Hot Pink Smoothie & Thoughts on Aging Gracefully

Before I threw it away, I was flipping through an old InStyle magazine, the one with Olivia Wilde on the cover, and as I always do, read about the photo shoot for the cover.  You know, what music was playing, what clothes were chosen, what did the cover subject show up wearing, what requests did they have, etc… etc… etc…  And Olivia apparently requested something called a Hot Pink juice from One Lucky Duck in NYC.  There was a shot of the beverage,  it was hot pink, and ever so pretty!  I say it was pretty because lately I’ve been overdosing a bit on green juice/smoothie concoctions.  I’m severely anemic and green leafy things are good to add iron to my diet, but while I like spinach based things to drink, it’s not easy being green all the time.  InStyle‘s brief mention of the Hot Pink juice said it contained beets, pears, pineapple and ginger.  This being the age of the Internet and all, I of course googled One Lucky Duck.  Sure enough, Hot Pink Juice is on the menu  and made up of beets, pears, pineapples and ginger.

How hard could it be to make this myself?  I’m nowhere close to the New York, but even if I were, I don’t doubt that I could make it for less than the $7 they charge.  Given that my mother-in-law just gave me a bag full of beets from her garden, I set out to make the Hot Pink Juice for myself.

Okay, here’s a quibble I have though with juicing:  does it benefit you more to just have the juice?  I would think that having all the fiber from the fruits and veggies would be more beneficial than just the juice.  Am I wrong on this?  If so, someone please correct me!  I don’t have a juicer (well, unless you count the attachment on my Magic Bullet) so I usually liquify things in my Kitchen Aid blender if I want “juice,” thereby drinking all the fiber-y stuff as well.  I usually add in some ice too to make it a smoothie and  increase my H2O intake because that’s one way I cheat having to suck down an entire gallon of water a day.

I looked around on said Internet for other Hot Pink juice recipes, but couldn’t find one with the same ingredients.  So, I gathered together the ingredients, threw them in my blender, and voilà:  my Hot Pink smoothie!

I have to say, it was good.  And super filling!!!  If you like beets, you’ll like this.  If you don’t like beets, you might still like it.  You can taste the beets, but it’s not overpowering.  Kind of like when you have a juice with spinach in it; if you throw enough other tasty things like ginger or lemon in, you barely taste the spinach.  Same thing here.  I didn’t taste the pineapple or pear, but they did add a sweetness and smoothness to the drink that I think would otherwise have been lacking.  The ginger just gives it a very refreshing zing.  See below for the recipe…

Smoothies, healthy eating (for the most part), exercise and InStyle magazine are just some of the ways I sort of try to maintain my youth.  When I was a kid, my grandmother, who probably was only in her mid-forties, was completely gray.  One could even argue that she had no hairstyle per se, just hair that was combed.  Granny (really!) wore glasses, frumpy outfits, clunky shoes, and had a perpetual stern look on her face.  She was a lovely woman, truly, but, and I’m sure this is colored a bit by my youth, she just looked… old.  And most of her friends did too.  I think during that era, when you got to a certain age, you were supposed to look it.

Nowadays there are celebrities that are at least a decade older than me that actually look younger than me.  I think our culture is so driven by the ideal of youth that we are constantly trying to maintain it.  I mean, in all honesty, that’s why I try to eat healthy (most of the time), drink my vegetables à la Hot Pink smoothie, exercise at least an hour a day, color my gray, read InStyle to stay somewhat on trend with my clothing, know the lyrics to some of  the Top 40 songs my kids are listening to, and that’s just a start.  Gone are the days when grandmothers looked like grandmothers.

This is not to say that the midriff-baring clothing that’s showing up in fashion magazines is something I’ll wear; not even Shania Twain would probably go there anymore, and she’s not an everyday mom like me.  There are some things I just won’t do ever again because I know those days are gone:  (If my children are reading this, I promise I will not show you up on Just Dance 4 when your friends are over.)

I won’t dance on top of the speaker at a dance club.

I won’t get into a car with a person who has had imbibed at all or is texting (and neither should anyone).

I won’t stay up to watch a Rockin’ New Year’s Eve just because midnight signals a new year; sleep is more important to me now.

I don’t care about every little detail about the newest boy band;  I’d rather learn the details to what Obamacare will do to my household budget.

But just because I don’t want to relive my 20’s – or 30’s or 40’s – doesn’t mean I won’t try to keep myself “young.”  I’m one of those weird people that believes my body will operate better and my quality of life will be enhanced at 80 if I take care of it NOW.

So…  it’ll be Cheetos, M & M’s, cake, dancing outlandishly, driving a little too fast, or ringing in the New Year only on occasion, and living my best, healthiest and happiest day to be “young” each and every day.

Hot Pink Smoothie

Ingredients:

• 1 medium size beet (about the size of a tennis ball), peeled and cut into chunks
• 1 C pineapple, cut into chunks
• 1 small pear, peeled and cut into chunks
• 1 small piece of fresh ginger (about the size of nickel), peeled
• 1/2 C crushed ice
• 1/4 C water
• stevia to taste (optional)

Directions:

1. Place water, beets, pineapple, pear and ginger in the bottom of the blender.  Add stevia if desired.  Press the liquify button to blend to a juice.
2. Add in crushed ice, blend again.

Note:  I’m all about saving time and being efficient.   I sometimes double my smoothie recipes and then pour the half I’m not drinking into one of those prepared smoothie bottles you can buy in the produce section of the grocery.  Then, the next morning or afternoon I already have a healthy option ready for my meal. Win Win!