Toddler Friendly Smoothie

We drink a lot of smoothies at our house, especially since the weather is warming up!  It is a cool and refreshing way to start the day and an awesome way to get in a heaping amount of greens early on.  Talk about starting the day out right!  Ayden has always enjoyed smoothies too and I was recently talking to a fellow mother who had never thought to make smoothies for her daughter.  I had her at, "He drinks an entire handful of spinach!"  I don't know about other toddlers but Ayden, who doesn't have molars yet, has a tough time eating leafy greens.  He'll put them in his mouth and gum them around a bit and then out it comes.  Smoothies are the way to go in our house!

If you've never had a green smoothie, you may be concerned about it tasting like grass or other things green.  I'd imagine that some greens may cause that to happen (kale, for instance) but the light flavor of baby spinach is completely masked by the fruit.  Nothing but sweet deliciousness and TONS of nutrition.

I typically put in some frozen fruit, a banana (sometimes frozen, sometimes not... depends on what we have available) a HEAPING handful or two of spinach and a liquid of some sort.  Sometimes we juice some carrots, a head of romaine and an apple and add that as the liquid.  If we don't feel like cleaning the juicer, we just stick with coconut water or OJ.  Any kind of yogurt, milk or milk substitute would work too!  You can also add ice if you don't have any frozen fruit.  The sky is the limit.

Ayden's favorite combo:
Pineapple, orange, banana.

The amount of each ingredient you add is totally personal preference to what consistency you like and what flavors you want to dominate.  You really can't mess it up!

Kid tested, mother approved!

Get your toddler to drink his/her greens today!  If you give it a try let me know what you think!  Are smoothies a regular on your menu?  What is your toddler's favorite flavor combo??

~Sarah

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