Does anyone pre-prep fruit for smoothies?

[katespade]

I'm thinking I want to start prepping fruit to store in my freezer for smoothies.

Does anyone do this? Any hints or tips or recipes? Do you just buy bulk bags of frozen fruit or do you slice up fresh fruit? Is there a difference between the two? What are your favorite fruit combos to use?

[pooh8402]

I used to buy fresh, chop, then freeze, but the texture gets weird and I threw a bunch away. It's honestly cheaper for me to buy the prechopped frozen bags, which are less than $1 each.

I love mixed berries with spinach and beets, and "orange-yellow" fruits and veggies like peaches, pineapples, mangoes, butternut squash and carrots.

[ewall]

We buy frozen berries from the grocery store. Kroger always sends us coupons for it so it's fairly inexpensive. Then we take any leftover overripe bananas, break them into chunks, then toss them in a plastic container in the freezer aka our banana box. I do the same thing with any fresh fruit that I know we are not going to eat all of before it goes bad. I don't really chop anything, just toss in chunks.

[katespade]

ewall - Do you need to freeze your banana chunks flat first, or do you just toss them into a bag before they're frozen? I've seen a few recommendations about laying them out on a cookie sheet to freeze, but I don't really have room in my freezer to do that...

[bk1]

I use frozen fruit. When my bananas are getting over ripe I peel them, break them into chunks, put them in a freezer zip lock bag, and toss them in the freezer
You don't need to put them on a cookie sheet first. Yeah some of the chunks will freezer together but they are easy to break apart. I break the bananas into 5-6 pieces.

[amaranth]

I buy costco frozen fruit. The quality is amazing and so much cheaper than fresh. A huge bag of organic raspberries is somehow only $9 whereas to get that many raspberries fresh, in questionable quality, would be like $30. They recently started selling premade smoothie packs that include the spinach and kale chopped and packaged in with the berries, but usually I just add those on my own.

My favorite easy smoothie recipe is:
-1 can coconut milk, full fat
-1 banana
-1 cup frozen berries
-Greens if I have them

[katespade]

amaranth - I will definitely be making a Costco trip this weekend! It's really unfortunate that I can't do greens because of my dietary restrictions, but I have some supplement powder that I'm planning to add as a substitute.

[amaranth]

Feb 1, 2018 10:20:03 GMT -5 katespade said:

amaranth - I will definitely be making a Costco trip this weekend! It's really unfortunate that I can't do greens because of my dietary restrictions, but I have some supplement powder that I'm planning to add as a substitute.

I occasionally struggle with greens too so I get it. One of my friends steams her greens then freezes the steamed (limp) greens in ice cube trays then throws a few of those into her smoothie. She said it's the only way she can tolerate them. I have never tried it to offer a review.

[awick14]

katespade I freeze bananas flat then put them into a bag in the freezer.

It's been so long since I've made a smoothie.