My first job was actually at a smoothie shop inside a gym. As part of my duties, I was supposed to come up with new flavors to offer as "specials" each week.
Tough job, to be sure! I mean, blending up any combinations I want and being paid to "test" them?
Twist my arm.
So I learned a bit about what makes smoothies tastes amazing and why some come out meh, and I'm going to share that with you, along with tips on how to help children accept and enjoy them so you can get them powerful nutrients each day, plus a shortcut if you don't have the time for this!
I am going to share two kid-friendly favorites with you (keep reading!).
I don't know about your children, but if I offer mine a spoonful of cod liver oil, they're gonna give me a big "no thanks!"
But if I offer them an icy, creamy Blueberry Chocolate smoothie, well. That's a different story!
This is why I capital L, LOVE smoothies for children.
It's easy to sneak targeted supplements into them without them noticing.
You can maximize their power by choosing nutritionally dense food ingredients, as well.
I'll share some of my tips for making smoothies taste juice-shop level yummy, so keep reading!
Here is why I love making smoothies for children.
1. They're easily accepted by picky palates and so convenient!
2. You get to control the wholesome ingredients and choose nourishing ones
3. They can be packed according to individual needs (ex: extra protein, extra vitamin c, no dairy)
4. They look and taste like a frosty treat.
5. You can sneak things in there that children (or you!) wouldn't eat otherwise.
It's super simple to sneak veggies into smoothies, and if you pair them right, nobody will ever know.
Fail-proof healthy veggie pairings:
Carrots : Citrus , Apple
Greens : Berries; Chocolate
Cauliflower: Chocolate, Coconut
Beets: Berries, Citrus
Use the pairings above to blend your smoothies and seamlessly hide the veggies inside!
Keep reading for my list of delicious and healthy milk / juice blend-ins.
PB&J Smoothie
1/4 of a raw beet, peeled and chopped
1 cup mixed frozen berries
1/2 frozen banana
2 T almond butter
1/2 T ground cinnamon
8-10 oz milk of choice
*BONUS: Add some cleansing + multi vitamin/mineral support with Balance Complete*
Tropic Thunder Smoothie
1 cup diced pineapple
1/2 raw carrot
1 frozen banana
juice of 1 fresh squeezed orange
1/4 T pure vanilla extract
1 T cinnamon
8 -10 oz coconut water
*BONUS: Add some cleansing + multi vitamin/mineral support with Balance Complete*
Tip: You can substitute steamed veggies for raw ones in smoothies. It's a great way to use leftover steamed carrots of broccoli and it makes them even more indistinguishable to little taste buds!
What about something a little more advanced? You can serve your children a "hulk" or "pj mask" or whatever you choose green smoothie created by one of my favorite Master Herbalists and Aromatherapists to learn from, Debra Starkey.
According to Debra:
"{This smoothie is] Great tasting, fresh food based available at any supermarket, packed with powerful nutrients (595 grams calcium, 1105mg potassium, 18865 Vitamin A IU, 4.47grams protein, 17mg Vitamin C, .13grams omega 3, 10.90 grams fiber to name a few, plus a multitude of other vitamins and minerals and phyto-nutrients), this smoothie may be enjoyed morning, noon or night. And that’s before you add either a couple capsules of MultiGreen or a scoop of JuvaPower to really amp it up a notch. Kids and adults love its smooth texture and delicious taste.
In a blender (I use a VitaMix) combine 2 tablespoons each of flax seeds, chia seeds, and sesame seeds. Blend a few seconds until a flour consistency. Add one cup cold water, one cup ice, one large hand full spinach; 2 stalks of kale - use the leaf part only, no stalk (one cup each if compressed), 1/2 avocado if large or one whole - peeled and pitted of course, one small orange peeled and cut into quarters. Whiz until smooth and enjoy, may add additional water if too thick. You can substitute a banana or a few berries instead of the orange, BUT - do not turn this into a fruit smoothie. This is not a “drink” but a smoothie and enjoyed more when a little thick.
When I had my consulting office and people made and drank this smoothie, testimonies would come in within a week. It is truly the most amazing and inexpensive smoothie ever. I often have this in the morning and it is very filling, so much so I don’t need lunch; or I’ll have it for dinner."
I've tried it, and it's delicious!
You can listen to Debra teach "Nutrition Tips for the Family" here in this video.
Like Debra, I usually enjoy coming up with new recipes in the kitchen.
But also, sometimes I just don't have the time or desire to do the "work" involved with prepping, measuring, getting out multiple ingredients and putting them back....
And that's where Revive Superfoods has really helped me.
Their smoothies are made the way I would make them- smart superfoods blended into yummy familiar fruits to make smoothies that taste like a treat but are so healthy and nutritious!
They're beyond easy because they:
1. Come in their serving cup (no mess!)
2. Taste incredible
3. Are clean and vegan
4. Fun for me and my children
It's a piece of cake for me to make these on a busy morning and get everyone out the door (complete with a lidded up!) with nourishing food in their bellies.
We've successfully dodged hangry days using our Revive smoothie stash!
They've given me a special offer for my community (that's you!) of 50% off your first box.
Totally a steal!
And, they're already packed with "sneaky" ingredients the way I would myself - with just the right amount of veggies and plant extras to add nutrients without making it taste funny.
All you add yourself is the liquid, of which there are many options.
When making homemade smoothies or blending up a Revive smoothie, I like to choose something really nutritious as the blending liquid.
Top 3 Favorite healthy smoothie liquids:
Coconut Milk
2 oz Ningxia Red + Water
Balance Complete + Water
Raw Milk
Read more about the benefits of raw milk at the Real Milk website
Other tasty and healthy smoothie liquids:
Cashew Milk
Oat Milk
Almond Milk
Green Juice (I like Suja myself, but skip this for the kids...they will definitely notice!)
And when I want to give an extra boost of power my super smoothies, I add Balance Complete.
It has a creamy, vanilla ice cream taste that everyone in our family loves, and it blends well with literally any smoothie recipe.
Alone it's actually a meal replacement with fiber and cleansing properties.
I try to give it to my children a couple times a week to make sure they're getting "holes" filled!
It is a nutritive energizer and a cleanser.
Its high in fiber, high in protein, and contains the good fats, enzymes, vitamins, and minerals needed for a nutritionally complete meal replacement, and it supplies an amazing 11 grams of fiber per serving, absorbs toxins, and satisfies the appetite while balancing the body's essential requirements.
It also blends suuuuuper smooth with zero grit. Literally is just disappears!
For daily health maintenance, replace your least nutritious meal with Balance Complete or a smoothie with Balance Complete in it!
During Young Living's five-day nutritive cleanse, you replace your three daily meals with Balance Complete and follow the recommended schedule. But this can be used anytime as a healthy and gentle way to infuse deep nutrition into your body and give a gentle cleansing nudge.
Smoothie best practices:
- When adding "hard" ingredients like nuts or tough veggies, grind them alone in the blender first as fine as you can, then add a minimal amount of liquid to blend into a paste, then add the rest of the ingredients.
- Pair the "right" flavors together! Use one of the recipes here, create one using my veggie pairings above, or grab a revive smoothie to go. In general, less is more- the less flavors you combine, the better your outcome is likely to be.
- Use a good blender. Nobody wants to chew their smoothie. Juice shops have that smooth, almost fluffy consistency and that's what you want for maximum palatability! There are some very fancy ones out there, but for an excellent low/mid-priced one I absolutely love, check out this one.
- Use enough liquid (but don't use too much). Use just enough liquid to get things flowing, but not so much you lose the friction needed inside the blender to get it smooth. You can always add more liquid, but you can't take it out.
I hope this write up helps you go forward and make deeply nourishing, easy smoothie meals for yourself and your children.
Let me know what you make, and if you have a great recipe, will you share it with me? I love learning new ones!
Resources
Get some Balance Complete
Order some Revive Smoothies (55% off!)
Learn more about Cleansing
Fill a well greased cake pop pan almost to the top with batter, then bake at 350 for 15-20 minutes.
Let cool slightly, then remove from pan after removing lid by banging against the counter.
Any that don't fall out can be carefully scraped out with a spoon.
We love using Young Living Vitality oils in baking, because they're super convenient, have a broader range of amazing flavor than dried versions, and offer their own wellness benefits.
Let them cool to warm to the touch, then roll in powdered sugar if desired.
Store in the fridge since they don't have any icky preservatives in them!
If you love the look of these, you might also want to make my Pumpkin Magnesium Muffins, that are nourishing, crowd-pleasing and pack 100mg of magnesium in each one!
My daughter’s diagnosis of Eczema at one year old launched me into a deep investigation on gut health.
As it turns out, gut health is quite possibly the most important part of your immune system and overall wellness.
With what I learned through research, I was able to create a protocol that healed my daughter and reversed her diagnosis.
Today, she has had perfect skin for years, and can and do eat anything she wants.
The gut healing removed every sensitivity and reaction!
When I was healing my little one, I searched for ways to give her treats while making sure I was getting gut supportive foods into her and avoiding all the misleading “healthy” things and junk out there.
While undergoing a healing diet to reverse the eczema, she couldn’t have any candies laden with sugar damaging her gut, hurting her immune system and causing more inflammation.
And I couldn’t give her typical vitamins with their non-helpful vitamin forms and hidden toxins.
That’s when I started making Gut-Supportive Gummies!
Here is a quick “why” for each of the four simple ingredients in the recipe.
Gelatin is a known gut-healing food, because it helps to heal the mucosal lining of the intestines (preventing and healing “leaky gut”). It reduces inflammation and does many more helpful things, but that’s for another post- I’ll keep it short to get to the gummies!
Vitamin C boosts the immune system, lowers inflammation, improves skin by supporting collagen production, and helps support healthy gut flora….and that’s just the beginning! The form I choose is Ascorbic Acid, because it’s the form the body uses and is simple to utilize. It’s important to get a clean brand that’s free from gmo corn and mold.
Raw Honey is known for it’s immune support benefits, as well as the fact that it’s a natural sweetener. Despite it’s high sweetness on the tongue, it tends to have a slightly lower glycemic index than plain white sugar, and even shows useful in managing diabetes. Pasteurized honey has it’s protective benefits destroyed, so I always choose raw. Using raw, local honey is best, but if you can’t find it, any raw is great.
Juice/liquid is traditionally just a vehicle in a gummy recipe, but I do my best to choose the best quality I can and make it purposeful. My favorite is Ningxia Red, a super high antioxidant drink made from a specific goji berry. It’s made with the puree adding to the nutrient value and has a deep berry taste my kids and I both enjoy.
Once you’ve chosen your ingredients, you can grab a saucepan and a silicone mold or small pan and get to cooking!
You can mix the ingredients by any method you prefer, but be sure to do the Vitamin C powder last, so the heat doesn’t render it useless.
In the recipe are my tried and true steps for smooth and easy gelatin every time!
Gut-Boosting Gummies
4 oz Juice
2.5 Tbs Grassfed Beef Gelatin
2Tbs Raw Honey
1 tsp Vitamin C Ascorb
Pour 1 oz of juice + gelatin in a small cup to “bloom” the gelatin.
Heat remaining juice on stove just to a simmer.
Turn heat to low and dissolve in honey.
Whisk cold gelatin/juice paste into hot juice/honey.
Turn off heat.
Mix in AA powder.
Use a syringe to fill molds (work quickly!) keeping pan on stove.
Chill 1 hour then pop out and store in fridge.
Hints
- If you find your gelatin hard to remove from the molds, freeze them for 30 minutes and then remove.
- If you don’t have or want to use a mold, any pan will work! You can cut the gummies into cubes after it chills.
- Change up the flavor with your favorite water enhancer
These keep in an airtight container for up to one week. If making a big batch, you can store the excess in the freezer.
My children absolutely love getting these, and I like to use them as rewards and as a chaser for supplements that they might not like as much.
The shapes you can make really are endless, and you can do any size!
I also like to make a batch when someone is feeling under the weather. I give them to the sick person, and everyone else too!
If you make these yummies, I would love to hear how you liked them!
Herbs are powerful , as we well know.
When you open your dried herbs as home, you immediately notice their scent and each is unique.
Oregano smells pungent and crisp.
Clove smells spicy and warm.
Thyme smells herbaceous and bright.
What you are smelling and what you are tasting are the lifeblood of the plants that have hung around in the leaves. 
These are the constituents that act as healers in the plants themselves!
Dried herbs have just a small selection of those constituents left lingering in their leaves, and even those small amounts can be powerful!
Ever had a cup of chamomile tea to help you wind down for bed, or had a cup of peppermint tea when you were feeling stuffy?
If you have, you know how helpful even those small amounts of healing constituents can be.
The downside is that in this form, you’re getting only a fraction of what the original plant had to offer.
This is why our family uses herbs in a very special way- a way that carefully collects all of constituents in the herb, preserves their efficacy through super selective processes, and then bottles them for our simple use.
An herbal UPGRADE, if you will!
The constituents in the plants that I’m talking about are, of course, Essential Oils.
Their potency is unmatched-one drop contains approximately 40 million-trillion molecules.
To compare, one drop of true premium peppermint essential oil has the constituent equivalent of 26 cups of dried peppermint tea.
You’ll notice when smelling premium essential oils that they smell much more robust than their lower-quality oil or dried herb counterparts - it's a beautiful scent orchestra!
And the orchestra of constituents you smell creates a symphony of effective action in your body!
How? 
The class of molecules in essential oils are incredible tiny-small enough to cross the blood brain barrier and enter into cells and even act on and inside cells.
They have MANY different functions to support the body. While they can create conditions where unfriendly viruses and bacteria cannot live. the most important function is performed by phenylpropanoids.
They clean the receptor sites on the cells. Without clean receptor sites, cells cannot communicate, and the body malfunctions, resulting in sickness.
The constituents of essential oils have been used as far back as we can trace, even in the Egyptian times where crude distillery machinery and tools have been found in tombs, as well as viable essential oils that still maintained some benefits.
They’ve been used by the German and French for hundreds of years.
In this video, the first one in a class I teach once a year called Oils of The Bible, I briefly introduce the concept of essential oils from a biblical perspective.
If you would like to keep learning on this topic, you can join the class and peruse at your convenience here.
Numerous studies and tests have been done proving the efficacy of essential oils.
Clove, Cinnamon, Rosemary, Lemon, Lavender and Frankincense are some of the ones that have the most testing and studies available.
In order for them to work like this, they must be the highest premium quality.
It’s sort of like going to MacDonalds vs going to BurgerFi...I really don’t need to explain the differences to you such as price, ingredient quality, experience, body benefits, etc.
You get it. 
In over ten years of walking alongside families, there’s never been one that I haven’t been able to help with the right premium essential oils.
And in our own family, we’ve dealt with sick days, chronic illness, chronic pain, short term injuries, chronic conditions and more…with premium essential oils by our side supporting us.
We have even reversed chronic diagnosis in our family.
Here is the short list of things we have conquered in our own home:
Asthma
Eczema
Migraines
Anxiety / Anxiety Attacks
Seasonal Allergies
Ear Infections
Bronchitis
Measles
RSV
Strep Throat
Boo Boos
Bug Bites / Stings (even a jelly fish sting once…ouch!)
I firmly believe the reason we have had such outrageous success using plants this way in our home is because of two things:
- We are using the most premium quality available, so each drop is powerful and effective
- We have community support when we need it to guide and encourage us
We’ve found herbs in this form are incredibly powerful when used intentionally.
And they’re really so easy to use, too. Since they are so tiny, they jump right into your body and go where they need to go.
It’s a breeze to use them on children, and especially a blessing for those kids who are adverse to taking things orally.
Give them a little foot rub with some supportive oil and they’re ready without tears!
I'm so thankful a fellow mom told me about these when my first child was 6 weeks old. I can't imagine having faced everything we have without these upgraded herbal helpers.
Are you ready for an herbal upgrade?
I could talk a long time about a LOT of things, but few things more than the importance of adequate mineral intake.
And one of my favorites to park at and chat about is: Magnesium.
Now magnesium is ESSENTIAL. It’s one of the seven essential minerals that your body must have.
Linus Pauling, double Nobel Prize winning chemist, famously said, “You can trace every sickness, every disease, and every ailment to a mineral deficiency.”
Our children are often deficient and we often don’t even realize it!
What are some of the signs? They include (but aren’t limited to):
- Grumpiness/Irritability
- “Growing Pains” or cramps
- Anxiety/Stress
Are you kids experiencing any of these?
As they hit major growth spurts, childrens’ bodies gets really depleted of magnesium which can lead to growing pains, night terrors and trouble settling down at night in general.
Magnesium is one of 60+ minerals that I, and my children, take every single day.
In my opinion, it’s more important (and beneficial) than a multivitamin; it’s essential for hundreds of biochemical pathways!
And what about safety? Great news. It’s water soluble, and easy to spot when you’ve had enough (your stools will be loose).
The known benefits of Magnesium are too bountiful to even list in their entirety, but I’ll share a few.
- Fights depression (better than drugs in many cases)
- Balances mood
- Supports bone growth and health
- Relieves anxiety
- Support healthy bowels
- Improves sleep
- Stops headaches
- Relaxes muscles
- Brain support
Basically…you want magnesium and you want enough of it-for you and your family.
When sick, it’s invaluable.
Amazingly, a protocol of magnesium has even shown effectiveness against viral illness.
If you or your child is very deficient, it can take a few days, weeks or even months to replenish. Give yourself time to see the benefits. You deserve it!
So how can we get some?
Pumpkin seeds are super high in it, followed by almonds and spinach.
Choose sprouted raw seeds/nuts when possible!
An ionic supplement will also get you all you need, and my favorite is Young Living. In my opinion, it's the best one on the market-it’s blended with 60 naturally occurring and derived trace minerals (like selenium, copper and ZINC) plus herbs that help with absorption. It's called Mineral Essence.
It even assists with hydration of cells, making your water-drinking more efficient!
To be honest, it doesn’t taste great (although all of my children take it without struggle, so it must not be SO bad).
I bribe them with a Lily’s chocolate chip.
Dark Chocolate
Avocados
Pumpkin Seeds
Chia Seeds
Flax Seeds
Legumes
Fatty Fish (like salmon)
Bananas
Greens
Want a recipe to make your kids super happy, and give them lots of magnesium to boot?
How about two recipes?
Keep reading!
This Chocolate Pudding packs tons of magnesium in each bite (but the kids won’t be able to tell!).
- Magic Chocolate Pudding
1 cup avocado (the less “ripe” the less avocado taste)
1 ripe banana (the riper, the better)
4 Tbs raw cacao powder
2 tsp vanilla extract
2 Tbs Maple Syrup
Place ingredients at room temperature into a high speed blender. Blend until completely smooth and combined.
Chill for a minimum of 30 minutes before serving.
- The riper, the better on the banana
- The less ripe your avocado is, the less avocado taste
- If your produce is more firm, you may add up to 3 tbs of liquid water or your milk of choice
- You may sub any sweetener for the Maple Syrup
- A little almond extract is also yummy-it's strong so just a couple drops!
- Add a drop of Young Living Orange Vitality oil or Young Living Peppermint Vitality oil for a variation
- Top with any fruit/seeds you like! Chia seeds, crushed pistachios + sea salt, berries, and grain free granola are some of our favorites!
If you liked this recipe, head over to my post for my super cozy and convenient Pumpkin Mag Muffins to delight everyone in your house.
