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This green apple smoothie is sweet tart, featuring dates to enhance the natural sweetness, balanced by the tartness of green apple and lemon.
Writing a whole foods blog seems to make people think all sorts of things about you: that you have it all together, you have some kind of super-human desire to eat massive amounts of vegetables, that you’re a “smoothie person”. Ahh, to be a smoothie person. Truth is, in 4 years of food blogging, we’ve never come up with a smoothie recipe that didn’t taste bitter or turn out brown. And we certainly do not have it all together. Life is messy. We make random meals made of bits and pieces in the fridge. We love popcorn with lots of butter and salt (to a fault). We don’t really drink smoothies. Until this green apple smoothie.
Related: 10 Delicious Ways to Eat Leafy Greens
Making this green apple smoothie
Healthy eating is a process. It’s hard to know when you’re “there”, and each person’s journey is completely unique. For Alex and me, all we know is that where we used to eat frozen packaged food and fast food, we now love to cook from scratch from our kitchen. And we consider that a win!
Wherever you are in your healthy eating journey, this green apple smoothie recipe is easy and quite tasty. We haven’t loved many of the green smoothie recipes we’ve tried, but this one hit the spot for both of us. It uses Medjool dates to enhance the natural sweetness, balanced by the tartness of the green apple and lemon. One tip: it’s best when freshly made, since refrigerating dulls the flavor. So if you can, whip up a batch and drink it immediately.
We hope you enjoy it, even if you’re not a self-described “smoothie person”. And remember, every small step towards whole food eating is a good one, even if you take a few steps backward in the process.
Looking for healthy breakfast recipes?
This green apple smoothie is a great way to start the day: here are a few other healthy breakfast recipes we love:
- Perfect Strawberry Smoothie
- Banana Smoothie
- Healthy Banana Bread Muffins
- Chocolate Blueberry Smoothie
- Homemade Acai Bowl
- Best Instant Oatmeal Recipe
- Apple Gluten Free Oatmeal Muffins
- Apple Cinnamon Pressure Cooker Steel Cut Oats
- 5 Minute Pesto Breakfast Sandwich
- Avocado Toast with Turmeric Egg
This recipe is…
This green apple smoothie recipe is vegetarian, vegan, gluten-free, dairy-free, and plant-based.
Green Apple Smoothie
This green apple smoothie is sweet tart, featuring dates to enhance the natural sweetness, balanced by the tartness of green apple and lemon.
- Prep Time: 5 minutes
- Cook Time: 0 minutes
- Total Time: 5 minutes
- Yield: 1 large smoothie (or two small) 1x
- Category: Drink
- Method: Blended
- Cuisine: American
Ingredients
- 1 large green apple
- 4 medjool dates
- 3 cups spinach
- 8 ice cubes
- ½ cup water
- 1 teaspoon fresh squeezed lemon juice
Instructions
- Core the apple and cut it into chunks (do not peel). Remove the pits from the dates.
- Place all ingredients a blender and blend. Add lemon juice and blend for a few seconds again. Serve immediately.
Notes
Adapted from YumUniverse
I’ve recently stopped consuming meat and dairy, so I’ve been looking into juicing and blending as a means to clean and reboot my system. I wasn’t sure I would like this since I had never used dates in a recipe. It was surprisingly delicious! I will definitely include this smoothie as my top 10. Thank you!
So glad you enjoyed!
Just made this smoothie today! It is delicious! Thanks for the great recipe!
So glad you enjoyed it, Michelle! Thanks for trying it out :)
Oh yes, the ‘you must be so prepared and just so calm and do everything perfectly because you write a blog about healthy foods’. Um, no. And yes, sometimes healthy food bloggers do stand in their kitchen eating peanut butter and chocolate chips because that is life.
Back to the smoothie – this looks perfect for a summer breakfast! Light and fresh and bright! I have just gotten on the smoothie train, and to be honest I am getting a little sick of bananas. This green apple and spinach smoothie sounds like just the change my breakfast needs :)
I’ve gotten into a smoothie habit in the winter, and it honestly has transformed my life. I no longer feel weighed down by breakfast, nor do I get intense hunger pangs by mid-afternoon. I just make a two-serving smoothie and sip on it until about 2pm! That being said, most of my smoothies aren’t that inspiring, so I’m always on the look-out for new recipes. This looks great, and I’m always a fan of dates as sweetener. Thanks!
As much as I’d love to be a smoothie person, I’m just not. I need some chew in my breakfast! But this smoothie looks super refreshing…we just went to the apple orchard yesterday so I’m thinking it’s time to give smoothies another shot!
I like that you say healthy eating is a process and each person’s journey is unique. I guess the downside of social media is that it makes everyone and everything appear perfect. Thanks for being real and honest – it’s one of the reasons I like your blog. :) And this is the most gorgeously green smoothie I have seen! Love its simplicity and brightness.
Yum! Trying this smoothie this week! I’ve been wanting to try a smoothie with dates in it for some time now. Now I just have to search for them at the supermarket!
Kisses from Buenos Aires xx
http://amateandarottweiler.blogspot.com.ar/
This smoothie is such a beautiful color! I love to put dates in my smoothies. They are so good and give them just the right amount of sweetness!
I am very intrigued by this recipe! it’s funny what you said about people thinking healthy cooks are smoothie people, haha. I think it’s definitely true.
I am really interested by the use of dates here! But I have a lot of spinach around, so I think I’m going to try this!