Smoothie made with greens, flax, and berries?

[TinaMaverick]

Spinach and kale, sprouted flax meal and unsweetened frozen berries. 

[jmcbn]

Smoothies are discouraged regardless if the ingredients are compliant because they tend to be high in sugar, and because you drink rather than chew them they leave you feeling less satiated. This is because it is the act of chewing that starts the digestive process.

Flax seed, whilst compliant is not ideal. It's grouped with nuts & seeds on Whole and is a fat, and one whose use should be limited.

We'd really prefer & recommend that you eat your food - Here's the official take on it:
 

Smoothies: We’d rather you didn’t

This is a very popular question, with a very unpopular answer. Smoothies (generally made using lots of fruit) are technically compliant on your Whole30, but we strongly recommend against it. Food that you drink sends different satiety signals to your brain than food that you chew. So when you drink your meal, your brain isn’t getting the feedback it needs to tell your body that it’s had enough of what it needs. Plus, smoothies are generally really fruit-heavy, and starting your day off with a liquid sugar-bomb sets you up for cravings, hunger, and volatile energy levels throughout the day. In summary, we’d rather you just eat the food, and skip the smoothie.

 

[Tom Denham]

Conventional wisdom is that smoothies are good, healthy choices. Conventional wisdom is WRONG. 

 

Liquid food digests faster than whole foods that you chew. So the same amount of food consumed as a smoothie will lead to hunger faster than it would if you chewed the food and ate it in bites. Getting hungry faster is okay if you are wanting to gain weight and are trying to eat more all the time, but is a really bad idea if you are a normal person. 

 

Smoothies typically lead to eating problematic portion sizes. People routinely eat more fruit in a smoothie than they would or should eat as whole food. 

 

Flax is touted as a superfood as a delivery vehicle for omega3 fatty acids. It is not. Unfortunately, flax is rich with the ALA form of omega3 fatty acids. Our bodies are not good at converting ALA to the forms of omega3s that we can actually use - DHA and EPA. So consuming flax proves to be a tease most of the time. The omega3s are expelled as waste without being accessed because our bodies can't use ALA. Cows and chickens can convert ALA. It is best to feed farm animals flax and then eat them.

 

This smoothie includes no meaningful protein. No protein means it is woefully inadequate as a meal. 

 

I began the Whole30 journey so long ago, smoothies were not discouraged. I got a Vitamix blender and made smoothies. Back in that era, I had to eat 5-6 meals per day to be satisfied. Part of the problem was smoothies. I would be absolutely stuffed after drinking an avocado, orange, spinach, carrot smoothie, but get hungry 2 hours later even if I ate 2-3 boiled eggs or some chicken with the smoothie. As time went on and I heard more negative things about smoothies, I quit making them even though the Vitamix blender was a gift from my wife. I found it easy to downshift to 4-5 meals and soon was happy eating 4 meals per day. With a little more skill composing meals, I am now satisfied eating 3 meals per day and I am a ferocious, big-appetite eater.  

 

Do yourself a favor and break with conventional wisdom and abandon smoothies.