Recipes · Sides

Bulk Green Smoothies

Seth Jovian
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This is a way of making 3x of the Mean Green Smoothie, in order to bottle and freeze them. Since it involves bulk amounts, this recipe aims to homogenize the ingredients so the resulting bottles are similar, but you can also do this by mixing all 3 smoothies into a large pitcher and then pouring it out into the bottles.
Prep Time1 hour 30 minutes
Course: Snack
Cuisine: American
Keyword: celery, cucumber, ginger, Granny Smith apples, kale, lemon
Servings: 7 quarts

Equipment

  • 1 Vitamix blender (or something equally powerful)
  • 1 cutting board
  • 4 large bowls
  • 7 freezable quart bottles
  • 1 kitchen scale
  • 1 large knife

Ingredients

  • 2.5 lb curly leaf kale (about 3 bunches)
  • 2 lb slicing cucumbers (about 3 cucumbers)
  • 2 lb celery (about 2 stalks)
  • 3 lb Granny Smith apples (about 6 apples)
  • 3 lemons
  • 1 ginger root (about 6 oz)
  • 3 pints water

Instructions

Clean the veggies (5 min)

  • Get the 4 large bowls, the cutting board, kitchen scale, and big knife.
    One of the bowls should be big enough to hold all the kale; the others can be somewhat smaller
  • Rinse the kale, celery, cucumbers, and apples
  • Peel off stickers, remove ties

Chop and divide the kale (10 min)

  • On the cutting board, roughly chop all of the kale
  • Put the largest bowl on the scale and tare it
  • Put all the kale in the bowl and note the weight — should be about 45-50 oz.
  • Divide the weight by 3
  • Take that much kale from that bowl and put it in two of the other bowls.
    You should now have an equal amount of kale in 3 bowls.

Chop and divide the celery (10 min)

  • Cut off and discard the heads of the celery stalks
  • Roughly chop the rest of the celery
  • Put the remaining, 4th bowl, on the scale and tare it
  • Put all the chopped celery in it and note the weight — should be about 30-36 oz.
  • Divide the weight by 3
  • Take that much celery from that bowl and add it to each of the 3 kale bowls

Chop and divide the apples (10 min)

  • Coarsely core and chop the apples, such as by slicing one big side off and then the other big side, leaving a disc with the core in it; then slicing off the two small sides from the core, and finally cutting the small sides in 2 and the big sides into 4
  • Tare the scale with the now empty 4th bowl on it, if need be
  • Put all of the chopped apples in the bowl and note the weight — should be about 30-36 oz.
  • Divide the weight by 3
  • Take that much in apple slices from that bowl and add it to each of the 3 bowls with kale and celery

Chop and divide the cucumber (10 min)

  • Coarsely chop the cucumber, such as by slicing it in half lengthwise, and then slicing it every inch or so crosswise
  • Tare the scale with the once more empty 4th bowl on it, if need be
  • Put all of the cucumber chunks in the bowl and note the weight — should be about 30-36 oz.
  • Divide the weight by 3
  • Take that much in cucumber chunks from that bowl and add it to each of the 3 bowls with kale, celery, and apples

Peel and dice the lemons (10 min)

  • Peel the 3 lemons, or cut the peels off
  • Chop the lemons into halves or quarters, and remove the seeds if you want
  • Tare the scale with the once more empty 4th bowl on it, if need be
  • Put all of the lemon chunks in the bowl and note the weight — should be about 4-5 oz.
  • Divide the weight by 3
  • Take that much in lemon chunks from that bowl and add it to each of the 3 bowls with kale, celery, apples, and cucumbers.

Peel and dice the ginger root (10 min)

  • Peel the ginger root
  • Chop it into several pieces
  • Tare the scale one last time
  • Put all of the ginger pieces in the bowl and note the weight — should be about 2 oz
  • Take that much ginger from that bowl and add it to each of the 3 bowls with kale, celery, apples, and cucumbers.
    The 3 bowls are now complete and you can put away the scale and the 4th bowl.

Blend the veggies (30 min)

  • Get the 7 quart bottles
  • For each of the three bowls: put half of the contents in the blender, blend it down, then add the other half and finish blending it until smooth — 2 or 3 minutes.
  • Pour the smoothie into the quart bottles — each batch should yield 2-¼ to 2-⅓ bottles, for roughly 7 bottles total.

Freeze and thaw

  • Freeze the bottles
  • Thaw a bottle out in the fridge over two days, or for 3-4 hours in water, or 20-30 minutes on defrost in the microwave.
  • When ready to drink, shake the bottle vigorously because the contents will have separated
  • Drink through the thick straw

Notes

This is a bulk version of the original Mean Green Recipe, which makes about two quarts.