Smoothie Criminal

I once found the prospect of making smoothies somewhat intimidating, and for the life of me, I can't remember why. Smoothies are ridiculously easy to make. If I'm feeling too lazy to cook, I throw some ingredients in the blender and blend away. Takes two minutes. Maybe.

My smoothies typically involve three ingredients: ice, liquid, and fruit. And by using frozen fruit, I don't even need the ice. If I'm not using frozen, my personal guideline is 2 parts fruit to 1 part ice. Frozen fruit or not, I like for the liquid level to come about 1/3 of the way up the pile of solids in the blender pitcher. Usually a favorite fruit juice, although I sometimes use flavored seltzer to cut the sweetness a bit. I've tried nearly every fruit I can find, since I often grab randomly at whatever I have in the kitchen. Not every combination achieves deliciousness, but even a bad smoothie tends to be at least drinkable because of the sweetness/sugar. They're like dessert wines in that respect. Tomato fits surprisingly well into a lot of combinations. Sweet (carrot, bell pepper) or relatively flavorless (celery, cucumber) vegetables can also work and offer interesting new textures.

Remember that breakfast recipe I put up a while back? Remember all my talk about experimenting being half the fun? Same idea here.