Guess what I did today! I rode my bike to work! A little over half my trip is along the American River on the bike trail, and it was gorgeous. Such a wonderful way to start my day and get in my exercise! Though I’m definitely going to have to do something about arriving at work sweaty. I’m suuuper professional 😉
Yeah, I got my phone out and took pictures while I was riding. I should probably be embarrassed by my stupidity, but I’m actually kind of proud of myself!
Okay, I know some of you are distracted because you saw the title of this post and you’re thinking “carob?!?! What the hell is wrong with her? Chocolate, chocolate, chocolate!” To you, I say: fine, use chocolate! A chocolate-covered strawberry smoothie would be awesome.
But first, let me talk to you about carob a little! I have mentioned this little secret of mine before: I’m not a big chocolate fan. I love some chocolate chips in my banana bread, and some cocoa powder in my breakfast truffles. But I’m not the raging chocoholic that most women are.
I am, however, quite the fan of carob.
Even though you can use carob chips in place of chocolate chips and carob powder in place of cocoa powder in recipes, they really don’t taste the same. Carob has its own unique subtle flavor. If you haven’t tried it before, give it a shot. I love the flavor, and it actually has some great health benefits.
Now for the recipe! I was getting ready to load this up with all kinds of stuff and decided to make it super-simple. Three ingredients.
serves 1
1 C frozen strawberries
1 C unsweetened vanilla almond milk
3 T carob powder*
1 t vanilla extract
optional: 1 T chia seeds for some healthy fat!
*if you do replace this with cocoa, you probably only need 1-2 tablespoons, depending on how strong you want it and how dark your cocoa powder is
Blend it all up!
Nutrition facts per smoothie: Calories: 125; Calories from Fat: 51; Total Fat: 5.6g; Saturated Fat: 1.3g; Sodium: 183mg; Total Carbohydrates: 21.7g; Dietary Fiber: 7.8g; Sugars: 8.1g; Protein: 4.9g
Leave a Reply