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Today please welcome Shirley from Gluten Free Easily!

If memory serves me correctly, Shirley is one of the very first bloggers I met in the GF community (or maybe it’s just that it feels as if we’ve known each other a long time!). Somehow, we got to chatting via email, and I discovered that Shirley is one of those open, friendly, and generous bloggers who automatically makes blogging newbies feel welcome and comfortable. If you’ve got a question or a problem, she’s always happy to help.

Shirley is also really active within her local gluten-free community, helping folks to learn more about the GF lifestyle and living gluten-free EASILY–using real, whole foods that are naturally gluten-free. She has a wealth of knowledge about living gluten-free and maintaining a healthy gluten-free lifestyle; and any time I have questions about what is or isn’t gluten-free (or how to find out), Shirley is my go-to person!

Her blog is also filled with a huge array of yummy, foolproof recipes, many of them vegan. She may be known for her crustless pies, but some other treats I’ve also enjoyed include the Pumpkin Spice Latte, Brazilian Un-Cheese Rolls/Biscuits, Flourless Egg-Free Nut Butter Cookies, and the crazy-good Chocolate Chip Samoa-Taste Cookies. All were huge hits with the HH, too!

Last summer, I had the great pleasure of finally meeting Shirley in person when she came to Toronto to speak at a conference and we shared a fabulous dinner at Il Fornello with a couple of other bloggers. I’m happy to report that she is just as warm, affable, and good-humored in person as she is on her blog. That’s one of my favorite benefits of blogging: getting to meet up with old, dear friends–whom you’ve never met before!

Today, Shirley shares another quick and easy treat–one with fruit AND vegetables.

I’m so honored to be sharing a guest post on Ricki’s blog today. I’ve been a fan of Ricki’s for years! I actually got to meet her “In Real Life” last summer — a definite highlight of 2013!

You all know that Ricki is a doll and she creates such incredible recipes. She is truly ingenious with her creations — offering a complexity of flavors and textures in her recipes. When Ricki creates a recipe with just a few ingredients using a very simple, easy concept, she almost apologizes by putting it in its own category; i.e., “flash in the pan.” Honestly, I often love those recipes more than her other recipes — and that’s saying a lot!

You see…I am all about those kinds of recipes all the time. Those recipes are the essence of my gluten free easily approach, which some might call too easy or borrrring … or simply lazy. Ha! So I like to support my propensity for simplicity with quotes like this one: “There is great satisfaction hidden within simplicity.” Thanks to Anthony Douglas Williams for that one, and I really think this wisdom can be true for food and life in general.

Most often, I love simple recipes that are made with real food, whole food that I have on hand. This Carrot Colada that I’m sharing today qualifies.

I don’t have a juicer because I am pretty sure that I’d consume more of the sweet juices than I’d need, but occasionally I purchase fresh carrot juice and add it to my smoothies. (And I also love it when friends with juicers come for extended visits and we juice daily!) Carrots are healthy and naturally sweet, of course, and carrot juice brings those factors plus such a lovely orange color to smoothies.

With this Carrot Colada, I added just a few other ingredients that I always have in my refrigerator, freezer, and pantry. That would be bananas (I won’t tell you how many are in my freezer right now; I’m a banana hoarder!), coconut milk (my favorite non-dairy milk), and baby spinach (great for salads of course, but wonderful for both its nutrition and mild flavor in smoothies as well). This Carrot Colada is so simple yet so satisfying and good for you!

Incidentally, if you’re a big fan of pineapple in your coladas — as in pina coladas — you can certainly add some to this recipe (I’d skip the rum though, especially in the a.m.), but this Carrot Colada is plenty sweet “as is” and offers you enough of a tropical vibe with only the bananas and coconut milk.

Print This!

Carrot Colada [see ACD variation below] 2 cups (480 ml) carrot juice [for ACD, use a combo of carrot and celery]

2 bananas, preferably frozen [for the ACD, use frozen pears]

1 cup (240 ml) coconut milk (full fat or lite; I use canned, but you can use coconut milk in a carton)

1 handful baby spinach (more or less, to taste; Ricki’s note: I used about 2 cups/480 ml) Add all to your Vitamix (or any good blender) and blend, slowly increasing from low to high, until the spinach is fully incorporated. (This will only take about a minute or so.) Serve. I like to drink half in the morning and the other half for my afternoon snack. Makes 2 servings. Suitable for: ACD Maintenance, sugar-free, gluten-free, grain-free, dairy-free, egg free, soy-free, nut free, vegan. Variation for earlier stages: Use juice of one carrot instead of 2 cups juice along with juice of 2 celery stalks; add enough water to reach 2 cups (240 ml). Use 2 frozen pears to replace the bananas. [suitable for stage 2 or later this way.]

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Shirley Braden has lived gluten free since June 2003. She is a long-time gluten-free support group leader as well as a local, state, national, and international speaker. She teaches gluten-free individuals how to live easily, economically, and healthily with her gluten free easily–gfe—approach. Her award-winning blog by the same name is very popular. Find Shirley on Facebook and twitter.



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