Red smoothie

I've been in the habit for a very long time of having a smoothie for breakfast most days.  Always Mon-Thurs, and sometimes the other days. 

In my smoothie, I put spinach, frozen fruit (classic medley, which is peaches, strawberries, pineapple and grapes), and soy milk.  At some point in the last year or so, I started adding Vega protein powder and chia seeds.  And at some point in the last few months, I've started doing half the liquid as carrot juice (and half soy milk).

Well, last night, we had our neighbors over for dinner.  I couldn't tell you where I read about the recipe, but someone posted about having found the best veggie burger recipe, and compared it to Houston's (which is my favorite restaurant veggie burger, though I haven't been there in years). 

So for quite some time yesterday, I was cooking.  The burgers were primarily made of beets, brown rice and black beans, along with prunes, onions, garlic and spices.  They didn't hold together too well, but they were indeed delicious.  Just a bit labor-intensive, which I didn't mind on a weekend.

After roasting the beets, you had to skin them and grate them.  Then you were supposed to put the grated beets in a strainer and press out the juice.  The recipe said to press the juice into a bowl if you wanted to use it for another purpose.

I decided to do that.  I didn't end up with much beet juice, but maybe a couple tablespoons' worth? 

Anyway, I added it to my smoothie this morning.  Absolutely no difference in the taste (I think I'd have to have more than a couple tablespoons to have an impact), but it made a huge difference in appearance!

Usually, my smoothies are kind of a grey-brown color, with a bit of a green undertone.  If I add cherries as a frozen fruit, it can be a bit more pink or red.  But today was red, red, red.  It looked like a berry smoothie and was somehow even more enjoyable because it looked so good. 

Anyway, no FMM today I guess, and so I had to post something to procrastinate on going to work.  This is going to be week 2 on the new IT system -- hopefully less painful than last week, but I have no doubt it's still going to suck...