I’m going to make a confession today: I don’t enjoy midweek breakfast. When the kids are is school, it means we rely on cereal, or breakfast bars and fruit, or sometimes family habits make an ugly appearance, and just like Mom, they skip. Give me an hour or two post wakeup and I’m ready for something, but I have a really hard time eating when I first wake up.

Saturday mornings, on the other hand, are a smorgasbord of delight. Crepes with fresh berries, waffles with fresh berries, bacon and eggs, whatever – I enjoy putting in the time to make a heartier meal, mostly because it becomes brunch. We like to sleep in and I’m not even going to feel guilty. There were years when wake up was 5:30 a.m. or earlier with the oldest boy raring to go the minute his feet touched floor. He’s 14 now and sleeps in the basement. Some days I don’t see him until after noon.

With the change in our schedules we haven’t been up to race out and meet school buses. The kitchen has been a bit of a graze crazy zone and the kids still reach for a granola bar or yogurt before they pick carrots to snack on. One of the ways we find balance without the work of full meal prep has been smoothies… which are definitely not new, but a challenge as I find many carb heavy and they cause my blood sugars to spike like crazy.

My naturopath made some suggestions on easy smoothie changes and I’ve got to admit, they’ve been helpful. Less fruit and more veggies has been the big one… and now smoothies chock full of avocado, cauliflower, and spinach are the norm.

This morning we had a bacon and egg wrap just before noon but I knew we wouldn’t be having lunch so I wanted to amp up the vitamins and fibre to cut down on snacking. Kev and I enjoyed a mocha smoothie and when he tried it, he said it tasted like a chocolate shake “kinda”. It was a smooth and rich shake-like smoothie but it was full of good for you ingredients: almond milk, frozen cauliflower, frozen avocado, frozen banana, frozen spinach, cocoa powder, instant coffee, and maple syrup for a little bit of extra sweetness. We top it off with a dollop of whip cream to make it seem more decadent, but it’s a lower-carb, higher fibre substitute to any ice cream shoppe treat.

Does it taste just like a chocolate shake? Absolutely not. Does it take a bite out of any cravings for chocolaty goodness or coffee shop sugar-laden concoctions? Indeed it does and I can feel good (which leads to feeling better!) knowing that we’ve made some little changes to balance our diets.

What is your go-to smoothie recipe? I’ll admit that I’m a bigger fan of berry-based smoothies (still balanced with frozen veg) than my mocha concoction this morning, but one of my children consumes frozen fruit as if it’s ambrosia and even though my freezer stash is now empty again, I can’t really complain about that, can I? Besides, there’s nothing wrong with a little variety!