The weather is starting to get warmer and I find myself in the mood for smoothies more often now. Smoothies are a frequent after-school snack for the boys on warm sunny days, as you might recall from my post on after school snack ideas. I let the kids customize their drinks by tossing in whatever fruit they can find in the fridge and/or freezer. When my bananas get overripe, I cut them up and put them in the freezer so that we can use them in smoothies. My favourite add-in is pineapple. There’s just something about pineapple. It makes the smoothie frothy and sweet without adding extra sugar.
The thing I love about smoothies is that you can pack a lot of nutrition into one drink, and you can sneak in healthy ingredients that your kids might otherwise balk at. I’ve been known to add things like kale, spinach, chia seeds, oats, oat bran, and flax seeds in our smoothies without anyone noticing.
When KURA Nutrition offered to send me some of their smoothie starter powder to try, I was very interested. I had actually never used protein powder before, and I was curious to try it out in our smoothies. I learned that KURA’s powder has pure protein from grass-fed, free-roaming cows from New Zealand. And it has so much more than just protein – it also has loads of vitamins, fibre, Omega-3s and probiotics. It has all the stuff I want in my smoothie, and none of the stuff I want to avoid, like added sugar, preservatives, and artificial sweeteners, flavours and colours.
Here’s a breakdown of what each serving contains:
– 14 grams of KURA’s pure, bioavailable protein
– 100% RDA of Vitamin D, C B6, B12 and six other vitamins & minerals
– 26 essential vitamins and minerals
– 5 grams of fiber
– 5.4 grams or 4 times the Omega-3’s found in a single serving of Salmon
– 4 billion CFU Active Probiotics
– Prebiotics
– GMO Free
– Gluten-Free
– No Added Sugar – only natural occurring lactose from milk
– No Preservatives
– No artificial sweeteners, flavours or colours
So what was the Whine Critics’ verdict?
A big thumbs up! All three of the kids really loved the smoothies with KURA smoothie starters, and so did I. It made our smoothies really rich and creamy. You can even skip the yogurt and bananas and still get a nice creamy smoothie with this powder. It comes in three flavours: berry, chocolate, and vanilla. We use the berry one a lot, usually adding in frozen blueberries, fresh strawberries, ice, and milk (I like almond milk in mine). I liked the vanilla powder with pineapple (of course!) and oranges. It reminded me of an Orange Julius. I think everyone’s favourite, though, was chocolate. We had a chocolate, banana, and peanut butter smoothie that was to die for. I wish I had a photo but we gulped it up too quickly!
Giveaway!
KURA is giving one lucky winner a 16.9 oz bag of each of the three flavors of KURA and a shaker bottle ($85 US value). This contest is open to residents of Canada and the U.S. and will run from Friday April 10 until Friday, April 24. Good luck!
And, I also have a discount code for you to use if you’re purchasing KURA products on Amazon, valid until April 30 2015: KURAFOODS
Disclosure: I received complimentary products from KURA for the purpose of this review. This post contains Amazon affiliate links. All opinions in this post are my own.
My kids like to whine, especially when it comes to the food they eat, but that doesn’t stop me from trying to make tasty and healthy meals for them. Follow along as I share family-friendly recipes and reviews from my picky family members, who I lovingly call “The Whine Critics.” 
