Watermelon coffee drink is an idea you can make to use up watermelon leftovers and the reserved juice.
The watermelon taste is balanced and add a nice subtleness to coffee that’s stronger than water or ice… afterall, watermelon is 90% water.
Gotta love watermelon water!
…as you’re quenching your thirst and getting watermelon fruit nutrients all-in-one swoop!Oh, and coffee energy that you can sip on all day with cold brew coffee if you choose!
Watermelon coffee has a crisp enhancing flavored coffee taste that’s good and healthy. Its low calories and loaded with Vitamin C, B6, and magnesium.
And unlike morning coffee, this watermelon coffee drink you can sip on all day or until your caffeine quitting time. ⏰
How to make watermelon coffee:
It’s made effortlessly in a day with cooled liquids ready-to-go and to mix together.
This can be half pre-made cold brew coffee and half watermelon juice that comes out from carving a watermelon and saving the liquid..
Basic watermelon coffee
And then make a frozen layered drink as fun as this watermelon one if you dare… here you’ll take advantage of healthy plant-based food coloring that give a nice green color (…yes?) and saving part of the watermelon full of fiber that’s usually never eaten or shared.
And you can add to a salad too. 🤔
Layered watermelon coffee
You can zhugh your drink with watermelon shapes and watermelon popsicles…
Add layer of watermelon juice from a fresh cut watermelon. Freeze
Cut the green section of the watermelon (that looks and tastes like a cucumber) into small chunks and blend with water. Add layer to glass and then freeze.
Add cold brew coffee with a drop of Pandan gel. Tip: add about half coffee and half watermelon for good taste results. Freeze.
Pull out of the freezer and add milk to see the watermelon layering effects!
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.
Either avocado smoothie way, an avocado super fruit is one good healthy fat food to eat first thing because of its profile. 🥑
An avocado has fiber, protein and healthy fat that will help your muscles, and prevent blood sugar spikes that’s easier to do on an empty stomach before you’ve had your first meal.
And all that helps prevent weight gain from cravings.
And on those missions, you can add one more healthy step intention.
You can make your avocado smoothie more of a savory experience with a little vinegar, leaning into its veggie appearance. Yes, adding a little vinegar like in a salad but in your smoothie.
I recommend drinking this with the simple avocado smoothie only, but up to you or not if you add to your avocado coffee as a healthy smoothie enhancement.
Vinegar with acetic acid is a natural probiotic and can help balance gut, improve digestion, and lower bloating and gas.
As food as medicine goes, ACV can be your remedy for heartburn symptoms taken before or with your meals. No more popping pills.
A good way is to add a few ACV eye dropper drops full or a teaspoon of vinegar to your avocado smoothie that you’ll barely taste.
And one last easy step for your healthy balanced living is growing an avocado seed to a plant.
This way you keep all the avocado parts, in sustainability efforts.
An avocado plant from a seed adds life-giving greenery to a room in just weeks.
The plant can serve as a daily reminder that an avocado could be your healthy change today.
For healthy inspiration and other delicious anti-inflammatory smoothie recipes 🌈 , get the free 7-day Healthy Smoothie Recipe Guide while it’s available.
Avocado is one of the healthiest ways to break the fast in the morning. It's high in glutathione antioxidant that's raised with coffee in research studies.
Lemon strawberry parfait is a cool light summer treat for the senses and a sweet afternoon pick me up. Made with yogurt and eggs, this would make a great brunch waffles idea! 🎉
I love a delish layered dessert with a divine summer fruit pairing like strawberry and lemon (…you too?) that you can make year round in the day…
And night…
Luscious lemon parfait with berries.
This luscious, low-calorie parfait is better than any store pudding I’ve ever tried… and as healthy as a smoothie.
Here’s the ingredient low-down that makes this dessert healthy:
…Oh and I almost forgot that it’s happy too! Because a lemon color that’s more sunny than cool yellow makes me smile. ☀️
Lemon – this is the ingredient in many cooked dishes especially close by the Mediterranean. If there was a fruit as commonly used as butter, it would be a lemon. 🍋 Yes?
A fresh lemon is tart and acidic enough to make you want to pucker up.
Lemons are anti-inflammatory Vitamin C-rich fruits good for anti-cancer pink ribbon breakfast ideas. 💗
They’re also loaded with limonene that’s anti-stress, so calm-soothing… and that’s why we get happy with citrus scents around, like bergamot.
If the lemon color didn’t create a favorable emotion, the powerful lemon zest flavors in the curd are bound to make your lips curl. 😊
Then when you pair the tart with a sweet balanced flavor like a strawberry, you’re in for a divine food pairing marriage that won’t disappoint.
Strawberry – you can use frozen strawberries for this recipe and that’ll be useful for a later date when strawberries aren’t in season.
These days, it’s hard to tell which season we’re in by the temperatures outside and as we see summer fruits in the winter, and vice versa. With a freezer, you can freeze the effects and have a year-round grocery store with your fave foods. 🎉.
So you have options. Either you buy fresh and freeze or you can also buy a bag of frozen strawberries, like the kind you would use for smoothies.
Also, organic strawberries are in-season in the summer, and getting strawberries from your local farmers market is a good idea. Organic ones are the ones I would recommend eating as free from pesticides.
Plain Greek yogurt – when selecting yogurt, it’s best to take a look at the ingredients. With so many yogurt options, you can zero in on the lower sugar content tubs.
Whole milk texture consistency will work well with this recipe, but all plain yogurts will taste good. The star ingredients for this parfait is the lemon and strawberry (in case that wasn’t obvious).
Making the lemon curd is pretty easy too, but makes this parfait taste perfect.
For an extra citrus zing-y experience, add zest to the zhugh. Because afterall, zhugh is the zest of life… at least in food anyway.
For zing, there’s no better substitute in this lemon strawberry parfait than lime zest to compliment the lemon tart and strawberry sweetness… and bring out the balanced sweet paired dessert vibes in a cool lemon zig and lime zag way.
This is a divine pairing that's cooling, light, luscious, and healthy!
Course Dessert, Snack
Cuisine American
Author Brandy @ Healthy Happy Life Secrets
Ingredients
lemon curd
frozen strawberry
Plain Greek yogurt (whole milk fat)
additional lemon zest for zhugh
lime zest (optional)
Instructions
Thaw frozen strawberry so that it's mushy and there's strawberry juice. Mash to the bottom of your glass. Then freeze again until ready to make the parfait.
Make your lemon curd and refrigerate until cold.
Add your lemon curd ontop the frozen or semi-frozen strawberry layer. You can de-thaw in the fridge a few hours before you're ready to eat.
Add yogurt to the top layer as it makes this snack luscious to enjoy! Zest with lemon for zing and also lime for a citrus twist!
