Coconut Vanilla Matcha Smoothie

We’ve never been those people who drink green smoothies. But it’s not for lack of trying! Odd as it sounds, it’s been hard for us to make tasty smoothies at home. We’ll try throwing delicious-sounding ingredients in a blender and what comes out is either brown or extremely bitter. (Or it separates in the refrigerator when we try to save it for later – anyone feel me? So.gross.)

This smoothie took us six separate variations to develop. As deceptively “easy” smoothie development is, we felt like we couldn’t cut a break: too bitter, too thin, too thick, too cold. But we finally ended up with a concoction that’s nutritious, refreshingly delicious, and doesn’t separate in the refrigerator. (In fact, I put one in the refrigerator for two days and it was just as tasty as when we made it fresh, which is helpful if you like to make smoothies in advance.)

The key to this smoothie is matcha, which is green tea powder. Green tea has all sorts of nutrition benefits, like:

• High in antioxidants
• Decreases risks of high blood pressure, diabetes, cardiovascular disease, or strokes
• Quickly calms and relaxes
• Helps burn fat
• Etc, etc — see this reference

But not only is green tea full of health benefits, it’s pretty darn tasty combined with coconut milk and vanilla. We added fruit to bring in some brightness and a bit of agave for sweetness. We don’t use agave often, but found it to be the best natural sweetener here since the taste is less distinctive than honey or maple syrup. But you can feel free to use your natural sweetener of choice. Enjoy!

Coconut Vanilla Matcha Smoothie

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4.5 from 2 reviews

• Author: a Couple Cooks
• Yield: 2

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Description

*If you don’t have agave on hand, you can try a natural sweetener of your choice: maple syrup, honey, and so forth. However, we found that agave sweetened well here since it has a less distinctive taste than the natural sweeteners we normally use. You can add more or less sweetener depending on your taste.

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Ingredients

• 1 can light coconut milk
• 1 tablespoon Aiya cooking-grade matcha
• 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
• 2 ½ tablespoons agave nectar*
• ½ cup shredded unsweetened coconut
• 1 cup frozen pineapple
• ½ ripe banana
• ½ cup ice
• Small pinch salt

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Instructions

1. In a blender, blend all ingredients together on high-speed, stopping to scrape down the sides if necessary.

This recipe was developed for Aiya Matcha. Product opinions are our own.

About the Authors

Sonja Overhiser

Cookbook Author and writer

Sonja Overhiser is an acclaimed vegetarian cookbook author and cook based in Indianapolis. She’s host of the food podcast Small Bites and founder of the food website A Couple Cooks. Featured from the TODAY Show to Bon Appetit, Sonja seeks to inspire adventurous eating to make the world a better place one bite at a time.

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Alex Overhiser

Cookbook Author and photographer

Alex Overhiser is an acclaimed food photographer and author based in Indianapolis. He’s host of the food podcast Small Bites and founder of the food website A Couple Cooks. Featured from the TODAY Show to Bon Appetit, Alex is author of Pretty Simple Cooking, named one of the “best vegetarian cookbooks” by Epicurious.

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