Drinks

Mixed Berry Protein Smoothie

April 24, 2020~ Breakfast, Drinks, The Platefull Blog

I’ve been working on ways to add protein and fiber to my kids’ diet, as they aren’t big meat eaters. My youngest is going through a carb and cheese only phase, so it’s hard to get him to eat anything else right now. Luckily, this Mixed Berry Protein Smoothie saves the day! He will happily drink this and asks for it every day. I love it too! It’s simple to make and by soaking the chia in the yogurt and milk before blending, he doesn’t even notice that its there.

To start, combine the yogurt, milk, and chia seeds in a blender and let sit for about 10 minutes to soften the chia seeds. After 10 minutes, add the frozen mixed berries and honey. Blend (I use the smoothie setting on my Vitamix) and serve immediately!

Sit back and watch your kiddos enjoy! (He’s the cutest, isn’t he?!). My kids love this smoothie with a side of pancakes. 🙂

Mixed Berry Protein Smoothie

Author: Sarah
Yield: 3 cups 1x

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Ingredients

Scale

1 cup milk

8 oz yogurt (I use Stonyfield Organics Strawberry Yo Kids)

2 Tbsp chia seeds

1 cup frozen mixed berries

2 Tbsp honey

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Instructions

In a 2 cup measuring cup with a spout (or bowl – it’s easier to pour out of a container with a spout), whisk together the milk, yogurt, and chia seeds. Let stand for 5-10 minutes.

Add the milk mixture, frozen berries (do not thaw) and honey to a blender. Blend until the mixture reaches smoothie consistency. Serve immediately.

Family Game Night

December 14, 2019~ Drinks, Lifestyle, The Platefull Blog

After getting extremely bored with playing Trouble every. single. night. I was on the hunt for fun games that us adults could enjoy, but would be simple enough for our 5 year old (and some for our 3 year old as well). I found the best article that reviewed multiple games and age groups! I selected a few games from that list and promptly ordered them on Amazon Prime. Two days later, we had our first family game night and our kids now beg to have game night EVERY night. They love the games and so do we! And of course, who doesn’t love popcorn and hot chocolate?! So today I’m sharing the best, richest hot chocolate recipe and the list of games we love so far. Let’s start with the games and save the best till last, shall we? 😉

As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. These are all games that our family loves.

Game List and Review:

Sleeping Queens – this has by far been the favorite of all of the games I ordered. Our 5 year old loves it and honestly, we love it too. It’s too advanced for our 3 year old, so we play this one after he’s in bed, or he “helps” one of the grown ups. It does give the option of using addition (up to 10) and our 5 year old is able to make some equations on his own. I would guess as he gets closer to 6, he will do that part even more on his own. Either way, he beats us fair and square all the time!
Sushi Go – This one has quite a few rules to remember, but after a few times through, our 5 year old got it down. Our 3 year old has no clue what he’s doing in this game, but he loves to be a part of the action, taking a card and passing the rest. Sometimes he even ends up with more points than I do, which is embarrassing to say since I should be using some sort of strategy I guess. This one’s definitely a keeper – we all enjoy it!
Taco Cat Goat Cheese Pizza – we just got this game out for the first time today. After just one round, we are still figuring it out, but the boys were really giggling with this one. It seems like it will be a really fun game over the holidays with a crowd!
My First Castle Panic – Both our 3 and 5 year olds can play this game. I love that it’s a cooperative game. It’s all of us against the monsters, who are trying to get to the castle to knock the walls down! You can ask other players for help, which is nice because it encourages the boys to offer help to one another, which never happens. As adults, we don’t enjoy this one quite as much because it’s pretty simple, but it is a nice short game that our 3 year old can really take part in, so the boys love it.
Skip Bo Jr. – Both boys like to play this game. Our 5 year old understands the rules, and our 3 year old can do it with a little help, since it only requires being able to count up to 10. He doesn’t understand any sort of strategy, but he likes putting his cards in the middle.

I’ve got a few more games planned as Christmas gifts for the boys, and I’m anxious to see if any of those become favorites. I’ll update this post after the holidays to include those as well! They are: Ticket to Ride My First Journey, Connect Four, Trouble Olaf’s Ice Adventure, and Kanoodle. I love that this has become a tradition in our home that we all look forward to!

Now for the good part. We always make a bowl of popcorn and sometimes as a special treat, this hot chocolate. I love that it cooks in the slow cooker, so there’s no work when it’s time for game night!

Hot Chocolate

Author: Sarah

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Ingredients

Scale

6 cups whole milk

2 cups heavy cream

1/2 cup granulated sugar

8 oz semi sweet chocolate chips

1/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder

2 tsp vanilla extract

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Instructions

Add all ingredients to a slow cooker and whisk vigorously for 2 minutes. Heat on low for 6 hours or high for 4 hours, whisking periodically. Serve with your choice of toppings: marshmallows, candy cane, etc.

Bunny Juice

November 11, 2019~ Drinks, The Platefull Blog

Apparently we have a thing for naming juices after animals (see the Green Gorilla Juice recipe), but hey, if it makes juicing fun for my kids, I’m all for it! They love this juice and so do I. During cold and flu season, I’ll sometimes add in a small piece of peeled turmeric, but it stains my hands pretty badly, so it’s not my favorite thing to do. :). More often, you’ll find me buying a turmeric shot at Whole Foods and just dumping it in at the end. I also sometime buy a ginger shot if I don’t feel like peeling ginger. I know, lazy. Another great add in is mango juice!

Author: Sarah
Prep Time: 10 minutes
Total Time: 10 minutes
Yield: 4 servings 1x

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Ingredients

Scale

8 oranges, peeled and quartered

5 carrots, ends removed and halved

1 lemon, peeled and quartered

1 1-inch piece of ginger, peeled

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Instructions

Run all ingredients through a juicer. Chill before serving.

Green Gorilla Juice

November 8, 2019~ Drinks, The Platefull Blog

About a year ago, I bought a juicer. To be honest, at the time I wasn’t really sure if I would ever use it. I was looking for a way to keep us healthy through flu season and was hoping I could trick my kids into consuming mass amounts of vegetables in juice form since they aren’t always great about consuming them in food form. Most tricks like that don’t work on my kids though. My youngest can sense a vegetable from a mile away.

I ended up using the juicer more than I initially thought I would. I definitely noticed a difference in how often my kids got sick when I was juicing for them (in addition to trying my best to get them to eat healthy foods). This juice is bright green, which my kids think is kinda cool. They LOVE putting the fruits and veggies into the juicer because they think the way the juice and solids come out is hilarious (put your frame of mind in boy humor and you’ll know what I mean). Much like other meals, if they make the juice, they drink the juice! Win, win! This Green Gorilla Juice is one they are happy to drink – and I’m happy to serve.

Green Gorilla Juice

Author: Sarah

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Ingredients

Scale

1 broccoli stem (only the stem – no florets), sliced in half

1 cucumber, quartered

2 kale leaves, torn into pieces

2 pears, quartered

2 apples, quartered

1 lemon, peeled and halved

16 oz Pineapple Juice

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Instructions

Feed the broccoli, cucumber, kale, apples, pears, and lemon through the juicer. Pour the juice into a pitcher and fill with 100% pineapple juice (my pitcher takes about 16 oz pineapple juice to fill to the top). Chill and serve.

Notes

You could juice a pineapple, but I personally hate cutting fresh pineapple, so I take the shortcut of using store bought pineapple juice. I buy the R.W. Knudsen Organic 100% pineapple juice for this recipe.

Apple Cider Sangria

October 21, 2019~ Drinks, The Platefull Blog

We are headed to the pumpkin patch for our annual trip to pick out pumpkins to carve. The pumpkin patch we always visit makes their own apple cider and its amazing. All that thought about apple cider inspired me to make this recipe! Why not celebrate our trip to the pumpkin patch with an apple cider drink?! Apple Cider Sangria is perfect for a Halloween party or to serve at Thanksgiving. It’s also a perfect drink by the fire pit with the cool Fall air. Whenever you decide to drink this, I promise you’ll love it! Hint – serve the kids plain apple cider, with some chopped up fruit in their drink and they’ll feel pretty special too. Just be warned – if your kids are like mine, you’ll end up with sticky hands from fishing the fruit out of their cup to eat it. 😉

Apple Cider Sangria

Author: Sarah
Prep Time: 5 minutes
Total Time: 5 minutes
Yield: 4 servings 1x

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Ingredients

Scale

1 bottle white wine (Sauvignon Blanc or Pinot Grigio)

2 cups apple cider

1/4 cup bourbon

3 cinnamon sticks

1 orange, sliced

1 apple, diced

1 pear, diced

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Instructions

In a large pitcher, combine the white wine, apple cider, and bourbon. Add the cinnamon sticks, orange, apple, and pear and stir well. Refrigerate until cold. Note: If you plan to make this ahead, take the cinnamon sticks out after a couple hours so it doesn’t get too spiced. To serve, pour into wine glasses and lay a cinnamon stick across the top.

My Morning Routine

October 8, 2019~ Breakfast, Drinks, The Platefull Blog

A few months ago, I really started thinking about how I could start my day in a way that gave me energy and motivated me to get out of bed in the morning. I had fallen into a pattern of hitting snooze so many times that I rolled out of bed right before my kids. One of the pitfalls of working from home is that there’s really no motivation to look presentable each day, thus my rolling out of bed at the last minute and working in sweatpants everyday wasn’t a problem. But, it actually was a problem. You see, I recently finished reading Girl, Stop Apologizing and it was like a huge wake up call to me that I wasn’t making time to work on my goals. I wasn’t making time to take care of myself. I certainly wasn’t making myself a priority. From the second my feet hit the ground in the morning to the second I went to bed at night, I was doing things at full speed, for other people. As I walked through the steps in the book, I began to piece together what an energizing morning routine would look like for me. Here’s how it’s come together:

5:00 Wake up, drink a glass of cold water while I make my coffee. Then I spend the next hour drinking my coffee and working on my one primary goal.

6:00 I belong to The Balanced Life Online, which provides a calendar of Pilates workouts Monday-Friday. MWF workouts are about 15 minutes, while T-Th are more like 30 minutes. At 6 AM, I do my pilates workout for the day.

6:15/6:30 I head to my favorite comfy chair to do 10 minutes of meditation through Headspace. Then I write in my gratitude journal, following the #last90days methodology.

6:45 Pack school lunch for my Kindergartner, set out backpacks, shoes, coats, etc.

7:00 Get my kids up (if they aren’t up already). Get them ready for school.

7:10-7:20/7:30 The boys watch a show and have a glass of milk, while we snuggle. I have thought so many times about doing away with this part of the morning routine, but these morning snuggles start the day off right for all of us and are truly one of the things I’m most grateful for each day!

7:30 My husband takes the boys to school and I get myself dressed and ready for the day, while listening to my favorite playlist or podcast.

8:00 Make my favorite green smoothie and sit down at my desk to check email and begin my work day.

So, that was a really long post to get to the point….which is that this green smoothie is a rock solid part of my morning routine! It’s smooth and delicious, and easy to make thanks to my freezer smoothie packs. Once in a while I get crazy and swap out the smoothie for an oatmeal bowl or acai bowl (look for those recipes soon!), but it’s rare that I don’t start my day with this smoothie! And I haven’t gotten sick of it yet. 🙂

Morning Green Smoothie

Author: Sarah

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Ingredients

Scale

1 cup spinach

1/3 cup avocado

1/2 banana

1/3 cup frozen pineapple cubes

1/3 cup frozen mango chunks

1 tsp matcha powder

1/2 cup coconut water

1/3 cup coconut milk

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Instructions

*Note: For this recipe, I use frozen avocado chunks from Costco. I pre-assemble smoothie packs by combining the frozen avocado, pineapple, and mango, along with half a banana that I have peeled and sliced into individual smoothie portions and freezing. Each morning, I dump a smoothie pack and the remaining ingredients in my Vitamix blender.

To mix the smoothie: Combine all ingredients in a blender. I use a Vitamix and blend on the smoothie setting. If the smoothie looks too thick, I add a little coconut water.

Pumpkin Spice Latte

September 12, 2017~ Drinks, Recipes, The Platefull Blog

Hello Fall! Its starting to get cooler here at night and I am just so ready for Fall. Its my favorite season! I saw the other day that the beloved PSL is back, so in an effort to stick with my healthy eating plan, I’ve recreated my favorite fall drink to fit with my “rules.” This is my favorite drink to curl up under a blanket with on the deck in the chilly morning air! Enjoy!

*Recipe adapted from Iowa Girl Eats (one of my favorite food blogs!)

Pumpkin Spice Latte

Author: Sarah

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Ingredients

Scale

4 dates, pitted

4 cups coconut milk

8 tbsp pumpkin puree

1 tsp pumpkin pie spice

3/4 tsp cinnamon

1 1/2 tbsp vanilla

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Instructions

Use a stick blender to blend the pitted dates into the pumpkin puree. (Do this is a tall, skinny container to avoid pumpkin going everywhere!). Transfer the puree to a medium saucepan. Add the cinnamon and pumpkin pie spice. Stir until bubbly and fragrant. Add the vanilla and stir for 1 minute. Pour in the coconut milk and whisk until the mixture has come to a soft boil. Let it simmer, whisking occasionally, for about 5 minutes.
Line a sieve with a single layer of cheesecloth and place over a pitcher. Slowly pour the hot mixture over the sieve to strain.
Prepare 1-2 shots of espresso (I prefer 2 shots from my Nespresso machine). Fill the remainder of the cup with the pumpkin spice latte mixture.