Beetroot Breakfast Smoothie

Breakfast is my favourite meal of the day by a million miles. Sweet and savoury are both totally acceptable so you can just go with whatever mood you are in. It is so quick and easy to whip up a delicious bowl of something so there are no excuses not to enjoy it every day!

A good, nutritious breakfast really is the best way to start the day as it levelling your blood sugars and getting a big dose of fibre, protein, vitamins and minerals. Having protein at breakfast helps you stay full all morning and regulates your blood sugar so that you don't end up with that mid-morning energy crash. This recipe is packed full with protein rich ingredients to kick-start your day with a big dose of healthy.

This breakfast smoothie really is one of my absolute favourites - it looks and tastes awesome, is really filling and only takes a couple of minutes to make. Even if beetroot isn't your thing, don't be put off - You really wont know it is there! (Beetroot lovers are welcome to double the quantity!) It is also quite thick so it also works really well as a smoothie bowl which you can cover in all sorts of delicious toppings.

Ingredients (serves 2)

2 bananas
1 handful of frozen berries
2 cups of almond milk (500ml) - I make my own which is the best way to avoid nasty additives
2 handfuls of spinach
1 beetroot
4 tbsp of oats
3 heaped tbsp of ground flax

For the topping

2 tbsp of chia seeds
4 tbsp of hemp seeds

Start by taking the skin off the beetroot and cutting it into smaller chunks. You can also cut up the banana to give your blender a helping hand too.

Then simply place all the ingredients (except the chia and hemp seeds) in a blender and mix until smooth. Add a little water or extra almond milk if it is too thick.

Then stir in the chia and hemp seeds and it is ready to enjoy!

Handy hint:
If your smoothie maker tends to warm your smoothie a little, freeze the bananas first or add a few ice cubes to the blender to keep it cool

Butternut Squash & Lentil Soup

There is an absolute rule at home that we do not attempt to make soup. For a family of cooking enthusiasts we are pretty terrible at it and it notoriously results in disaster - how you can go quite so wrong I do not know. So today I decided to break all the rules - call me a maverick but you don't get anywhere staying inside your comfort zones, do you? I am also limited to a relatively liquid diet (thanks to a nasty spell of mumps), had lots of leftover lentils and am currently obsessed with coconut.

As it happens, this actually turned out pretty well so I thought it was worth sharing.

This is a slightly wintery soup but the coconut gives it an exotic touch that is getting me excited for summer.

Ingredients (serves 3-4)

250-300g of butternut squash (about 1 cup)
3 carrots
750ml vegetable stock (or water seasoned with herbs, salt and pepper)
1 1/2 cups of lentils
100ml of coconut milk
100g of coconut cream
1 tablespoon of ginger
a sprig of rosemary

If your lentils are not yet cooked, start by rinsing them and placing them in a pan with vegetable stock.

Peel the carrots and butternut squash and cut into chunks. Place them into the pan with ginger and a little salt and pepper. Leave to boil for about 5 minutes on a low heat before adding the coconut milk.

Once the vegetables start to soften, add the coconut cream and allow to dissolve. If your lentils are already cooked, add them to the pan too. Once the coconut cream has dissolved, remove the pan from the heat and pour the contents into a food processor. Blend until a smooth, creamy liquid forms, adding a little water if it is too thick. If you are using a hand blender, make sure you let the contents cool before blending so that you don't burn yourself!

Once a smooth soup is formed, pop it back on the hob to heat up or store in a tuppaware for later. Serve with a sprig of rosemary - mainly because it looks pretty but also because it tastes good too!