Hey Loves,
I hope you’re enjoying the start of the season and getting excited about all things pumpkin and spice!
How was your weekend? Mine was spent doing some house cleaning (which I find kind of therapeutic sometimes believe it or not), going to a little Fall festival in Sandpoint, and then some shopping for my upcoming plans. I haven’t bought new clothes like this in a very long time so I had way too much fun trying it all on. I can hardly recognize myself because I can’t recall ever enjoying shopping like this. Clearly that’s changed because I must have tried on the entire store.
Something else I never used to like much were smoothies. Well it’s not that I didn’t like them, but I would never have chosen to drink a smoothie over a meal in most cases. I don’t know though, I tried a few smoothie variations over the summer when the weather was super hot and I’ve been hooked ever since. It’s one of my current obsessions actually and I can’t get enough!
In honor of the Autumn season I wanted to try a very seasonal one to share with you today so I pulled out the spices and grabbed some pumpkin! This is an extremely simple recipe that takes all of 5 minutes to blend up. I used Greek yogurt in mine but you can easily make it completely dairy free and vegan. Oh, and following a popular trend I decided to try granola as a topping and was very surprised at how delicious it is, you must try it. Happy sipping guys!
XOXO
A quick and light smoothie that brings all the cozy flavor of pumpkin spice and creamy cheesecake together in one glass.
Ingredients
- 1/3 cup pumpkin puree
- 1/3 cup plain nonfat Greek yogurt * see note
- 1/2 scoop vanilla protein powder **see note
- 1 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice ***see note
- 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
- 1 cup unsweetened almond milk (or preferred milk)
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1 – 2 cups ice cubes
- Optional Toppings:
- granola
- nut butter
- coconut cream
- more Greek yogurt
Instructions
- Combine the pumpkin, yogurt, spices, milk, and vanilla in a blender and pulse until smooth. Add in the ice and blend until the smoothie is thick and creamy. (Start with about 1 cup of ice and go from there as it thickens until it’s your desired consistency)
- Pour into a tall glass and top with granola or anything else you’d like!
Notes
*If you want to make this vegan just replace the Greek yogurt with coconut yogurt or, if you want it extra creamy, coconut cream
**I used Vega brand
in my smoothie but any type of vanilla protein does well.
***If you don’t have pumpkin pie spice you can replace it with 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon, 1/4 teaspoon ginger, 1/8 teaspoon nutmeg, and 1/8 teaspoon cloves
For whole smoothie (without extra toppings); Approx. Kcal:200 Protein:26g Carbs:16g Fat:3.5
http://www.gringalicious.com/pumpkin-spice-cheesecake-smoothie/
