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This is John Kohler with okraw.com. I have another exciting episode for you today and
today's episode we're going to answer the question, why is your superfood green smoothie
making you fat? Whether you're putting weight on the buttocks or in other areas, if you
know what I mean. So, in any case, you know, this video's made because I was actually watching
another video that popped up on my screen on YouTube today where there was a raw food
chef actually making a superfood green smoothie recipe, yo yo, wassup? And in this superfood
green smoothie recipe ha has all these ingredients and I'll go over them actually really quick.
He had almonds, chia seeds, sun warrior protein powder, spinach, dates, pineapple, banana,
water and a frozen blueberries. So, I saw him make this and as he's putting in this
together, I'm like cringing. I'm like, 'oh my gosh, can't believe he's making that and
showing this recipe to people.' Now, while this recipe is definitely healthier than eating
out at McDonalds and eating out of, you know, most any processed food at the grocery store,
even at a whole foods, because it's made out of whole foods and real foods and blended
up the blender to make a smoothie, you know, it's not exactly the recipe that I would want
to share with you guys, you know. Just about 4 or 5 episode ago, I had a really good green
smoothie episode and I shared with you my, you know, easy simple to make, tasty, delicious
green smoothie with 3 ingredients. I mean, his has over a half-dozen ingredients. So,
I also want to make this simple for you guys, but the other thing that's very important
to me is that I want to give you guys the shortcut, the fast track, you know. It's like
when you're playing monopoly and you pick up one of those cards, you know, you get to
pass go, collect $200 and all this gibberish stuff. I want you guys to be able to do the
best stuff now and go through the big learning curve that I had to go through. I've ben in
raw foods now for 18 years, and I've had my trials and tribulations, going into the high
fat route, doing a lot of nuts and it not working properly and guess what? If you wan
tot follow the people out there, you're going to get the results that they get, and I want
you guys to learn form my mistakes, and that's why I make these videos to share the best
of my knowledge with you so that you guys can be on the fast track to better health
today, instead of tomorrow. So, what we're going to do first is actually really quick
actually. I website that I recommend for you guys is actually called fitday.com. On that
website, you can actually out in all the different foods you eat in a day or even in just one
recipe and it'll actually spit out the different nutrients in there and also, you know, explain
your calories, protein and fat, where your calories are coming from. So, in general,
many people may be on the 80-10-10 diet. What does that mean? That means 80% of your calories
are coming from carbohydrate, 10% from protein, and 10% from fat. So, you know, I try not
to do 80-10-10, but I try to keep it low fat because I've learned that high fat raw foods
diets don't necessarily work, so keep my fat below 25% all the time. In addition, I also
try to, you know, eat the appropriate amount of calories for me. I don't know what the
appropriate amount is for you, but I know what mine is after living with myself for
many, many, many, many years now, and I want to encourage you guys to figure out what the
caloric needs are for yourself as well. So, in any case, in this smoothie, we're going
to go over it, in one smoothie, right? 2368 calories. So, if you just drank one smoothie,
you'd have, in my opinion, well about my calories for the day, and that's a lot of calories
in one smoothie, and, you know, that's just one meal, then you have, what? 2 more meals,
you're going to do another 2000 calories per meal if you're eating recipes such as this
one? That's like 6000 calories a day. Now, if you're a super athlete and running a lot,
you may need that many calories, but for most people that's far too much calories, and you
know what? What happens when you eat extra calories? Guess here it goes? Adds to your
waistline or other areas on your body. Oh, and the other thing besides just the caloric
density, which I know I don't have a huge problem if maybe you want to eat once a day.
The other challenge I have with this recipe is actually percentages of where the calories
are coming from. So, the calories are coming from 32% fat, 10% protein, which is good,
and 58% carbs. So, in my opinion, 32% fat, that's just a bit too much. So, let's compare
this to a recipe that I did, you know, just a few episodes ago. It's actually me style
green smoothie. For one carafe full was 850 calories, which was 2.7 times less, or lower
in calories, and my breakdown was 5% fat, 8% protein and 87% carbs, but another thing
I want to talk about is the recipe for green smoothies, you know. Many green smoothies
have a whole lot of ingredients, and in my opinion, the main ingredient to a green smoothie
should be, guess what? The greens, you know. He actually has a lot more calories coming
form almonds and other things than actually the greens itself. I mean, it's hard to get
ta lot of calories in greens, but my green smoothie that I posted just a few episodes
ago has like 2.5 times more greens in it and I want you guys to focus on the greens because
they're low-calorie foods but high nutrient density foods. They're some of the best foods
on the planet, in my estimation and my goal every day is to get 2 pounds a day into me
of greens and one of the things I always like to teach you guys is good, better, best. I
always want you guys to do the best you can and you may be on that learning curve, you
know. So, obviously a smoothie like the smoothie that he showed with those ingredients are
better than like a McDonalds shake or something like that, but I believe even better than
that is maybe going with something like I have. Another thing I like to think about
is I am a smoothie purist. I'm just a food purist, you know. I don't want to adulterate
my food, you know, or smoothies, with extra junk I don't need in there. So, he adds things
like dates for extra sweetness, but you got to do that when you add almonds in there,
'cause they're not so sweet. Well, you know, I just use bananas. If you got ripe pones,
they should be fine enough and these are just about ripe. They're going to taste sweet on
their own without having to add dates or other things to make it taste good. Another thing
about many recipes on lone and the recipe that I was talking about is that it's a, in
my opinion, bad food combination. Now, my recipes may not be the optimal food combination,
but I can tell you one thing. Mixing pineapples with bananas? Man, that just doesn't sit well
with me, and it may not for you, either. So, you know, you're in for a world of upset stomach
and a lot of calories. Along those lines, I always want you guys to improve what you're
doing and so now I even have a better, new and improved version of my smoothie. Not to
say that my old one was bad, because what it was like 6 bananas, 12 ounces of greens
and 1 coconut. What were going to do today on this new version that I put in onto fitday,
it's actually 764 calories. So, this is 3 times less than his smoothie, also contains
significantly more greens and, you know, I'm using a few less bananas, but I'm also adding
the blueberries. So, I want to encourage you guys to make purple smoothies sometimes, but
make smoothies of all different colors. Every different color, every different fruit and
vegetable has a whole plethora of different nutrition. So, you know, what we're going
to do today is make a simple smoothie with just these 4 ingredients. The first thing
I'm going to do is open my young Thai coconut. The other thing that I want to mention that
he used water in his smoothie. I'm using coconut water, 'cause coconut water is a real living
water. It's high in electrolytes and also we're going to get some of this baby jelly
coconut meat that actually adds some small amount of fat content but the small amounts
of fat content may help you absorb more of their nutrition actually in he greens because
it slows down your digestion. Also, you're going to be more satisfied for a little bit
longer than if we didn't put the young coconut meat in. Now, if you can't get young coconuts,
you know, I'd recommend maybe using a coconut water, but I'm raw so I wouldn't buy coconut
water in a package. I always like to use fresh coconuts, whether the young ones or the Mexican
ones and I just pour the water and just dehydrate the meats because that meat's actually a lot
thicker and a lot higher in fat. Opening the coconut's very easy. I'm just going to go
ahead and do it really quick. I'm shaving off all the coconut husk off the top of the
coconut so that we can see the nut itself. Alright, so once we go that shaved down, we're
going to go ahead and stick the tip into the coconut like so and then we're just going
to tap it. The knife should stick in. We're going to lower the angle of the knife and
just rock the knife and there you go, opens the coconut like a pop-top on a soda can.
Next, we're going to go ahead and carefully pour this coconut water in my blender carafe
and finally we're going to scoop out this delicious young coconut meat. At one point
in my raw foods journey, I did up to like 6 coconuts a day. That was my earlier years
when I maybe needed more calories, but that was actually insane. Nowadays, I maybe eat
maybe one a day if that. Some days I don't have any young coconuts. Nowadays, I tend
to actually go more for the Mexican coconuts and just drink the water without any meat,
actually. Now, we got all the coconut meat. We're just going to go ahead and drop that
in the blender there and this gives us our nice liquid base. What I want to do next is
actually open up some of these greens but we're not going to shove all of these greens
in there at once. We're actually using 3 containers of greens. Each one is 5 ounces. So, this
is actually baby mixed kales, this is actually power greens, and this includes baby kale,
baby spinach and baby Swiss chard, and then finally we're using arugula. So, I want to
encourage you guys to tactually always use a variety of greens, whether it's, you know,
in one smoothie or whether you're using ale today and arugula tomorrow, we want to get
all these different nutrients in all these different foods because every different leafy
green has a whole spectrum of different nutrition, including vitamins, minerals, phytochemicals,
and antioxidants and those phytonutrients, in my opinion, are one of the most important
things that are lacking in people's diets of today. I mean, most people don't even eat
they're greens and in this one smoothie I'm getting nearly 1 pound of greens in me. So,
if I eat this, one-pound of greens, maybe for dinner I'll have one pound of leaves for
salads, and that's my 2 pounds. Really simple, real easy to do. Now, I'm going to rip these
guys open and start adding it to our smoothie. So, what I'm going to do is I'm actually going
to add probably maybe like half of a container first. We're going to blend that up tot get
it liquid and then we're going to add the rest a little bit later on once this gets
totally blended. This is very important, especially if you don't have a high power blender. I'm
using the VitaMix triple blend VS and that's the model I recommend if you're serious about
your health and serious about a plant-based raw foods diet lifestyle. I do have to give
a disclaimer that I do offer these machines at discountjuicers.com and I want to encourage
you guys, if you need a blender, you know, go to my website, discountjuicers.com, and
support me. That makes my videos that, you know, I'm making for you guys possible. So,
I appreciate everyone that's supported me in the past and for all you guys that may
support me in the future. The VitaMix turbo blend VS actually comes with a tamper that
I'm not using today and also a nut milk bag and also a nice DVD and actually a recipe
book with recipes that can change your life that are all plant-based, vegan, vegetarian,
and raw. So, now that we got all that in there we're just going to go ahead and spin this
blender up. The VitaMix easily blend all this mixture up into liquid really fast and really
quickly. Now, that's one of the things I Like about the VitaMix is that it's literally one
of the most powerful blenders on the planet that'll literally micronize and fractionize
all the food that you're putting into it so that you're going to get the best digestion.
Many household blenders may leave nice large chinks and there's this hack. 5 ounces of
greens already in my smoothie. Alright, there's a total of 5. Let's go ahead and add the next
5. So, now we got the power greens mix. Now, the reason why I'm using the baby greens instead
of the large leaves of kale or even my tree collards behind me is because when you get
large leaves, you know, they taste a lot stronger. The baby greens actually taste a lot more
mild so you can stomach them better, they're going to taste better, and also these guys
are very convenient because they're already prewashed and all that good stuff. So, all
you got to do is literally open the package and out them in. So, I want to make it convenient
and easy for you guys to eat healthy and eat as healthy as you can. For example, microgreens,
which are the stages before this one that're like little baby sprouts have 4 times more
nutrition than the big leaves. So, I'm sure these smaller leaves have even more nutrition
than the big leaves as well, plus it's just a lot more convenient. So, if you're wondering
where to get these guys, you know, I'd recommend actually going you your local big box warehouse
club store. So, like a Sam's club or like a Costco. They'll oftentimes sell the spring
mix or the organic spinach in one pound tubs for about $4 or under $4 depending on where
you live. We're going to go ahead and blend up half of these power greens. That was simple
and easy. WE'RE going to go ahead and add the other half now. Another thing I recommend
that you guys do is you always want to eat the freshest foods as possible. I mean, eating
canned and bottled and processed foods, you know, that can sit on the shelf forever, the
complete opposite. I want you guys literally to grow your own garden if you can and eat
things out of your garden. That's absolutely the best. I mean, that is the fast track shortcut.
You can feed your soil, grow the best produce on earth, and then you're going to be eating
the best food in the world that literally money can't buy because even things organic
in trade, they may not be adding the nutrition to the soil that I would like. I mean, I know
this for me is a compromise. I'd rather be eating more of the stuff here, and I definitely
will be for dinner. Alright, so now we got 10 ounces of greens blended in the blender,
and I think for the last section we might try to add all the arugula at once. Let's
see how that's going to go. Arugula is definitely a good green and a lot of you guys may get
the larger arugula. Once again, the baby arugula tastes really sweet and actually I like it
a lot. I don't like the larger arugula, especially because the flavor gets a lot stronger. This
tends to be a lot more tender and a lot more sweet. Another thing is, if you're getting
your kids to eat this green lifestyle or even, you know, your significant other, it's defiantly
important to get the food to taste as good as you can. So, I mean, by using the baby
greens, it's just going to taste better so that they'll be more likely to drink it. I
mean, large leaves, curly kale, you know, to me it even tastes bad just at the store.
So, these guys taste significantly better. So, let's see here. Let's go ahead and blend
this guy up now. Alright, so now that we got all our greens blended up, we're going to
add the next component, and those are the blueberries. I always recommend freshest is
bestest and you always want to eat fresh blueberries instead of frozen ones but right now they're
out of season, so I got some frozen ones, you know. I rarely eat things that are frozen
and I encourage you guys to rarely eat frozen foods as well because, you know, things that
are at a cold temperature when you eat them, they could give you the brain freeze or they
will also slow down your digestion. So, I'm putting them in the smoothie for the nutrition,
also to make this smoothie like a different color than green, 'cause some people, you
know, don't like drinking green stuff, 'cause it's weird or something. I was actually on
the bus to the airport, and, you know, drinking a green juice that I had put in a glass bottle
and, you know, the lady across the street said to her husband, 'he's drinking something
green,' and I'm like, 'what're you thinking, I'm like not hearing you?' So funny. Anyways,
let's go ahead and blend this purple up in this green smoothie. So, that's all blended
up. Now, we got a nice, I don't know, almost like dark green slash purplish color smoothie,
and the last thing I'm going to add is actually the bananas, and I always encourage you guys
to actually blend your bananas last because bananas tend to oxidize fast and, you know,
if you over blend you bananas, the taste changes significantly and it actually changes for
the worse. So, what I'm going to do is actually just peel these guys and actually put them
in and actually do what's called pulse blend in the VitaMix. The other thing I want to
talk about is consistency, you know. Some people like that milkshake like consistency
in their smoothies and if you're using all fresh ingredients, you're not gig not get
hat, and that's where the frozen ingredients come in. you know, that's why I put the frozen
blueberries in today to give it a nice different color. Also, the nutrition and also a little
bit different consistency to make it a little bit thicker. On the same token you can also
freeze one banana and use one frozen banana and then also use 3 fresh bananas to temper
out that frozen one so that you're still getting fresh foods. So, we've already got 3 bananas
in there. Let's go ahead and put in the last one. So, I always encourage you guys to use
spotted bananas and these could be more spotted for me, but at least these are the ripest
ones I had to make this video today that I wanted tom make for you guys, 'cause they're
just going to be sweeter and it's going to make your smoothie taste better. I'm going
to go ahead and rotate this guy around a little bit and what we're going to do now is we're
just going to put it on high and we're just going to pulse it, like on, off. You're going
to do this a bunch of times to get your bananas blended up. If you don't do it enough, you'll
leave chunks and if you do it too much, you'll be over blending. It's probably better to
err on the side of over blending a little bit 'cause I don't like chunks in my smoothie.
Alright, I think that's pretty much it for my nice delicious afternoon meal. My purple-green
smoothie, with no superfoods. Well, actually, in my opinion, the term 'superfoods' is like
a big misnomer, you know. We always want to like label something, you know. What's the
best? What's the super? What's the best one? And as Americans and consumers, we always
want to get the best. Well, what if the best superfoods are the ones that you can grow
in your garden? If I had to say one food was the superfood, I would say leafy green vegetables.
So, you want to include more leafy greens in your diet, like you can, literally one
pound, in this green smoothie that I made for you guys today. Got to taste it. Absolutely
delicious. I taste the greenness. If I put a few more bananas in there, probably, you
know, wouldn't taste the greens as much. The bananas will actually sweeten it up, and I
want to encourage you guys to always experiment and don't just blindly follow. 'Oh, this is
the recipe John made. I'm just going to make it.' Well, hey, if you've got a few extra
ripe bananas maybe use those. Maybe use less greens because this is too hardcore for you.
One pound of greens in one smoothie, I might recommend 10 ounces, or 2 packs, for most
people that are just getting started with this 'cause it's defiantly pretty strong but
I can totally handle it. I know it's the best thing on Earth for me, and I love eating this
lifestyle and getting the results that I do and I want you guys to get them as well. So,
eat healthy, eat lower fat than some of the other recipes would lead you to believe and
eat more fruits and vegetables is the best way to succeed on a raw foods lifestyle. Once
again, my name is John Kohler with okraw.com. We'll see you next time and remember, keep
eating your fresh fruits and vegetables. They're the best.