rainbow recipes

one of the most important steps in following the guidelines is to PLAN what you eat. now, this may sound so basic and obvious to most of us that it hardly seems worth repeating. however, i've found that when i don't plan MY meals with the same care and attention i give my family's, i frequently end up eating things that aren't optimal for ME, or... i don't eat at all.

and that's not good, because a hungry mommy is an unhappy, unnourished, unnurtured mommy.

for myself, i realized that i could combine my love of milkshakes and my need to have relatively quick, easy meals i can prepare on a moment's notice into smoothies. they work for me because they're flexible, i can drink them as often as i'm willing to wash my blender, and i enjoy seeing how many colors i can pack into one.

1/2 frozen banana, sliced (slicing, then freezing, over-ripe bananas is a great way to use them up)
1 container greek yogurt, any flavor
1 cup of almond milk, chilled
1 Tbs almond butter
cinnamon, nutmeg or ginger to taste

this smoothie contains orange (cinnamon and nutmeg) yellow (banana and ginger) and white foods (yogurt, almond milk and almond butter.) i might even count the almond butter as a fat.

sometimes i omit the spices - though i really like cinnamon and ginger and always include them in winter. sometimes i substitute another nut butter, or leave it out entirely. i usually include the banana - sometimes its not frozen. (i count fruit-flavored yogurt as both white food and whatever color the fruit is.) recently, i've liked this combination:

1/2 banana, fresh or frozen (yellow)
5 strawberries, sliced and hulled (red)
1 container greek yogurt in peach (white/orange)
1 cup almond milk (white)

i like this one when im craving something chocolate:

1/2 banana, fresh or frozen
handful blueberries, fresh or frozen
1 container greek yogurt, plain, vanilla, honey or blueberry
1 tbsp almond butter
1 cup almond milk
1 scoop chocolate whey powder

any other smoothie fans out there?