Matcha green tea

Ooh, I make my smoothies with it every day in my Magic Bullet. I love it because it blends well with the bananas and fruits I like, and it has caffeine, which I um...need...

Method:
1. Put 1.5 teaspoons of matcha powder in bottom of heat-proof bowl
2. Heat tiny amount of hot water, like 3 tablespoons or so, just enough to blend with tea, to boiling
3. Pour the hot water into the bowl with the matcha and whisk. You're using a bowl because you have to whisk efficiently to blend it, and a cup or pot gets the powder stuck in the corners too much. I use metal mini whisks. I blend for like a minute total to ensure there are no chunks of powder left.
4. To cool down for cool smoothie ingredients, put half of the frozen fruit you're using into the matcha bowl while you prepare the rest of the smoothie. (For me this is always half a frozen banana.)
5. Put rest of smoothie ingredients in blender while you're waiting for matcha to cool. For me this is 2 teaspoons flax seeds that I grind in the blender first thing, 1/2 cup lowfat milk, 1/2 cup plain Greek yogurt , 1/2 cup frozen berries OR 1/3 cup frozen pineapple or mango, 1/2 teaspoon or 1 teaspoon sugar.
6. Combine now cooled matcha with ingredients already in blender and blend.

Enjoy!

Oh, and why bother with the heating up and the cooling down? It's because apparently the caffeine is more easily absorbed when the tea is brewed in hot water first. It's also easier to blend as a paste/liquid than as a powder.

I add it to vanilla Greek yogurt and smoothies sometimes.

On a less diet-friendly note, I made these once: http://www.sweetestkitchen.com/2008/12/matcha-cocoa-cupcakes/ -- The cupcakes are very dense, but the matcha buttercream was amazing.