This is a nice spring soup, although you could really make it any time of year because it works well with frozen peas. The mint and lemon give it a refreshing, bright flavor, and it’s super easy to make. The recipe that inspired me does not call for a high-powered blender, but I was glad to have one because I did not have to thaw the frozen peas, and since the peas were frozen I didn’t have to re-chill it at the end either. I’m also guessing that using a Vitamix or Blendtec gives it a smoother consistency. Continue Reading →
I’ve been adding ginger to smoothies for a long time, but I only recently learned that you don’t have to peel it. Just cut off a piece, wash it, and toss it in the pitcher. Its flavor has a nice strong profile that stands up well to combining it with more bitter greens such as kale—if you’re trying to move beyond baby spinach in green smoothies, I highly recommend trying ginger. Even if you’re not having bitter greens, it still tastes awesome. Continue Reading →
Updated May 27, 2017
This is a common concern when buying a Vitamix machine. Do you really need the Vitamix dry container? The dry blades are shaped to push ingredients up, in order to minimize packing into the bottom corners. The dry container fits C- and G-Series Vitamix machines. That includes almost all of the current machines, but note that this container does not work with the personal size S-Series, and it does not work with the Ascent Series. (A dry container for the Ascent Series rumored to be in the works.) For more information about the different models, see my comparison page.
I’m trying a new feature, inspired by kottke.org, where I announce updates to old posts.
Avocado as a smoothie/soup ingredient: You can reduce the introduction of air bubbles by blending everything except avocado first. Then add avocado and blend briefly (~5 sec). The avocado is so soft that it does not need to be blended for very long, and a shorter blend time will introduce less air. You can of course use the air bubble removal trick, but I often make cold avocado soups pretty thick, which makes it harder to get rid of the air bubbles.
Cilantro: Storage tip: keep cilantro bunch in a jar or cup with about an inch of water in it, similar to how you’d keep flowers in a vase. Put a produce plastic bag over it (loose is fine) and store it in the fridge. You can change the water occasionally and trim the bottoms of the stalks when you take it out. It will keep for a couple of weeks, compared to possibly less than a week if it’s just left loose in the fridge. It will slowly lose its aroma, but I’ve been impressed with how long it lasts.
Making pancakes is surprisingly easy once you get the hang of it. My dad likes to point out that he can make them from scratch in the same time it would take you to mix up a batch from pancake mix. A Vitamix lets you grind the grains on the spot so the whole-grain flour is maximally fresh. You can also make whatever flour combination you want on the fly (sub in oats, buckwheat, corn, rice, quinoa, etc.) I hadn’t made pancakes in a while though so I’m keeping this batch simple with just wheat and oats. This is a standard buttermilk pancake recipe, a little extra deluxe by my standards because I used butter. Continue Reading →
If you’re excited about getting an awesome blender, but Vitamix and Blendtec prices are out of your range, there are some cheaper options that I’ll go over today.
Before I get into it, I want to point out that if you use one of these machines regularly and think about its long lifetime, the cost is less daunting. For example, if you get a new Vitamix 5200 for $449, and use it 5 times per week for the 7 year warranty, that’s 25 cents per use. Add to that the machine will probably last at least 15 years, and you may use it more than 5 times per week, and the cost per use goes much lower. If you get one, and find that you hardly ever use it, it’s easy to recoup your cash. If it’s within 30 days you can get all your money back from Vitamix, and they even pay for return shipping. After that period you’ll have to resell it yourself, but the machines are so highly regarded that they maintain good resale value (for example, I just looked on eBay at completed listings of used 5200’s and it looks like the average is about $350!–more on this later). Another way of looking at the value is if you currently buy smoothies or blended coffee drinks, and switch to making them yourself, the blender will quickly pay for itself. Continue Reading →
If you’ve never tried sweet potato in a smoothie before, you’re in for a treat. They add a nice creamy texture as well as some sweetness and subtle flavor. In some ways it evokes the pumpkin in the pumpkin pie smoothie, and you can substitute sweet potato for the pumpkin in that recipe.
There are two main types of sweet potatoes, and I go for the soft/moist/orange type, as opposed to the lighter colored dry type. I usually find Garnet or Beauregard varieties, but there are others that are interesting to try as well. There’s sometimes confusion* because these orange sweet potatoes are often sold as yams in the US. Technically they’re not actually yams, which are larger and are generally not available in the US, but they’re called yams here for historical reasons. Continue Reading →
I received these Vitamix spatulas as a gift soon after mentioning them a while back, and I’ve been happy with them. They are relatively rigid, so they do not seal against the container the way a silicone one would, but they are flat enough that they are able to scrape almost everything out. The scraping surface is long enough that they can clean off the sides of the container pretty efficiently. They are long and narrow so they can get between the blades to scoop out thick mixtures. If you want to get every last bit of a thick mixture out, it’s still a bit fussy around the blades, but you can get most of it out pretty quickly. I often leave the last bit of a thick mixture in, and then make something else that I blend it into (for example: blend nut butter remains into a smoothie, hummus remains into vegetable soup).
They are a little bit longer than the tall 64-oz container is deep, so they will work with any of the Vitamix containers. They come with the Vitamix website and phone number printed on one side of the handle, but if you don’t like that it’s pretty easy to scrape off.
I previously wrote that I was concerned that they would be easily destroyed by the blades, but so far they’ve held up well. I do take some care to not bang them into the blades, as they seem like they could get chewed up by the sharp edges.
Update: After over a year of use I’ve found these are even less delicate than I thought. I started using them near the blades, and they are not getting too chewed up. (I push the spatula against the back of a blade as I turn it counter clockwise to scrape the bottom of the container.) They are beginning to show a bit of wear, but not enough to affect them in any meaningful way.
Update 2: I started using a silicone spatula that works a bit better than these.
Nutella is pretty delicious, and I’ve been curious about making a version of it myself. I was wondering what it would be like fresh and without having the first two ingredients be sugar and palm oil. In case you didn’t catch it, Nutella settled a somewhat hilarious class action lawsuit last year over misleading health claims. I decided to try making a more wholesome version with just hazelnuts and chocolate, first ingredient hazelnuts. It’s quite simple to make with a Vitamix, but I took a few missteps the first two times I made it. Continue Reading →
I got a deal on some extra lettuce this week, and I’ve been curious about lettuce soup for a while. I looked up recipes, and I found a Mark Bittman recipe that looks good (completely worth watching the video, even if only for the intro–it’s my favorite intro of his), but it cooks the lettuce. I was interesting in leaving the lettuce raw, so I made up something loosely based on a basic salad. It came out well, though a little bitter, so I added an orange to mellow out the flavor. I used a loose-leaf lettuce, but I bet a butter/Boston lettuce would be nice. It comes out, not surprisingly, tasting a lot like lettuce.
juice of 1 lemon (at least ¼ cup)
1 peeled orange
½ cup walnuts
1 head washed lettuce
5 ice cubes
salt and pepper Continue Reading →