Superfoods and Smoothies
A healthy diet and physical activity are key necessities for living a longer, healthier, happier life. Whether you are trying to lose weight, manage chronic pain or just trying to live a healthier lifestyle overall, it’s important to understand the type of foods you should be consuming each day. Superfood smoothies are a great way to incorporate many different vitamins, minerals and nutrients into one meal and are often recommended to help stay healthy, manage pain and even lose weight.
What is a Superfood?
A superfood is a type of food that is known to be nutritionally dense making it good for your health. Different superfoods can help to manage chronic pain and can help lead to a healthier, pain-free day. According to Harvard Health, there are a number of superfoods that every individual should be consuming each day1. However, it’s often hard to include every superfood into one meal.
That’s why superfood smoothies are a perfect solution and are highly recommended for those with chronic illness and pain. Because smoothies contain many ingredients in one, you can load it up with all the superfoods necessary to provide you with many different nutrients, vitamins and minerals for the day.
Types of superfoods can range from plant-based items to fish, nuts and seeds, and also some dairy. These foods are known to contain specific nutrients like antioxidants, healthy fats, vitamins and minerals that are good for your health.1
Superfoods to Add to Your Smoothie2:
- Tumeric: known to reduce inflammation in the body.
- Kale: a powerful anti-inflammatory, loaded with antioxidants and is known to help arthritis and autoimmune diseases.
- Spinach: known to be one of the healthiest foods is packed with vitamins and has anti-cancerous properties.
- Blueberries: highest-antioxidant fruit.
- Strawberries: High in vitamin C while low in natural sugars.
- Lemon: cleanses the body.
- Greek Yogurt: High in protein and low in carbohydrates.
- Banana: Contains potassium and fibre that give you natural energy and helps you feel full longer.
- Chia & Flax Seeds: Both seeds contain lots of Omega-3’s and fibre.
- Nuts: Anti-oxidants that are a great source of fibre and contain a lot of vitamins and minerals such as vitamin b, vitamin E, calcium, iron, zinc, potassium and magnesium3.
Read on to learn about three delicious superfood smoothie recipes to load up on nutrients:
1. Blueberry and Spinach Superfood Green Smoothie4
Ingredients:
- 1 banana
- ½ cup of blueberries
- ¼ cup liquid (water or milk or juice)
- 1 cup fresh spinach
- 1 tablespoon of flax seeds
- Ice
The blueberry spinach smoothie is a simple, but powerful antioxidant superfood smoothie recipe that will help you get your greens in without actually tasting them. This recipe calls for no added sugars as all the ingredients contain natural sugars giving it a naturally sweet, fruity flavour. If possible, try to include spinach in almost every smoothie as the taste blends into the background and it is one of the healthiest foods for your body.
2. Chocolate Peanut Butter Protein Superfood Smoothie
Ingredients:
- One cup milk (skim, 1%, 2%, almond, whichever you prefer)
- A banana
- 1 tablespoon organic peanut butter
- ½ scoop chocolate protein powder
- ¼ cup of greek yogurt
- ¼ cup of strawberries
- 1 cup of kale
- ¼ cup of blueberries
- Ice
A chocolate peanut butter superfood smoothie tastes as good as it sounds. With high levels of protein, this smoothie can act as a meal supplement on its own. Because of its strong chocolate and peanut butter flavouring, you won’t notice the kale, making it the perfect smoothie to load up on this anti-inflammatory green loaded with antioxidants. Kale has also shown to help with arthritis and autoimmune diseases making it a great item to add to any other smoothie.
3. Lemon Turmeric Superfood Smoothie
Ingredients:
- A banana
- ½ greek yogurt (vanilla or plain)
- ¼ cup of milk (almond, or coconut)
- 1 tbsp of honey
- ¼ cup of lemon juice
- ½ tsp of turmeric
- 2 tbsp chia seeds
- Ice
This superfood smoothie is high in protein, antioxidants, omega-3s, fibre, potassium and low in carbs. Not only is this smoothie a great way to start your day by cleansing your system, but its high protein intake will help you feel fuller for longer.
Adding turmeric to this smoothie can result in a lot of loaded benefits. Although it may have a strong flavour, the lemon juice’s properties are known to mask the strong taste of turmeric. Not only is turmeric an antioxidant, but it can also increase the body’s antioxidant capacity. Its anti-inflammatory properties can help fight off cancer, heart disease and Alzheimers5.
For those trying to maintain a well-balanced diet, including a variety of different superfood smoothies into your diet can be hard, but these smoothie recipes make it easy. By knowing what kinds of superfoods are important to include in your diet you can play around with different recipes and adhere to your own taste buds. Happy blending!
More Information From DR-HO’s Blog
- 6 Foods That Target Inflammation
- The 5 Best Diets for Pain Relief
- What is the Mediterranean Diet and Can it Help with Chronic Pain?
- How to Work Out With Chronic Pain and Prevent Injury
- 4 Foods That Make Chronic Pain Worse
- How Chronic Pain Sufferers Can Get Back Their Energy
- 6 Things to Do After a Workout
Sources
- Harvard Health, 10 superfoods to boost a healthy diet
- Live Science, What Are Superfoods?
- Modern Honey, 6 Healthy Superfood Smoothies
- Nutrition Australia, Nuts and Health
- The Spruce Eats, Blueberry and Spinach Superfood Green Smoothie
- Evolving Table, Lemon Tumeric Smoothie with Chia Seeds
- Health Line, 6 Super Healthy Seeds You Should Eat
