"Recipe" 1 - Banana Blueberry Orange Smoothie

This was pretty much about as basic as it gets. It's a great starter recipe for someone using their vitamix for the first time. Lord knows it's not my first time as i've used the machine a good number of times (pretty much daily) since her 12/22 "inception" if you will - but a good first recipe nonetheless.

The ingredients, pretty basic fare that most people will probably already have in their house, orange, water (ummm, if not - i can't help you on this), a peeled frozen banana, frozen blueberries (which i happen to have because i always like to keep blueberries on hand).

A couple of notes - i always try to go organic where feasible, which definitely includes blueberries. The banana - not so much because i don't consume the peel - if you do, well i suggest you may have bigger issues in life then whether or not your produce is organic - but all the more power to you i say. The orange - not so much so either. I *will* say this, I did some volunteer work at a local raw restaurant one night (as they were getting ready to take part in a big Seattle food fest of sorts) and there was something in which they used the orange - peel and all, and amazingly enough it tasted good. I tried it one time since in my vitamix (using an organic orange). It's not something i feel the need to repeat - at least until some study comes out declaring "orange peel" to be the next great superfood - then i'll have my vitamix at the ready.

Ok, so now that i have everything compiled - let's put all these suckers into the blend:













and next, wallah - the finished product:
























This is pretty good. I'm only on day 2 of this blog and i'm already learning something new - as i've never really worked with videos before (aside from to play them). Maybe one day, i'll learn why the audio is not carrying over into my videos - *UGH* but alas ...

I'm including one more video - just because i think this feature is like *really* cool - enjoy ....

The Inspiration

After a quick google search - i found Julie Powell's original "The Julie/Julia Proect" blog (http://blogs.salon.com/0001399/2002/08/25.html) of which i've read the first few pages thus far. I figure it's a worthy investment of my time to read through the blog at least initially - to get an idea of how she attacked her mission. I can continue reading of course just depending on the overall interest level.

Upon my search for the blog - i found an interesting short interview that was done with Julie and provided her take on the "Julie and Julia" movie. The interview can be found here - http://www.yumsugar.com/Interview-Julie-Powell-Julie-Julia-3630257

She does seem to curse a lot! I like this though, I like a woman that curses - dunno why, eh - maybe it's a Brooklyn thing - ha! Another interesting tidbit about her, she didn't actually live in Queens at the time of the blog (as indicated by the movie) but rather, in Brooklyn - close to my old stomping grounds to boot, as I lived in Bensonhurt and she lived in Bay Ridge, which is right next to Bensonhurst (albeit - i didn't live there at that time) - funny world!

From the first few blogs i read of hers, i didn't notice any pictures or videos or much about the ingredients. That might change later into the blog, or maybe not - not sure. I'm guessing the photo/video stuff maybe wasn't as prolific when she did her blog.

I'm not sure what lines i have to draw in regards to copyright. As such, i won't post any specific recipes but it's my plan to show the actual ingredients. Ideally, let's get serious right? hehehe, this is Vitamix stuff - not "fine dining" - so for many of the recipes, it may be quite ok to experiment w/the ingredient portions to one's own liking - heck, that's part of the beauty/joy of owning the vitamix. Other recipes maybe will need to be more specific. We shall see.

And so it begins ...

Hi, and welcome to my blog. On Christmas Day - i was watching a movie w/family, "Julie and Julia". Then a couple of days days ago, my wife and I were watching "Bridezilla" where this bride was referring to her dress by name, "Antoinette" (i'm ummm *cough* pretty sure, she probably had a 3'some w/her hubby (her, her hubby and the dress) but alas, that's a blog for another day).

I was making fun of the show by joking referring to my new Vitamix as Antoinette when it occurred to me - why not create my own "Jule and Julia" type blog - by making every recipe mentioned in the cookbook included with the Vitamix. Now admittedly, this is probably not nearly as daunting as attempting to make every recipe from a french cooking book - but at the same time, i'm probably not nearly as smart of industrious as Julie Powell (for whose blog and story the movie was based upon).

Well, in order to start the venture - of course I need to have a catchy "catch phrase" and along the veil of "Julie and Julia", i thought "Andy and Antoinette" would fit nicely - and so ... my sojourn has begun.

One interesting aspect of this venture is that i follow a completely vegetarian (no meat of any kind, no fish, etc) and mostly vegan (no eggs or dairy) diet. Due to this, I'll be looking to "veganize" all of the recipes. This should be interesting because i'm sure i'll learn a lot about various ingredients and also how to veganize certain options.

My intent for this blog is to share photos, videos, information, challenges, and overall to be educational, fun and entertaining for all who decide to read.

So, later today I intend to make my first recipe - wish me luck ...