The Best Strawberry Smoothie

Along with the banana smoothie the strawberry smoothie is surely the most popular smoothie recipe. Strawberries are now available for most of the year due to the global marketplace and supermarkets importing fruit from around the world.

If you are unable to get hold of fresh strawberries then frozen strawberries can be substituted into the recipe. The recipe uses live yoghurt which contains friendly bacteria that benefit your digestive system. If your other half is asking for something a bit richer then you can substitute a good quality ice cream into the recipe instead of the yoghurt. For a compromise try half yoghurt, half ice cream.

Strawberries are a good source of vitamin C and also a good source of vitamin A. They are also a good source of the minerals calcium, potassium and phosphorus.

Ingredients
1 punnet of strawberries
1 1/2 cups of live vanilla/natural yoghurt OR 1 1/2 cups of vanilla ice cream
400ml Apple juice
Handful of crushed ice

Wash the strawberries and remove their stalks. For full flavour the strawberries should be at room temperature, storing strawberries / tomatoes in the fridge can mask some of their flavour. Juice the apples in your juicer or if you haven't got a juicer then you can use apple juice from a carton.

Place the yoghurt (or ice cream if you are feeling indulgent) and 1/4 of the apple juice in your blender, switch on and then add the ice and strawberries and blend until smooth. Finally add the rest of the apple juice and blitz briefly until it is thoroughly blended into the smoothie. Vary the amount of apple juice depending on how thick you like your smoothies to be. The longer you blend the mixture for, the more air will be introduced into the drink and oxidation of nutrients will occur more rapidly.

Drink immediately and enjoy!