was great, too.

Yogurt The original recipe of this was vegan, but I throw in like a half a serving of yogurt for the probiotic goodness (I'm not vegan, so this works for me, but if you are vegan, you can leave this one out).

Other things you can add A couple of times I've added Elderberry Syrup. Just a splash, for sweetness and that medicinal goodness that elderberry brings. If you like spice, you can do a sprinkle of cayenne or serrano pepper. Just experiment, as I said, it's a malleable recipe.

Things that didn't work Only one day I was running low on ingredients and tried to put a half of a bell pepper in. I thought it gave it an odd taste. That's all.

Step three. Add chopped ingredients to blender, smoothify, and enjoy. I'd recommend doing "liquify" to get it really blended up well. If you don't get it super smooth, it gets a little chunky and fiber-ey, which I don't mind, but the picky-eater husband didn't appreciate all that much.

Bon appetit!