Orange Julius - Pineapple Julius Copy Cat Recipes

As a kid, going to Orange Julius was a big treat.  So sweet and refreshing!  My favorite always was the Pineapple Julius, yum!  I recently found a copycat recipe for Orange Julius on Pinterest.  I didn't think it would be that difficult to adapt to make a pineapple version.  I was right.  This was very easy. 

Here's the Orange Julius recipe I found from the Budget Savy Diva

• 6 oz. can frozen concentrated orange juice
• 1 cup milk
• 1 cup water
• 1/4 cup granulated sugar
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 8 or more ice cubes
• 1 Tablespoon of Instant Vanilla Pudding Powder

Instructions

1. Place all ingredients in a blender except for the ice cubes.
2. Blend until mixed
3. Add ice cubes one at a time – blend until smooth.

Here's my adapted, lightened up Pineapple Version:

1-2 cups fresh pineapple, chopped into chunks
1 cup milk
1 cup water
1/4 cup Splenda
1 tsp vanilla extract
8 or more ice cubes (I didn't have any ice, so I left these out, but I can see where they would make it even better)
1 Tbsp of Instant Vanilla Pudding Powder (I didn't have any on hand, so I used Butterscotch instead)

Place all ingredients in a blender, except for the ice cubes.  Blend until mixed.  Add ice cubes on at a time, blend until smooth.

Cherry Chocolate Muffins and a Bananaberry Smoothie

Well, my oldest son asked me to buy some cherries not too long ago. Sure. Unfortunately, he decided that the best way to enjoy cherries was to make cherry juice and squish them. After cleaning up a good sized mess (note to self, never leave 4 year old with cherries unattended), I hid the rest of the bag in the back of a fridge drawer.

Coincidentally, I started noticing cherry based posts on some of my favorite foodie sites. One for chocolate cherry muffins caught my eye. This morning I decided to bake those muffins. But do you think I could find the original post? Why, oh why didn't I bookmark it? I should know better, I'm not going to remember who posted it...there are too many lovely recipe sites out there. So I started to search. Yes, I went through each blog site and typed in the word cherry to search. After about 10 blogs I found it. It was at Joy in My Kitchen. The recipe can be found here.
The muffins turned out quite nicely. I did omit the chocolate chips as I had used up what I had earlier this week making chocolate chip cookies. My son really liked them too.
I thought smoothies would make this into a more complete breakfast. They are so great and so easy. This version had:

1/2 container of vanilla yogurt (650 g size, PC provantage brand)
1/4 cup skim milk
2 generous cups of frozen mixed berries
2 ripe bananas, cut into chunks

Everything goes into the blender and blend until smooth. I did have to stop a couple of times to push the fruit down, but it all worked and tasted so delicious.
The funny thing was my youngest who watched me make the smoothies. He saw me put the banana in and said, 'no like banana Mama', but he was the first one to ask for seconds of the drink :o)

Fruit Smoothie

All smoothies have the same basic ingredients: yogurt, fruit, milk. I don't know why I don't make them more often, they are so easy. I made them today as I was looking for something yummy for breakfast that my husband (who just had his wisdom teeth out) could eat. The bonus discovery with this was realising that my youngest loves smoothies. I have such a difficult time getting him to eat fresh fruit that I was in shock watching him down this and ask for more. I'll have to start making them regularily. I have a friend who makes hers with spinach and other veggies hidden in so I'll have to start experimenting. This was the fruit version I made today.

5 yogurt cups, 4 vanilla and 1 peach (I used the Activia individual servings)
2 frozen bananas (I cut them into chunks)
1 cup of peach slices
1/4 can of orange juice concentrate
1/4 cup milk

Add all ingredients together into a blender. Blend until smooth. Pour into glasses to enjoy. This made 2 large glasses plus 2 kid sized glasses.