Double-Green Pear Smoothie

My loves! You know what the word smoothie means. I know you do. It means that my normal beer-and-cheese diet, the one that's typically seasoned with ginormous crunchy handfuls of good salty bff tortilla chips, is on an eensy little hiatus. A winter little hiatus where I try to live like a person who is not teetering on an addicty tightrope that stretches between the seven a.m. HUZZAH! of caffeine and the five o'clock sharp HUZZAH! of alcohol. A few weeks where I say things like, "Is it just me, or are these yeast walnuts actually the most delicious thing you ever tasted?" (It's just me!) 

To be fair, Michael was trying to share his Shake Shackstravaganza with Ben, but it showed up in my feed. Because NOBODY WANTS ME TO BE LIVING MY CLEAN LIFE.

"What should I label this dressing?" Michael asks, and I have to say, "Cashew Caesar." (With nutritional yeast!) Three different kinds of nuts are soaking in my refrigerator at all times, like tragic drowned things. I am staining our blender with the turmeric I'm adding to my crazy good lattes. You know. Like this.

Mmmm! Yellow foam! Like something from a poisoned beach!

Anyhoo, longtime readers might be saying, "Why February?" And thank you for asking! It's because our Ben was home through January, and I couldn't bear to be abstemious in the presence of someone so devoted to the culinary hedonism of our family. (He's on some sort of al-fredo cleanse.) Hence now. Sigh. Here I am: clean, Benless, and trudging in the slush. But loving the spring light! And feeling annoyingly great, tbh. Plus, you can't complain about pretend problems you invented for yourself. Or can you? For more clean recipes, Google "Ben and Birdy" with "clean." I should make a category in the recipe index, but I have about as much energy as the kind of person who thinks a leaf of kale might make a fun snack.

In other news, I read this book, Washington Black by Esi Edugyan, and it was breathtakingly good. I stayed up all hours with my headlamp, crying. I also read, and loved, The Great Believers by Rebecca Makkai. 

And this book! I have a piece in it! So fun! Except I made myself cry, reading it out loud in Boston on Monday. Because I am apparently the kind of person who is moved to tears by my own writing. Which, then, made me laugh. While I was crying. Because #kalesnack.

Okay, okay, the smoothie! I have suddenly taken to walnuts--their milky, savory richness--even though everyone else here hates them, and also they seem to burn these weird troubling craters onto my tongue, which might be some kind of sign that I'm choosing to ignore. You could totally use almonds or cashews instead! But I do love the walnuts here with the warmth of the vanilla and the bright, fragrant pearness of the pear. Also? The greens are optional. You can just stuff them in your mouth while the smoothie is blending, get them all nice and choked down before you even sit down with what would otherwise be a simply lovely fruity drink. In which case this is a Single-Green Pear Smoothie.

Double-Green Pear Smoothie

Makes 1 serving

Blend on high until very smooth and all the date nubbins and but chunks and leaves have fully disappeared:

1 little handful of raw walnuts (2 tablespoons?), ideally soaked in water overnight, especially if your blender isn’t super-powerful (or other, less punishing nuts if you prefer)

1 cored and cut-up pear

1 large handful of baby spinach or torn kale

A couple of ice cubes

1 cup of cold water

1 teaspoon of vanilla

1 pitted date

a pinch of salt

Drink right away!

Have a wonderful weekend, my darlings.