Use ripe fruit.
Unripe fruit isn’t very sweet, so it doesn’t do a good job of sweetening up your bitter greens. Unripe fruit is harder to digest than ripe fruit and isn’t as healthful.
Blend leafy vegetables first.
Leafy vegetables are often hard to blend when they’re mixed in with fruit. By blending the leafy vegetables first, along with the liquid base (milk, juice, tea or water), you avoid this problem. Chopping the leaves up beforehand can also help.
Try using frozen fruits and leafy vegetables.
As an alternative to using ice in a smoothie, you can use one or two frozen vegetables or fruits, putting them directly into the blender without thawing them. Freezing your fruits and vegetables is also a good way to keep them from getting overly ripe.
If your schedule is loaded, make your smoothie ahead of time.
If you have a busy schedule, you can make your smoothie the night before and store it in an airtight container in the fridge. This eliminates the need for putting ice cubes or frozen fruit in your smoothie. It also ensures that the smoothie is evenly cool throughout. You can store smoothies for up to two days in a fridge.
Prep your smoothies.
Another way to help with your scheduling is to prep your smoothies ahead of time, putting the ingredients for each smoothie recipe into a plastic bag and putting that into the fridge. You can do this for a week or more in advance. This also helps with grocery shopping, because you’ll know ahead of time what you’re running out of.
Change things up.
Variety is the spice of life. Drinking the same smoothies day after day can not only get boring but can limit the nutrients you’re putting into your body. So mix it up a bit. You can also make small substitutions in recipes, changing up your choice of vegetables and fruits. You can also substitute the type of liquid base in a recipe, using orange juice, apple juice, cashew milk, almond milk, coconut water or coconut milk in place of plain water or whatever else the recipe calls for. But be sparing at first in your substitutions, or you might end up with a train wreck.
Investigate superfoods.
If you want to add variety and nutrition to your smoothies, you might check out certain so-called “superfoods” like acai powder, maca powder, cacao powder, goji berries, spirulina, yacon, lucuma powder, bee pollen and coconut palm sugar. These items tend to be pricey, but most of them pack a wallop, and you only have to add a small amount to your smoothie. You should experiment with very small amounts at first, because some of them will add wild flavors or colors.
Consider putting thick smoothies into a bowl.
If you’ve made an extra thick smoothie or you want to add granola, nuts or other toppings to it, you might try putting the smoothie into a bowl and eating it with a spoon.