Total time: 5 minutes
Serves 1
- 1 c ice
- ½ c whole milk
- ⅓ c pure pumpkin puree
- 1 Tbsp honey
- ground nutmeg
Place ice, milk, pumpkin, honey, and a pinch of the nutmeg in a blender. Blend until smooth and frothy.
I was so excited to receive my very own single-serving travel-mug hybrid blender a few years back as a gift. I’ve always had the best intentions to try to stay fit and healthy. With smoothies, in my mind at least, being synonymous with ‘fit and healthy,’ this was just the ticket! I envisioned myself waking up each morning, whipping up a smoothie and heading out the door to start my day with it.
So what happened? The blender sat, and sat, and sat. Unopened, buried in the back of a cupboard. How it got to the back I do not know. I’m sure I originally set it out in an easily accessible place to encourage the desired use of it! But there it sat, out of sight, out of mind. I’d come across it during every cleaning marathon where I was tossing things left and right but refused to toss it. Each time I saw it I was re-invigorated to make use of it and time and time again did not. It even survived a move! If you’re like me, the criteria for what stays and what goes when moving is the harshest of all.
Then, low and behold, Real Simple read my mind yet again last year and present me with 10 ideas for: smoothies! Ten, single-serving no doubt, recipes! Finally, just what I needed to get my butt in gear and for my blender to finally see the light of day.
As for the recipe itself, it’s very pumpkiny. If pumpkin is your thing, then this is the smoothie for you. For me though, I wasn’t a huge fan. Seriously, if I eat pumpkin pie at the holidays, it’s definitely the situation of taking pumpkin pie with my Cool Whip.
But that’s not all. There is more to this pumpkin smoothie story. Don’t you hate when you have to open a entire can of something only to use a portion of it? And most of the time the remainder goes to waste? Since I wasn’t going to be making more of these smoothies with my not-so-rave review of it, I did however have a way to use the remaining pumpkin – our cat!
On a recent check-up, we were told our cat was overweight. I told the vet how carefully we watch our cat’s diet with three measured feedings a day to keep her weight and health in check. And only a few healthy treats every now and then. And even when meal time rolls around she’s crying a good half hour beforehand and inhales the food like she’s being starved.
The doctor suggested canned pumpkin in between feedings! It is very filling but low in calories, so that should help. So after I finished making this recipe, I was excited to give it a shot. I put a little spoonful in her bowl and . . . she wanted absolutely nothing to do with it!!
Hey at least one good thing came out of this recipe – I did get to finally use that blender.