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I am officially riding the smoothie wave! Took me a while, but I think I get it; fast, easy, portable, loaded with protein, and packed full of flavor. When my family gave me the best blender EVER for Mother's Day to replace my broken down blender that was so old it couldn't even break down ice anymore I was over the moon. I had been saving my spare change and entering every food contest I could find to try and win one of these bad boys. I am pretty sure I hinted towards a blender for every holiday for about 2 years, so when I opened that box on Mother's Day I almost passed out.
Since then, I have been blending any and everything I can possibly think of just to see how it turns out. I use my blender probably 4-5 times a day and smoothies have rapidly become our favorite weekday breakfast and afternoon snack. Since I have always had a soft spot for Ben and Jerry's Chunky Monkey Ice cream I knew that creating a smoothie using similar ingredients without the guilt associated with downing a pint of ice cream in a single sitting was a priority. Bananas, cocoa, and peanut butter are a perfect smoothie combo and when you add in a few dates for sweetness and homemade almond milk to bring it all together it's like a healthy party in a glass!
Chunky Monkey Smoothie
This protein packed smoothie mimics the flavors of my favorite ice cream without the guilt. Bananas, peanut butter, and cocoa marry together for a perfect smoothie combination.
- Total Time: 5
Ingredients
- 1 ¼ cups homemade almond milk, or store bought
- 2 frozen bananas
- 4-5 large fresh Medjool dates, pitted and chopped
- 1 Tbsp. cocoa powder
- 2 Tbsp. peanut butter
Instructions
- Place all of the ingredients in a high speed blender and blend until smooth.
Nutrition
- Serving Size: 1
Brittany says
Frozen bananas and peanut butter or almond butter are my favorite smoothie ingredients. I'll have to try adding dates to my next smoothie.
PS - I love your blue mason jar. We collected a bunch to use as centerpieces for our wedding so I have way too many but I can't part with them. They work perfectly as flower vases or cups. 🙂
Meg says
You will love the little extra punch of sweetness from the dates! I am such a sucker for mason jars. They are my go-to smoothie glass for sure. I guess it's true what they say...You can take the girl out of the South, but you can't take the South out of the girl. I remember my grandparents ONLY using mason jars in their homes to drink from.
Joy says
This has become an obsession in my household. Seriously : ) We have a massive zip lock bag of frozen bananas in our freezer! I buy the bananas for like 6lbs for a dollar, cut them all up and wrap two cut bananas in plastic wrap and them put them all into one big massive zip lock bag in the freezer. Ready for when we want one!!! SO delicious!!! I've always loved the combo of banana, chocolate and pb, but was always unsure of the measurmements. This recipe is the perfect porportions!!
Meg says
Yay Joy I am so happy that you love it!!! I do the same thing with our bananas so that they are always ready to go when the smoothie urge strikes:)
Dana says
Meg, this is totally my kind of smoothie! Only with almond butter 🙂 oh how I wish I had a vitamix! Homemade almond milk sounds divine.
-Dana
Meg says
Dana, mmm almond butter would be yummy too! I used to make my homemade almond milk in my old kitchen aid blender and it did really well. I just had to process it more like 7-8 minutes instead of 3-4. You should try it!
Heidi @ Food Doodles says
Yum! This is like my favorite smoothie 🙂 Except I don't usually put dates in mine. Must try that next time!
Meg says
I like the subtle sweetness from the dates, I hope you enjoy it!
The Vegan Cookie Fairy says
*Sigh* I wish I had a Vitamix. Every once in a while I come close to blowing all of my carefully saved, precious holiday money on one, then I think better of it. But someday, someday... until then, my Kenwood will have to do.
Meg says
I have requested no other gifts for a full year due to the Vitamix purchase. I simply wore our other blender out, it couldn't make one more batch of almond milk.
Beth @ Tasty Yummies says
Yum this is my favorite kind of smoothie, I make it way too often. It always feels so wrong too 😉 Actually drinking one very similar right now, no joke. I went with almond butter instead of PB though and added some spinach and ground flaxseed. Mmmmm extra fiber! haha
Meg says
Mmmm...I may have to try and sneak some spinach into mine next time!