This tropical hibiscus ice tea is an easy beverage to make that helps you stay hydrated in this crazy heat. I bought my hibiscus tea blend from my local farmer’s market, but you can also find it online with this link. What I love about this blend is that it also contains dried fruit in addition to hibiscus leaves, such as dried pineapple, apricot, peach, papaya and cranberry, which help gives the tea it’s tropical summer flavor.

To steep my tea, I use this steeper from Cuisinart. It’s cheap, well made, and I’ve put it in the dishwasher with no problems. Filling it to capacity is about 2 tbsp of loose tea. Since I let it simmer and steep for so long, it will flavor 8 cups of water, which is enough to fill my favorite glass pitcher. Make sure your tea is completely cool before pouring it into the pitcher for safety.

Tropical Hibiscus Iced Tea

 

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Prep time

10 mins

Cook time

30 mins

Total time

40 mins

 

Author: Lauren Bolanos

Serves: 8

Ingredients

• 8 cups of water
• 2 tbsp of hibiscus tea blend
• 3 tbsp of honey

Instructions

1. Pour eight cups of water into a medium sized pot, then turn on heat to high and bring to a simmer.
2. While the water heats, add 2 tbsp of your favorite loose hibiscus tea mix to your tea steeper.
3. Then add tea steeper to pot. Lower heat so it simmers for 5 minutes, add 3 tbsp of honey.
4. Then turn off heat and let tea steep and liquid come to room temperature for safety when pouring into a pitcher.

Notes

You can sub 3 tbsp of cane sugar for 3 tbsp of honey

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This easy vegan chai, will save you time and money in the morning. I wish I could take credit, but my husband Shameer came up with this recipe. I debated adding this to my website, since I use processed ingredients. However, convenience is king in the morning and both the Vanilla Almond Milk and Chai Mix are dairy free and non-gmo. However, they both contain cane sugar, so if you are being strict about your sugar intake than this recipe won’t be for you.

Both these ingredients combined in a 1:1 ratio, make the best vegan chai ever. It tastes just a regular chai latte, so your friends and family likely won’t be able to tell the difference.

Easy Vegan Chai

 

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Prep time

1 min

Cook time

1 min

Total time

2 mins

 

Author: Lauren Bolanos

Serves: 1 cup

Ingredients

• 1 cup of Vanilla Almond Breeze Almond Milk
• 1 cup of Oregon Chai Mix

Instructions

1. Combine ingredients 1:1 in a large sauce pan, and heat until desired temperature.

Notes

After trial and error the Vanilla Almond Breeze Almond Milk tastes the best with the Chai mix for the perfect hint of Vanilla and the right about of sweetness. Other milks can be used, but flavor may vary.

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This sweet potato and mango smoothie is a Vitamin C, Vitamin A, and betacarotene powerhouse. I had some leftover baked sweet potatoes (that were on the small side) in the fridge from dinner before, and turned it into breakfast the next day. The sweet potatoes also help give the smoothie a nice creamy texture. I will definitely be making this again in the future!

Sweet Potato and Mango Smoothie

 

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Prep time

5 mins

Cook time

1 hour 30 mins

Total time

1 hour 35 mins

 

Author: Lauren Bolanos

Serves: 2

Ingredients

• 2 small baked sweet potatoes
• ½ cup frozen mango pieces
• ½ cup frozen pineapple pieces
• 1½ cups of water

Instructions

1. The night before bake sweet potatoes. Wrap them in foil and poke a few holes in them to let out steam. Bake at 350 degrees fahrenheit for an hour and a half.
2. Let them cool down overnight.
3. In the morning, scoop out orange sweet potato flesh and add to blender.
4. Then add in frozen mango and pineapple, then water and blend.
5. For a thicker smoothie add less water, for a thinner smoothie add more. Enjoy.

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This juice made from beets, carrots, and cucumbers is my all time favorite to make. I wanted to make some juice recipes for my blog, since one of my resolutions is to use my juicer more. It’s a great tool to easily consume and absorb a ton of nutrients at once, but there are down sides too. Like too much sugar, no protein, and it can be a hassle to set up, dissemble and clean, especially compared to how easy the Vitamix is to use. I’ve also had issues with certain foods getting stuck (celery I bitching about you).

This recipe is one of my favorites because the hard carrots and beets juice up easily. I use a cucumber as well, as a base to get in more liquid. Carrots, beets, and cucumbers have natural sugars that I find sweet enough, so I don’t need fruit. Plus, the end result is still sweet enough that it tastes delicious.  This recipe just fills up one juicing pitcher at four cups, making this my all time favorite juice.

The benefits of the veggies in this juice are surprisingly similar. Beets are amazing for a lot of things including blood pressure, stamina, detoxification, inflammation, and they also help prevent cancer. Carrots have similar benefits for the heart, detoxification, inflammation and cancer prevention. Cucumbers are also great for detoxification, brain health, inflammation, and heart health. I’m actually pretty obsessed with cucumbers and use them as a base for liver pates, chicken and tuna salads, and as a snack with a little sea salt when I’m craving crunchy and salty food, which is all the time. Basically they’re my healthy substitution for chips and crackers. On that tangent, I hope everyone had a great holiday and New Years, and I hope you are as excited as I am to get back to the healthier stuff!

Beet and Carrot Juice

This tea mainly tastes like ginger, which I love, but also includes powerful pain-fighting herbs such as turmeric and lemongrass. Disclaimer: I am not a doctor or herbalist, if this helps you feel better, that’s awesome, but this tea is not meant to replace your medication or your health practitioner’s advice. I wanted to make something delicious and healing for myself, and of course, share it online with my followers. Feel free to change up the ingredients as desired, or add a sweetener of your choice.

Herbal Benefits

Ginger Uses: Indigestion, nausea, motion sickness, may help reduce cholesterol and narrowing of arteries, and relieves muscle pain. (White and Foster 560)

Turmeric Uses: Peptic ulcers, hardening of the arteries, indigestion, liver problems. Curcumin, the yellow pigment in turmeric, has been shown to possess antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, cholesterol-reducing, and cancer-fighting properies. (White and Foster 574)

Cardamom Uses: Indigestion, detoxification, oral and kidney health, improves blood circulation, and has antioxidant properties.

Lemongrass Uses: Contains anti-microbial and anti-bacterial properties, reduces inflammation, helps relieve pain from headaches, joint pains and muscle pains.

Ginger Tea for Pain Relief

 

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Prep time

5 mins

Cook time

10 mins

Total time

15 mins

 

Author: Lauren Bolanos

Ingredients

• 2 slices of ginger
• 2 slices of tumeric
• 3 cardamom pods
• 1 inch of lemongrass
• ½ lime
• 5 cups of water

Instructions

1. Fill pot with water, bring to boil.
2. Slice lemongrass lengthwise.
3. Add remaining herbs to water.
4. Squeeze in half a lime.
5. Let it boil until desired strength. I gave it 10-20 minutes.

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1. Local Organic Greens

Sometimes I will get a big bunch of kale, but that was before I went to my new favorite farmer’s market: Virginia Avenue Park on Saturdays in Santa Monica. This market is on the smaller end, but has a great selection of conventional and organic produce at good prices. They don’t have a lot of prepared food, which I prefer . The people here come to get groceries, not eat or hang out (which means less crowds) and the vendors are very friendly towards regulars. Even though it’s in a city, it has a neighborhood feel…crazy right? Parking can fill up so I get there between 8:30 to 9:00 and have no problems. I get a ton of organic baby greens (kale, spinach, mustard greens, swiss chard, and arugala) and use that in my smoothies and salads. These are the same greens that supply my whole foods so I feel that I get a great deal at this market for a high-end product. Sometimes I also use the tops of beet greens since I love my beets, and don’t want to waste the nutritious leaves.

2. Fruit

I’ve done lot of really low fruit smoothies with just a handful of berries, but they don’t taste great. I’ve started adding in a half to a whole banana depending on my mood. Sometimes I will throw in a half an avocado if I want it particularly creamy. Yes, avocado is a fruit. It has a pit.

3. Supplements

Recently, I’ve been adding supplements back into my diet. For awhile, I wanted to focus on getting my nutrients from food, but I have been researching some products and wanted to test them out – plus I’m really happy with my diet right now which means it’s time to shake things up. Right now, I use 1 tbsp of collagen hydrosolate in my smoothie as a protein powder. The brand I use is Great Lakes. After much debate, I started adding 1 tsp of cod liver oil from Carlson Labs into my smoothie. This brand was recommended in Pain Free in 6 weeks by Sherry Rogers and this company is held in high esteem by my health conscious friends. I’ve read that this company tests their product for contaminants such as mercury and PCBs. Another favorite brand among health bloggers is the fermented cod liver oil from Green Pastures.