SmoothieCast | Fairtrade Smoothie Recipes - Think Smoothies, Think Fairtrade

Description The mango is regarded as the queen of fruits in tropical areas of the world and is one of the most important fruit crops in tropical and subtropical areas. There are many varieties of mangos (over 1,000!). The mango is a medium sized fruit measuring 5-13 cm in width and 5-25 cm in length. The surface of the mango skin is smooth and thick, but non-edible. As the fruit ripens it turns to yellow-green or yellow-orange, often with splashes of crimson or blushed with dark red. Healthy Stuff Mangoes are high in vitamin A, vitamin C, potassium, niacin and fibre. Mangoes help protect against cancer, arteriosclerosis and they help maintain bowel regularity. Buying and Storing Try to choose large, firm, unblemished yellow/red mangoes and store them in your fruit bowl for 3-4 days until they ripen. You can get Fairtrade mangoes from Asda, Booths, Co-op, Marks and Spencer, Sainsbury's, Waitrose and Tesco stores, when they're in season. Preparation Jake says: Peel the mango with a sharp knife then cut off slices of the mango flesh and put them straight in the smoothie maker. Make sure you avoid the pit, and be careful whilst slicing because mangoes can be slippery. Ian says: Without peeling the mango slice away the four 'cheeks' from the pit. Score the mango flesh into squares and gently push the cubes apart, then slice them from the skin to get lots of small mango cubes. You can put these straight into the smoothie maker or put them in the freezer and use them later. Links You can find out more information on fairtrade mangoes here.

Description The Sharon Fruit is also known as Israeli Persimmon, Kaki Fruit, Japanese Persimmon, Velvet Apple, and many more names which you really don’t need to know! Grown mostly in Israel, America and Japan but in other places also, this fruit is light yellow-orange to dark red-orange in colour, varying from 2-8 cm in diameter, can be eaten fresh, cooked, dried or indeed in a smoothie (Result!) Healthy Stuff Sharon fruits are high in vitamin A and give you all the vitamin C you need each day (100% RDA) Buying and Storing Keep them in a cool dry place until they have started to become really soft, some species will dry your mouth out if you eat when firm (this can be done with sharon and kakki fruit variety as they are ripe even when firm, but Jake suggests letting all varieties go softish) as they are an astringent (can also cause body tissues to shrink, doesn’t sound too nice), the inside will appear stringly and moist when they are finally at their ripest and they will survive being ripe for a few days (always good). You can buy these from most big supermarkets or at good fruit markets, unfortunately not yet avaliable in Fairtrade Preparation Jake says: With a Sharon or Kakki fruit you can just bung it all in the smoothiemaker Ian says: With other varieties, (or if you don't like the skin) peel and chop up before blending Fun Facts Dried leaves can be used for tea, and persimmons are also used to make vinegar (Wow!). In america a persimmon pie contest is held annually, much like a pumpkin pie and whoever eats it fastest, bakes the biggest, can eat the most (and so on) wins!

Today my new Smoothie Maker got delivered. It's a Kenwood SB308 'Night and Day'. I was tipped off by a friend and managed to pick it up online at a bargain price. It was delivered by a nice man called Dave. I got it out of the box as quickly as possible and managed to assemble it without reading the instructions. There were two free recipe booklets, one had some nice photos to go with the recipes, but the other one was dull and grey. I tried an avocado and grape smoothie. The blades had no problems cutting through the ice and fruit. The handle was very handy for pouring. The smoothie got Pete's approval so it was cheers all round. I can now pass my smoothie junior onto Brummy Dave. Sadly the handle got snapped off at my last smoothie party so pouring can sometimes be a bit messy

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