Does anyone steam/cook their leafy greens for their green smoothies?

OliveGirl128

I've started doing a green smoothie every day, as part of my effort to increase my veg/fruit intake. I've been doing around 20g of raw kale and 50g of spinach as the base, and in an effort to add variety and also make prep time faster I was going to blend several kinds of greens together (kale, spinach, dandelion greens and collard greens), and then freeze in muffin sized disks.

However, I did some googling and found blog after blog saying that you're supposed to steam/cook greens because of their high oxolate levels, especially spinach. Raw kale also has something in it that messes with thyroid function? My brain is on overload right now and I don't know if I should be cooking/steaming all the greens I just bought, proceed with raw or just throw it all away and order a pizza

Do you use raw or cooked/steamed greens in your smoothies?

eta: did a bit more reading and it looks like you're supposed to blanch greens before freezing anyways, so I'm just going to go ahead and do this, I figure it can't hurt anything!

RodaRose

Do what works for you. I find that I prefer the raw taste of most greens. :

lemurcat12

I always use raw in smoothies, but I eat a lot of cooked greens (eat spinach about half raw, half cooked, and rarely eat raw kale other than in a smoothie, and I don't have smoothies a super lot).

I've read mixed things about raw vs. cooked and come to the conclusion (with greens as well as veg in general) that it makes sense to include a variety of both in my diet -- more raw in the summer, more cooked in the winter, but both during both periods.

However, I don't think cooked would hurt obviously if it tastes good to you. For me, the taste of cooked just seems wrong for a smoothie. But I wouldn't get freaked about consuming raw greens -- I think that's in the realm of overthinking it and losing any health benefits to increased stress. But JMO, of course!

AMV91

A lot of the nutrients in spinach or kale will seep out when its being steamed, if you included any liquid from the steamed greens as well, I'd say go for it, other wise, personally, I'd keep them raw.

OliveGirl128

lemurcat12 wrote: »

I always use raw in smoothies, but I eat a lot of cooked greens (eat spinach about half raw, half cooked, and rarely eat raw kale other than in a smoothie, and I don't have smoothies a super lot).

I've read mixed things about raw vs. cooked and come to the conclusion (with greens as well as veg in general) that it makes sense to include a variety of both in my diet -- more raw in the summer, more cooked in the winter, but both during both periods.

However, I don't think cooked would hurt obviously if it tastes good to you. For me, the taste of cooked just seems wrong for a smoothie. But I wouldn't get freaked about consuming raw greens -- I think that's in the realm of overthinking it and losing any health benefits to increased stress. But JMO, of course!

I was shocked when I kept seeing this on site after site-never in a million years would I have ever thought this was a 'thing' lol. I am making a batch right now of kale, spinach, collard greens and then dandelion greens-I blanched it all, blended it with some water and am flash freezing it (I have silicone muffin cups so I'm freezing them in that size portion-about half full). I'm a bit nervous to see what it's going to taste like, I can always add another banana to my smoothies if need be though lol. 2 bunches of kale, 2 bunches of spinach, 1 bunch of collards and 1 bunch of dandelion worked out to 24 servings, which is about a month of green smoothies for me since I usually have one six days a week. It's about an hour process but this will save me some time every day. If this works, then next month I'll rotate with 4 other kinds of greens!

OliveGirl128

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OliveGirl128

AMV91 wrote: »

A lot of the nutrients in spinach or kale will seep out when its being steamed, if you included any liquid from the steamed greens as well, I'd say go for it, other wise, personally, I'd keep them raw.

From what I read the oxolate leeches out into the water, so it's not a good idea to use it. I will still eat raw greens in other ways though, (I use spinach instead of lettuce for example).

eta: here's an article about blanching-interestingly, when using hard water it actually adds minerals (if I'm understanding correctly)-we have well water, so that might have added a few goodies lol.

http://www.livestrong.com/article/528167-nutrients-in-vegetables-after-blanching/

OliveGirl128

Follow up-just made my first smoothie with my 'green disk' and I couldn't taste the greens at all, (I didn't even add the splenda packet that I usually add). I did 1 disk, 1c water, 1c unsweetened almond milk, 1tbsp ground flax seed, 1tbsp chia seeds, 131g frozen strawberries and 101g of fresh banana. Just tastes like a banana strawberry smoothie Now I'm wondering if I should do 2 disks at a time hmmmm.