A post in four courses – aperitif | The World According to Me…

A friend got onto a course north of here at short notice and said she’d drop in for tea and a catch up on her way home…she’s rather careful with her diet which put a line through some other menu options: a great reason though to explore further along the green journey…

This ‘summer’, up on the Plateau anyway, we seem to have a three to five day cycle of summer(ish) weather followed by two to three days of not-so summerish weather…Wednesday was right on the cusp of the change: I planned on summery for the menu with a less-summery option in my back pocket…

Summer lasted the whole day so the Plan A aperitif was greenlighted…this was an easy one for my as it is what I have most nights when I get home, with something more substantial later in the evening…

Smoothie group photo

The makings are all very simple and flexible: my staples are the ginger, flaxseed and coconut water: the natures of the juice, fruit and green may change depending on what is available at the time:

a tablespoon of flaxseed/linseed. This adds a nice texture to the smoothie and is apparently healthy as well. Bought a big bag for not much at Hardy’s in Taupo – keep it in the fridge.

200 mls of juice. I usually use the Keri Premium Spicy Tomato Juice but the pineapple juicy was on special so I bought a bunch of it – I suspect from the lack of floaties that it is more processed than I like so once it’s ALL gone, it’ll be back to spicy tomato juice until winter when bulk carrots are available. On occasion, I buy cheap fruit, juice it and freeze it until needed – just have to remember to take it out a few hours before smoothie time so it can thaw to a slushie-like consistency.

200 mls of coconut water. In the absence of this, just normal filtered water (no additives in our water) and I’ll also use normal water to top the unprocessed ingredients up to the Max line in the smoothie jar.

Half an apple, cored. I’m not actually sure that it achieves anything taking out the core as there doesn’t seem to be any difference to notice when I forget. It’s probably more important to remember to remove the little sticker from the outside…the same weight of pears, pineapple, or other juicy fruit also go well.

Half an orange, or a similar weight of mandarins, or tangelo. I quarter it, and cut off the peel, squeezing any remaining juice into the smoothie jar – a little peel left on never hurt anyone and I never worry about removing pips: it doesn’t hurt the flavour and the surgery wastes too much juice…

A thumb-size piece of fresh ginger. Dice this up into littler bits…I don’t worry about the skin or knobbly bits: they are get combined in the processor…

A bunch of spinach…or silverbeet, or cabbage, or other greens. I chop off the rooty bit and normally halve the length so it fits better into the jar…

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