Better Than a Frappuccino?

My go-to mint chocolate coffee smoothie

You know you love the light sweetness of a Starbucks Frappuccino, but you hate all the extra calories and waiting in line to get one.

For me a Starbucks Frappuccino or iced coffee has long been a summer treat. But, a few months ago I got a Ninja Foodie and started experimenting with various protein ice creams, fruit smoothies, and just about anything else I could think of blending.

One day my wife and I were doing a number of household chores and I decided that I had a craving for one of those Frappuccinos. Not wanting to take a trip to the nearest Starbucks and waste gas and time I decided to try to make an alternative at home. This started both mine and my wife’s addictions to our own coffee smoothies.

I like to use a lot of various flavors and experiment and will include some of these flavors in other posts. But, in this post I want to give share with you the mint chocolate coffee smoothie recipe. This particular recipe has taken me at least three other tries before landing on this formulation, which from now on is my preferred recipe.

Ingredients:

1 cup coffee

0.5 teaspoon mint extract

16 grams vanilla casein powder (I use Transparent Labs)

0.5 teaspoon guar gum

15 grams cocoa powder

2 grams stevia

1 cup whole milk (I prefer whole milk but any similar liquid will do)

2 handfuls of ice (start with less ice and add more to achieve desired thickness)

Putting it together:

1. Add the coffee and mint extract — This will give a base of liquid for the powders that will be added along with making sure the mint is nicely distributed before you even start blending.
2. Add all the powdered ingredients — In no particular order add the casein powder, guar gum, and cocoa powder.
3. Add the milk — I like to add the liquids part before powdered and part after because I have found it makes for better mixing by keeping the powders from clumping. This lessens the need to scrape sides of the blender carafe.
4. Add Ice — The the more ice the add the thicker the smoothie will become. I generally like two handfuls which keeps it just liquid enough to drink using a smoothie straw.
5. Blend for approximately 2 minutes — I use the Smoothie program on my Foodie running it twice and checking between runs the flavor and how it is thickening.

Note that the volume you end up with will be approximately 48 ounces which is generally enough for two to four people depending on how much of a treat you want. Of course, if I am home alone I can easily finish one of these myself and not worry much about the calories or carbs.

Enjoy!

You just read another post from In Fitness And In Health: a health and fitness community dedicated to sharing knowledge, lessons, and suggestions to living happier, healthier lives.

If you’d like to join our newsletter and receive more stories like this one, tap here.