Healthy Avocado Smoothie with Cinnamon

Using the blender to whip up a quick vitamin and mineral packed smoothie for breakfast or later in the day is a fast way of providing your body with food, sustaining energy levels and keeping hunger pangs at bay. Avocado are one of the super foods and we eat a fair amount in our family… I love their delicious buttery texture and slightly nutty flavor, the hass varieties with their knobbly skin are my favorite. We enjoy avocados in smoothies, salads, spreads, sandwiches and pâtés and of course who doesn’t love guacamole. Even if you are not an avocado fan, you can pamper your face with these wonderful home-made face masks… avocado’s are so good for your skin… inside and out. I don’t ever remember not liking avocados and as a child my first memory of eating them was when dining at hotel restaurants and choosing from the menu an Avocado half filled with Prawn Marie Rose which I always seemed to favor.

Hubby is training very hard for the Ironman in Melbourne next month and burns a huge amount of calories training. This avocado smoothie with added banana (good for energy) and coconut water is a perfect drink to help keep him hydrated and sustain his energy levels before and after training. Wish I could say the same for myself… apparently me vigorously hand beating cake batter does not count as daily exercise… so hubby gets a bigger serving.

I have always admired Simone’s beautiful food photography on  her blog Simone’s Kitchen and her food photography challenge is back  with this months theme “raw food”. Even though my avocados may not be so perfect, my aim was to create a dark food image with contrast for this blog post. Why not hop over to Simone’s blog if you would like to join in.

After you have run a sharp knife lengthwise around the avocado and twisted the two halves in opposite directions…  removing the stone is easy. Hold the avocado half (with the stone) firmly in your hand and with a sharp knife, hit the stone with the blade of a knife. Twist the knife (blade is wedged in the stone), the stone should easily be removed, while still attached to the blade.

As with most smoothies you can play around with the ingredients and choose ones that suit your palate and health requirements… adding a little sweet warming spice like cinnamon adds another element of flavour which is quite nice. If you make smoothies regularly it is a good idea to keep the bananas and avocados (or other fruits and vegetables) in the fridge so they are always chilled when you need them for your smoothies. If you are training hard or always on the go…give your hard-working body some vitamin and mineral love with a quick and easy smoothie.

Healthy Avocado Smoothie with Cinnamon

Ingredients:

• 1 large avocado, cut in half and stoned
• 1 small banana, peeled and roughly chopped
• 1 tablespoon of fresh lime juice
• 8 tablespoons of low-fat laban or low-fat yoghurt
• 400ml to 500ml of chilled coconut water
• 1/4 teaspoon cinnamon powder or vanilla extract
• 2 teaspoons of maple syrup (optional)

How to make: Place the avocado, banana, lime juice, yoghurt, coconut water, cinnamon and maple syrup into a blender. Blend all the ingredients until smooth, add some more coconut water if the consistency of the smoothie is too thick. Pour into serving glasses and serve immediately. Serves 2 to 3.