Coffee milkshake is a nice option along with many coffee drinks out there… coffee lattes, macchiatos, cappuccinos… and the list keeps growing as coffee interest grows. ☕️
I was a late coffee bloomer if there’s such a thing… starting a morning routine decades into life.
It was a bitter acquired taste to my younger self.
But I realized after some years into the happy habit, around the 7-year switch (like allergy changes), that my gut couldn’t keep up with my cup o’ java demand… so I switched to homemade cold brew coffee.
Because I didn’t wanna give up my new healthy routine.
Afterall, black coffee is a healthy plant-based antioxidant beverage choice. Tea has its own special place in my drink world, but after noon. 🕛
…And with a cold brew coffee milkshake, you don’t have to choose, you can enjoy anytime of day!
It’s a great treat option (…yes/maybe?) especially when it’s still warm temperatures outside. And that can be closer to year round in these climate change days.
And just seconds if you’ve been on the cold brew coffee bandwagon for a while, and have your setup and coffee grounds available.
…I could make you a nice cup in a minute and it’d be ready to drink in that same minute. 😊
I started making cold brew daily in 2019.
That’s when I discovered that I could not have a regular morning coffee routine because of the acidity. Whether it was the fasting day next morning or it was breakfast time, my stomach needs water and food first!
…Maybe yours is like that too.
But I can enjoy cold brew coffee at ease with some small food (like a banana, yogurt, or some fiber) in the gut.
So if you have a sensitive gut or lining, that’s something to consider… and maybe you don’t have to give up a coffee habit or coffee morning routine if you don’t wanna.
…And this light creamy coffee milkshake is a nice complement.
You can keep adding cold brew to your milkshake that can be a breakfast shake (or more like a light cappuccino). 🧋
And it’s a healthy breakfast dessert drink because it’s light but also has egg protein. 🥚
With a plant-based milk like almond milk added, this does your body good. 🌱
Since cold brew coffee is less acidic in the process, you can start your morning with any ground coffee that you can sift through the coffee filter, that is “the brew” process in cold brew.
You can use light, medium, or dark black coffee grounds. Whatever suits your fancies.
And to top it all off, the optional sweet zhugh is chocolate shavings. If you use dark chocolate then you gain some additional healthy polyphenol anti-inflammatory points. 🎉
That’s all the sugar needed in this coffee milkshake drink, if any.
It’s not loaded with sugar like so many cool coffee beverages you buy that give even my inner child a sugar skin crawl attack just looking at how many grams of sugar. 😮
This milkshake can have no added sugar and be wickedly good!
…And not only is this a low-sugar beverage, you gotta love that this is 3-ingredient easy shake steps… where you focus mostly on the drinking enjoyment!
Beet berry smoothie is one inviting drink that’s vibrant pretty to look at… and pretty gut healthy. Plus, tasty good!
Like a painting in creation, the Alizarin crimson hues in this beet red smoothie are deep saturated in color 🎨 and filled with rainbow polyphenol anti-inflammatory goodness.
Ginger as a punchy spice ingredient is good for digestion and calming bloating symptoms.
It’s one of the power spices for digestive health. And even recommended for IBS patients.
Plus, adding ginger to a beet smoothie gives it a flavor pairing knock-out punch… that I’m all about coming from my catering days.
…And this one knocks you off your seat!
Ginger takes this beet drink from good to POW-WOW. 🤩
You may even skip a caffeine jolt as the flavors are awakening strong.
And if ginger is not a flavor vibe you’ve gotten accustomed to… (or maybe even detest today), I can totally relate.
…When I was a kid, my mom cooked ginger in meals. Not just hints of ginger spice, but actual whole chunks of ginger.
And that’s when I made a face ☹️ and didn’t want to eat food or anything that came within millimeters of the infected ginger taste.
But as our bodies change, our tastes also change.
Little did I know that ginger is Vata balancing.
And it’s surprising I started to like the taste of ginger decades later… it grew on me with ginger and cookies and gingerbread cookies. 😊
…And ginger chocolate.
…So, maybe those are the sweeter ginger tastes needed for you to see the value and bring ginger alive in your life. 😉
Crystallized ginger goes well with chocolate and is one of the happy foods (as it has a little bit of sugar). Sugar and spice is balancing.
You can even make a puzzle game out of it if that’ll bring in the likability factor.
And slowly your tide can change one ginger taste at a time and you find yourself one day drinking ginger water.
And graduate to a smoothie like this one where ginger is one of the star ingredients that gives this beet smoothie some good stars! 🌟
Along with a red apple, this is one anti-inflammatory beet smoothie.
Apples are high in quercetin that daily help us keep the doctor away. 🍎
…And finally, another star ingredient is the blended in super berries, like blueberries (and you can substitute or mix in with strawberries if you prefer).
Fresh peach juice is a great cold summertime drink you can make with a summer glow or sunrise effect. 🌅 And if you want to make your drink taste like a peach pie without the fat calories, you can also do that with the steps below…
When you add enough cinnamon, you will get a delicious sweetness pairing that tastes like a peach pie or dessert. 🥧
A whole wheat peach galette is a whole way to get your peach-fill. 🍑
But you can also keep it cool (andthe hot oven off!) with an easy fresh cold peach juice drink.
Just add cinnamon that’s an Ayurvedic balancing spice for Vata that’s calming and sweet. That’s what I’m talkin’ about!
There are two common types of cinnamon: Cassia and Ceylon.
For this drink, you’ll want to use the Cassia cinnamon that’s the common cinnamon spice you find in most grocery store spice aisles.
Even the easy to find Vietnamese cinnamon is more like the Cassia type.
It’s the tastier cinnamon version that is great for baking with. Ceylon is the more anti-inflammatory one good to add to drinks like tea or coffee.
And with Cassia cinnamon, this flavor paired drink will transform and turn into a peach pie… and maybe remind you a bit of old fashioned apple pie from the enhanced heavy sprinkle of cinnamon spice… 🥧 You’ll want to mix in a dollop and not a dust.
For the peach juice part: fresh peach juice is easy to make with a blender and when peaches are ripe and super soft. That usually takes time from when you buy from the market.
And that can be a good thing…
For a later date juice (or delay in making the juice), you can ripen in a controlled environment…
Put your peaches in your fridge fruit or crisper drawer that’s lower humidity than other parts of the fridge, where fruit will ripen faster and stay fresh. You can preserve your peaches for weeks.
When you’re ready to make your fresh peach juice drink, it will already be ready to serve cold because the peaches are cold.
Quicker Peach Ripening Method:
…Or if you keep peaches out at room temperature in a fruit bowl, they’ll ripen even faster if you’re ready to make your drink as they go from ripe to rot pretty quickly.
This way, you’ll chill your drink after making it.
Either ripening way works. It’s 6-of-one half-dozen the other as we used to say in catering. The mantra is the same and your preference liking.
…Make it slow or fast based on a calendar is the question.
Either way when you start the home fresh peach juice making process, a fresh peach drink can be on your menu as a next day chilled morning beverage instead of mango or orange juice…
That’s good for Vata variety.
And with peaches, you can also get a special sunrise effect when you add water that brightens the day. 🌅
A morning sunrise fresh peach juice drink.🌅
The simple steps are below 🍑
You can turn your juice into a refreshing sweet peach-ade with a little lemon juice instead of a tart lemonade.
Peach is an abundant seasonal summertime fruit favorite and staple. It’s bright, juicy, and high in Vitamin A and C antioxidants.
You can also make one other summertime favorite: old-fashioned porch peach sun tea… that’s a great way to celebrate a summer break! ☀️
Old Fashioned Summer Porch Tea from Fresh Peach Juice
You can take a large glass jar and brew old-fashioned summer tea that’s super easy to make. I’m pretty sure that comes from my adult southern roots living in the Carolinas. 😉
You would basically pour fresh water into a glass jar that has a lid. Then set the tea bags in the jar, using about 4 tea bags for a 6-cup or 3-pint jar.
A classic brisk tea like Lipton gives a super crisp or brisk tea taste.
The bags conveniently have strings, so you can easily tie the bag strings together and hang the labels over the top opening and then secure the lid.
Then set the jar outdoors on a patio that gets sun for at least part of the day. You don’t have to boil water.
And like magic 🪄, you have sun tea in about a day or two. You can leave outside longer for an even more raw, brisk tea taste.
When it’s done, refrigerate or add ice cubes and enjoy!
And finally, with peaches you can use also add fresh diced peaches into your drink or daytime Sangria mocktail for some zhugh and sunny hues.
How fun in the sun, right?
And if you’re peach inspired and don’t want to stop there (or still have extra peaches you don’t know what to do with), you can make a peach profiterole that could take the summer peach vibes to a whole ‘nother (baking) level! 🍑
Blend softened ripe peaches leaving about 1/3" or 1 cm to top of glass. You can add a little water if you prefer less concentrated juice. For peach pie drink: blend in cinnamon spice to taste.
For the sunrise effect, add fresh cold water to fill up to the top of the glass. Bottoms up!
A light Pina Colada is a dessert drink just like a regular Pina Colada with coconut cream that is usually a star ingredient.
And if you want to save the heavy calories… and still have a delicious copycat tropical drink, you can make my Light Pina Colada version. Recipe below. 💕
I think this is a drink dream come true.💭
And a deliciously light tropical smoothie is a great add-on drink for staying cool in hot weather. 🧉
Actually, any Pina Colada is cooling. This one comes to mind as was one sweet drink that gave tropical vacation vibes. 🏖️
The problem with this drink is classic… as in a classic Pina Colada version ishigh calories and sugar.
It’s heavy like a meal. And not a good one.
But, the good news is…
Instead, you can make a healthy, frozen light coconut water tropical smoothie version at home that’s delicious and easy to make.
…And it has no added sugar as fruit will serve as the sugar. Sometimes with all our variety choices, we forget coconuts are fruit too. 🥥
And from the fruits (like pineapple), this is a Vitamin C loaded drink that’s good for boosting the immune system. C is also an antioxidant (aka anti-cancer) that’s water-soluble, so it’s unlikely you’ll take too much. 😊
So this vitamin powerful drink, you can make for everyday healthy drinks. And if you want, add your ginger for a punchy smoothie digestif.
It’s your drink!
…And it’s cool triple layered one if you dare make the American flag colors 🇺🇸 or another (your) country’s flag colors. You can make any color palette with your taste palate and fruit rainbow polyphenol colors. 🌈
Btw, this red, white, and blue one is good anytime of year and especially July 4th Independence Day celebrations. I got a sparkler window show. 🎇
…And then after you’ve made the frozen flag, you’ll end up with this changing colors cool drink as you witness time passing. You may want to make two drinks at a time for yourself.
…One light Pina Colada tropical smoothie you can watch, and another one you can enjoy in the moment. 🍍🍍 Gotta love healthy and happy!
Add first layer of blueberries and blue matcha tea to your drinking glass. Freeze.
After the first layer is solidly frozen, add coconut water layer. Freeze.
Add red juice layer. Freeze.
Add pineapple juice on top. Tip: use fresh pineapple chunks and blend up so there's a thicker juice pulp puree that makes this drink good food drama and taste. Add your pineapple wedge. Enjoy and watch the drink melt like moving colored sand!
Healthy protein foods are a priority at the top of healthy eating and weight loss. They go hand in hand with healthy fats.
And plant based foods are fun to plant into your overall diet because they add color, textures and flavor.
In catering, we always leaned into plant based foods for the color like in a Crudite dish with raw crunchy veggies and the rainbow effects from the anti-inflammatory polyphenols.
…which makes them wildly nutritious and can be the healthy rainbow food on your plate! 🌈
Making them delicious in dishes from their natural bland-boring taste and out of their whole identity or grocery packaging is what makes the tasty edible difference.
Well… when it’s reframed that way, then we can embrace adding more plant-based foods to our healthy diets. They’re sustainable.
But the real problem with veggies if there is one, is that they’re not filling to our bellies.
Most are low calories leaving us feeling hungry. And that can be good for weight loss when balanced in our lives…
Plus adding healthy protein foods to fill in the gaps for us.
Like these examples:
A plant-based tofu “chorizo” healthy protein foods dish doused with balancing Ayurvedic spices.
Tofu chorizo recipe below. 🌱
You can add alliums like onion and garlic that are fiber and good for immunity. Plus green veggies like green bell peppers, and plenty of spices make this a balanced healthy meal.
You can save tomato for your Italian dishes and lean in on the sweet potato in this dish. 🍠
The spices add the flavor and this one has paprika, turmeric, 5 spices, garlic powder, and cumin.
And for healthy proteins, while sausage is usually high in saturated fats, tofu has healthy fats (Omega-3 and unsaturated fat types) and nutrients like magnesium and calcium so it can be a chorizo substitute.
Three Sisters is a corn, bean, and squash trifecta.
Other healthy protein foods include a 3 Sisters dish that celebrates beans at the heart of plant-based healthy protein foods.
This is a complete meal. If you have a corn, beans, and squash trifecta, and also add olive oil or avocado to the meal, then you have all your macros in one. That’s tasty and healthy smart eating.
The stuff I get wildly excited about, plus playing with food. 😊
…Like a plant-based homemade pizza that can bemade with wholesome healthy whole wheat, and in as much time as it takes to place a pizza order and have it delivered… and it’s funny I would know because for 4 teenage years, I was a pizza maker for Domino’s Pizza.
That would be a long time for a teen in today’s working world… but I had fun working. People at all ages stay put when they’re happy.
Back then, like most my age I leaned into the carefree happy over healthy.
These days, wiser having tried more food experiences, we can make better choices.
And we can bake and make our own meals where we get to choose ingredients.
Whole wheat flour is slightly higher in protein and fiber than everyday white flour. And that reminder can help move us closer to healthy desires.
Each step starting with food thoughts make us intentional about what we manifest in this Life.
If we source healthy ingredients and foods, then that’s what ends up on our plates and in our bodies.
And the choice of healthy protein foods is a healthy leader for us and our meals especially when we choose the protein foods first.
Too often we have healthy intentions but end up with the happy for any number of reasons. 😋
So balance or a happy medium I like to say is the best approach… and in my world, I lean into the happy tastes and end up doing the healthy without compromising taste…. and happy to give healthy friend advice.
It’s simple when there’s no pressure to eat healthy, so then it’s easier to make the healthy choice most the time because the freedom of choice…
And we can do that when we go out also. There are plenty of healthy and tasty places to eat these days.
Intentional good foods is what happened when I planned events for American restaurants serving Mediterranean cuisines.
Those experiences made me appreciate small plates and family style foods with healthy flavors.
At a Spanish tapas place, small appetizer plates were the only plates they had.
They also had gigantic paella pans (that could’ve held all the small plates inside).
One was the Friday happy hour pan fit for as big as a dining room table.
I remember back when I would blog every day and the people I worked for didn’t even know what a blog was. I just told them it’s marketing and they let me do my thing, haha.
But the people that were coming to the blog, got it.
You all get it. 😀
I shared recipes and special happenings that’s still the way things are today.
And in the Italian, Spanish, and Lebanese restaurants where I was a food insider, one common ingredient used was tomatoes. Often it was a subtle hint as part of a mixture of flavors we call a relish.
Like Meshi Bel Zeit stuffed veggies that was the vegetarian option for Lebanese events.
For home meals, a dish like that would pair well with a common tomato dish that goes well with many healthy protein foods including peas.
Green peas are a good source of healthy protein as are chickpeas. That makes us hap-pea! 🫛
And quinoa is good to add to our healthy protein foods list. It’s another complete meal.
Quinoa has 9 essential amino acids that our bodies can’t make, so you can definitely feel full after a bowl. It’s a food illusion because you’re eating what looks like a cooked grain (starch), but as a pseudo-grain it’s acts more like a protein super food when it lands in your body.
Frozen peas cooked in with quinoa. Hold the salt.
And even more of an illusion when you add quinoa as a breakfast cereal. This would’ve been a great way to start the back-to-school days if we knew about the super grain way back then.
3 Tips for Cooking Quinoa – Healthy Protein food
1. Use a pan (instead of a pot) for more even cooking.
2. Toast your quinoa on the stovetop before cooking.
3. Don’t salt your dish until the end if you use peas so they don’t dehydrate.
You can make a quinoa paella like this one made of quinoa instead or rice, and then add other healthy protein foods on top. This way you can get all your protein grams in that day with a bottomless quinoa dish.
If gram numbers count for you… the easy way to remember is to take your weight and divide by two for a rough idea of how many pr0tein grams you’re looking for.
Quinoa paella would also be deliciously paired with a za’atar cracker.
