Sunrise Smoothie

I am very pleased with this, my very own creation. You have to try it. Delish!

Ingredients
1 cup orange juice - You can substitute other juices. I've tried apple and grape. Both worked fine, but orange is my favorite by far.
1 cup frozen strawberries - You can use fresh. I did, but found that the strawberry flavor was much stronger when they were frozen.
1 medium to large banana - This surprisingly adds a lot of the sweetness.
2 tbsp flaxseed. - This blends right in and is a great healthy boost for a morning drink.

Put orange juice in the blender.  You'll want to put your liquid in first, to help it blend smoothly.  Add other ingredients and blend until all chunks are gone.

I love this. My kids love this. I broke my blender a few weeks ago and have been dying ever since. I can't wait til the replacement part comes, because I want my smoothie!

Strawberry Lemonade Slush/Lemonade

This is a two part recipe. It came out pretty great. It was a spur of the moment thing. It starts out with a lemonade or limeade base and then you add that to the strawberries.

Ingredients for lime/lemonade base
2 1/2 cups water
1 1/4 cups sugar
1/2 tsp finely shredded lemon or lime peel
1 1/4 cups lemon or lime juice
Ice cubes

For a lemonade or limeade base, in a medium saucepan heat and stir water and sugar over meidum heat until sugar is dissolved. Remove from heat; cool 20 minutes. Add citrus peel and juice to sugar mixture. Pour into a jar; cover and chill up to 3 days. (For lemonade, combine equal parts base and water in ice-filled glasses; stir.)

Strawberry Lemonade Slush
For each serving, ina blender container combine 1/2 cup fresh or frozen unsweetened strawberries, 1/3 cup lemonade base, and 1 tbsp sugar. Blend until smooth. With a blender running, add 1/2 cup ice cubes, 1 at a time, through opening in lid until beverage is slushy.

Wassil

This has been in our Mom's Cookbook for forever and I've never had it. It's basically a fancy apple cider. It was really simple and pretty tasty. It was fun and we all really enjoyed it.

Ingredients
6 cups apple cider (I didn't have a jug of apple cider, so I just used enough apple cider mixes and water to make 6 cups worth)
1 cinnamon stick
1/4 tsp nutmeg
1/4 cup honey
3 tbsp lemon juice
1 20-oz. can pineapple juice unsweetened

Heat cider and cinnamon stick in large pan. Bring to boil and simmer covered 5 min. Add remaining ingredients and simmer uncovred 5 min. longer. Keep hot ove rlow heat or heat in small batches.

I just did the whole thing in the crock pot. I heated the first ingredients til pretty darn hot and then added the rest and kept it on low. It turned out awesome.

Homemade Lemonade

Yesterday I was inspired at the grocery store and bought some fresh lemons.  So with our dinner last night we had some homemade lemonade. It was super easy and I must say, pretty darn good!

It may not be much to look at, but it was good lemonade. All I did was this:

juice 3 lemons

Add to pitcher with 1 cup sugar. Stir lots to help the sugar dissolve.

Fill up with water to 2 quarts (my pitcher marks 2 quarts, so it was easy.)

Stir and add some ice to get it cold. Enjoy!

Strawberry Juice

I started making "banana juice" for Joseph a while back. It's just a simple banana, milk, sugar, and vanilla combo. My mom made it when I was a kid and I always liked it. Anyway, I started experimenting and substituting other fruits for the banana. It has made a big variety of "juices" for us, and best of all Joseph loves them! Oh yeah, and they're actually pretty good for you too.

Ingredients
1 cup strawberries (fresh or frozen)
1 cup milk
1 tbsp sugar
1 tsp vanilla

Combine all ingredients in blender and blend until smooth. Will be bubbly.
You can vary the amount of sugar or vanilla. I've actually started using brown sugar instead of white and it's just as good. (Another one of those: I heard "brown is better than white" things. I haven't verified it yet.) I do like using frozen fruit because it makes the juice really cold. But fresh fruit is just as good. It just won't stay cold as long.

Adore the photo magic ;) I like these milkshakes because they're really foamy. Joseph likes to lick his lips to get his moustache. It's cute.