Experimenting Part 1

T minus 18 days 'til my surgery! So I met with a nutritionist last week to talk about the whole 3 months on a liquid diet thing and she had some great suggestions starting with: START EXPERIMENTING NOW! She recommended that I start replacing at least one meal a day with a "liquid meal" so that my body gets used to it and also so that I have a few recipes I know will taste good and fill me up after the surgery. Here is what I have learned so far:

• Everyone recommends the Magic Bullet Blender for a reason, its awesome! I found mine at JC Penny for 50 bucks. Its small (perfect for my dorm room) and it really blends everything!
• Vanilla nonfat yogurt makes a great base for any kind of fruit smoothie, throw some almond milk in and its delicious!
• To make something sweeter, don't add sugar, add vanilla extract or an alternative sweetener.
• Pineapple juice is supposed to make the swelling go down faster after surgery so stock up!

 I also found a couple recipes that work for me. I am only on the third day of trying to replace one meal with a smoothie so I only have 3 right now but more are sure to come!


1. Nutella Strawberry Smoothie

1 cup cut up strawberries
1 cup vanilla almond milk (you can substitute regular milk)
1 scoop of vanilla Ensure protein powder
2 tablespoons vanilla nonfat yogurt
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 tablespoon Nutella

It seriously tastes like a Nutella covered strawberry. Great for those chocolate cravings!
Side note: The nutritionist said that Nutella is really more like frosting but in small doses its perfectly fine. This week I am going to try the same recipe but with bananas and peanut butter! Stay tuned!)

2. Mango Smoothie

1 cup cut up mango cubes (as ripe as you can get them)
1 banana, mango and carrot Gerber baby food (don't judge, it actually works)
3 tablespoons vanilla nonfat yogurt
1 cup orange juice

This was a little chunky but overall not bad, I think I just needed to pick out riper mangos, I am also planning to try this again but add in some frozen bananas and carrot juice or pineapple juice instead of orange juice.

3. Blended Chunky Cheeseburger Soup

Just blend the Chunky Cheeseburger soup until smooth.

I added a dollop of sour cream just to make it look a little more appetizing and was very happy to find out that it tasted like a liquid Burger King Whopper! Now if only I could find soup that will taste like pizza and I will be good to go!