I’ve got another quickie for you tonight. It’s more of an idea than a recipe. I’m sure a lot of you Budget Byters already stock your freezers with these handy smoothie packs, but I wanted to share the tip for those who may be new to the kitchen. Not only does this make smoothies faster and easier to make, but they’re a fraction, a small fraction, of what you’ll pay at your local smoothie counter.
So, the formula is easy. Three one pound bags of frozen fruit of your choice, and four bananas. Divide the frozen fruit up into 8 bags, and place half of a peeled banana in each bag as well. Seal them up tight and toss them into the freezer. When you’re ready to make your delicious smoothie, place the frozen fruit in the blender, add milk (or soy or almond milk), and whatever else you want and press go! No more hauling ten ingredients out of the freezer every time you want to make one smoothie. Just grab one bag and add a liquid. Sure, I also add spinach, cinnamon, and ground flax seed, but it’s still way easier to have the fruit divided up. And it only takes about 5 minutes to make all 8 packs.
This is my favorite smoothie – peaches, strawberries, raspberries, banana, spinach, light vanilla soy milk, ground flax seed, and cinnamon. It works, trust me! If you like things sweet, add a touch of honey and it’ll blow you away.
Smoothie Packs
Servings 8Ingredients
- 16 oz. frozen strawberries ($2.69)
- 16 oz. frozen raspberries ($4.15)
- 16 oz. frozen peaches ($2.69)
- 4 medium bananas ($0.86)
Instructions
- Divide the ingredients equally between 8 quart-sized freezer bags (1/2 banana per bag).
- Freeze the smoothie packs until ready to use or up to three months.
See how we calculate recipe costs here.
Nutrition
Have you tried this recipe?Mention @budgetbytes or tag #budgetbytes on Instagram!- 1 frozen smoothie pack $1.30
- 1 cup light vanilla soy milk $0.41
- 1 handful baby spinach $0.53
- 1 Tbsp ground flax seed $0.03
- 1/2 tsp cinnamon $0.03
- Empty one smoothie pack into a blender and add the soy milk, spinach, flax, and cinnamon.
- Blend until smooth, adding more liquid if needed.
Step By Step Photos
This is what goes into the frozen smoothie packs. I switch up the fruit a lot (I like blueberries too), but I always try to have at least three. Adding frozen bananas to a smoothie gives it a nice ice cream-like texture. If you’ve never used a frozen banana in your smoothie, then you haven’t lived. Okay, maybe that’s a bit extreme, but you’ve got to try it.
Divide the fruit between 8 freezer bags. One of my bananas turned out to be completely rotten inside so I could only make six this time around. I always tend to over estimate how much fruit is needed per smoothie and then I can’t fit it all in the blender. So, about 1/4 to 1/3 cup of each of the frozen fruits per bag. Then just pop them in the freezer until you’re ready to make a smoothie. They’ll stay good in the freezer for a couple of months. The bananas will slowly turn brown, but they’re still good eats for a while.
When you’re ready to make a smoothie, just put the frozen fruit in a blender with some liquid (and whatever else you want) and you’re ready to blend. I add spinach for the nutrients, not the flavor… you can’t taste it with all of the fruit. It blends easier if the spinach is at the bottom.
Don’t get me wrong, I LOVE milk… but in my smoothies I like light vanilla soy milk. It just has more creaminess than milk and the vanilla goes great with the fruit. In the old days, before Silk was everywhere, I used milk and added vanilla extract. So, that’s an option too.
I like to add some flax for fiber and omega-3s, and cinnamon just because I like it :) If I’m craving something sweet, I’ll add a tablespoon of honey or so, but usually the fruit and silk are sweet enough for me.
Blend that sucker up ’till it’s nice and smooth! Sometimes I have to add a touch of water or more silk just to get it going. That’s what will happen if you have too much frozen fruit in your pack. It’ll be waaaaaay too thick to blend properly.
Oh yums. It’s good. And good for you. And spinach? What spinach?
I loved the suggestion to put avocados in smoothies (thanks, Brent!) and I can’t wait to experiment with that. So, for all of you smoothie lovers out there…
These are a great idea! Just made up a batch today, used strawberries, peaches, and pineapple. I had one for lunch, it was way more filling than I thought it was going to be. I think I’m going to get the fixin’s to make some chocolate peanut butter banana smooths too. Yummo!
Cari – I’ve bought it both at my local grocery store and at Walmart. At my local grocery store it was with the other natural foods by all of the Bob’s Redmill brand bagged flours and grains (the flax was in a bag too – and quite inexpensive). At Walmart it was actually in the baking aisle, in a box, by the flour. I think Walmart also had some in the cereal aisle near the oat bran. So, hopefully, if you check all of those aisles you’ll find some! ;)
Where do you buy ground flax seed at? I looked at my local grocery store, but I’m not even sure with in the store where it might be?
I guess I have never put the spinach in the freezer because I assumed that it would change the texture or make it stringy… although I’ve never tried it!
I love adding avocado to smoothies – they taste so creamy that I substitute coconut water for milk/soy milk.
Is there any reason you couldn’t throw the spinach leaves into the frozen mix?
Can you also freeze the avocado?
You know, I’ve never tried to freeze fresh avocado. I think it might work, especially if it’s going to end up being blended into the smoothie anyway.
I love this idea but it was too big of a serving for me. I will tweak it next time.
I highly recommend the Ninja Pulse Blender!! I recently bought my first blender and went with a cheap Hamilton Beach model. It could NOT get through the frozen fruit and I returned it. I got the Ninja Pulse for Christmas and LOVE IT!!! It comes with a 40oz pitcher and also 2 individual serving cups (I believe 16oz) and with those you go straight from the blender to the car (or where ever). I drink mine on the way to work every morning. You just take off the blender lid and add a drinking lid. Saves on dishes too…gotta love that!! :)
This is one of those “duh, why didn’t I think of that!” blog reads. I did this last night. In 15 minutes I made 15 smoothie packets. I added 1 TB ground flaxseed to all my packets and spinach to several (mixed berry with spinach and chocolate spinach …).
My favorite smoothie is flaxseed, banana, 1 T natural peanut or almond butter, 1 c. dark chocolate almond milk and ice. Mmmmm. It’s a great dessert!
My favorite smoothie tip: add in silken tofu to boost protein.
Love all the smoothie ideas here! Gotta write ’em down..
At home I always make mixed berry (strawberry, raspberry, blueberry), banana, 2tbsp vanilla yogurt and orange juice. It can be a little tart for some tongues so I add honey when making it for guests :)
This is such a great idea, I have been thinking to do it earlier, maybe this is just the kick in the butt that I need to start! :-)
This is the blender that I have: http://www.amazon.com/Hamilton-Beach-51101B-Personal-Blender/dp/B0017XHSAE/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1319059007&sr=8-1&tag=vglnk-c278-20 It’s a single serving blender that doubles as a cup with lid. It was less than $15 at Walmart and I’ve had it for at least 5 years with no issues!
This looks SO good! What kind of blender would you recommend getting? I don’t want to spend too much on one but I don’t want to end up getting a bad cheap one that doesn’t work well or breaks easily.
Tanya,
I see u put kale in your smoothie. Do you have to wilt it first or just throw it in. It seems so “hardy”. I see Beth usually cooks it a little before using it in her recipes. I have some in my freezer after buying some for Beth’s kale sausage soup which was sooo good by the way. This post sure got a lot of activity!
2 frozen bananas
2 tsp cocoa powder
2 tsp maple syrup
1 tsp ground coffee (reg, I just put some aside when I make my morning coffee)
Silk
The coffee enhances the chocolate flavour. It’s the best chocolate banana smoothie ever! Sometimes I also add 1 tsp of almond butter to give it more staying power.
Seconding what another commenter said about the light soymilk. So many nutrients are fat soluable! :)
I love this idea. I went with a pineapple, mango, blueberry, banana combo because that is what I had on hand. This will be great on those days I just don’t feel like eating breakfast.
Just a word about using light soymilk–almost all of the important nutrients other than protein and calcium, ie the flavinoids and vitamins, in soy milk are fat soluable. The calorie advantage between regular and light soymilk is minimal, and the nutririent loss is significant. Full fat soymilk is comparable to 1.5% milk–not an aggregious amount of fat, and unsaturated at that. You’ll only add about 20-30 calories (depending on brand) to your smoothie by using the regular soymilk.