UPDATED June 16, 2020: Summer is here and with it comes an abundance of fresh fruits and vegetables. As the temperature rises, I can’t resist all the colorful produce at the grocery store this time of year and I usually start to incorporate more smoothies into my diet. Prepping smoothies in the morning can be time consuming, so I love having these make-ahead smoothie packs on hand, especially on days when I decide to hit the snooze button on my alarm.Smoothies are an easy way to incorporate fresh fruits and veggies into your diet. When you find your favorite fresh produce at the grocery store, make it into handy freezer packs to save yourself some time and effort the next time you crave a smoothie. Whether you want to blend a quick breakfast for the kids or fuel-up after a workout, all you have to do is add these freezer packs to your blender along with juice (and in some cases yogurt or grains, like steel cut oats or Chia and Flax seeds). Tah-dah, your smoothie is ready with the push of a button!
During recipe development, the Hamilton Beach Test Kitchen found that using room temperature juice works best when making smoothies with frozen fruits and vegetables. We know most of you will use juice that you already have in the refrigerator and that’s just fine too. You may need to add more liquid to achieve the consistency you want, or use the blender tamper to help mix the ingredients as the smoothie blends. Blender tampers are used to push ingredients closer to the blender blade, removing air bubbles and giving your smoothie a more consistent texture. Depending on how icy you like your smoothies, you can also leave the freezer pack on the counter while you hop in the shower or run the plastic bag under warm water in the sink for a few seconds to help thaw out the ingredients a bit before blending.
Try our Green Fruit Smoothie, Berry Smoothie, Pineapple Orange Cream Smoothie or Hidden Green Smoothie to get started. While these are just a few of our favorite smoothie recipes for summer, have fun with it and experiment mixing and matching your favorite fruits, vegetables, and juices until you find your favorite refreshing combination.
Do you have a favorite weekday smoothie recipe? Share with us by leaving a comment below.
Please help. How do you set up the freezer packs please
Do you take the recioe–put all ingredients into one small bag. Freeze. Or freeze separately then add to freezer bag?
Put all ingredients into one small bag and then freeze! Hope this helps.
YUMM! Thanks for sharing
good recipes i like them
I love smoothies. I make one with frozen bananas milk, yogurt chia, flax , psyillum, cheerios and peanut butter. I change it up by adding oat instead of cheerios or someother cereal.
I put all the ingredients into one bag and sprinkle just a little bit of sugar on them.Try to get as much air as you can out of the bag then seal and freeze.
I’m always looking for that one ingredient at the end. So I’m going to put everything for one smoothie that I put in my ninja and my husband splits with me into one ziploc. Except for vegetables that I buy fresh and use daily. So that being said all the fruit will be frozen. Won’t have to add ice.