I have one of the 500W Cook's Essentials Smoothie Makers and I LOVE it. It's loud & noisy but the spout has never gotten clogged. Now it fully smoothes, so no whole pieces (such as fruit, etc) are left to get clogged. Nor has cleaning been a problem, but I always clean right after use. The only problem is the plastic...the spout cracked yesterday during blending. Ideally I'd like a commercial blender. But if anyone knows of where to get replacement parts for the Cook's Essential the please let me know.

Kate, I lurk over here once in awhile, and happened to see your post. I do smoothies in several ways. Recently I've bought some little push-up containers for freezing and I'm making popsicles that are 'the bomb' - excuse the pun. I'll start with two recipes for popsicles that were given to me 30 years ago, and they easily converted to sugar-free, fat-free. The first is for fudgesicles. Mix a 3 oz box of instant sugar free chocolate pudding mix according to package directions, using nonfat milk. Then blend in a ?13 oz? can of nonfat evaporated milk (not the sweetened kind, just plain evap milk. If you're not watching your fat grams, regular evap milk makes a creamier fudgesicle, but these aint half bad.) Pour into molds and freeze. (If you're not on a diet, a cup or two of brewed flavored coffee and a can of that sweetened evap milk, frozen, is also yummy. But I digress......) The second is for dripless popsicles. It calls for a 3 oz box of any flavor Jell-o, mixed according to package directions. Do not chill. Instead, add a can of evap milk to make a "Dreamsicle", or 2 cups of mixed fruit, (mashed or pureed). Pour into molds and freeze. Now, for what I call a "milkshake", soften 2 tsp. of unflavored gelatin in about 1/2 cup water. Then place this in the microwave until the gelatin has melted and the mixture is kinda like eggwhite. This takes only 30 seconds or so. Into your blender, place whatever kind of fruit strikes your fancy. I like peach, banana or strawberry the best, or a mixture. Maybe about a cup. Add about half cup of water. If you want it like a smoothie you would not add dry milk, but I add 1/3 cup dry milk because I like it better that way. Start the blender, and while it is whirring, pour in the hot gelatin. Then start dropping ice into the blender until the mixture thickens and becomes smooth. Pour into a glass and eat it with a spoon. If your fruit is not sweet enough on its own, add some artificial sweetener or sugar. Smoothies can be made with all kinds of different fruits, and lot of times I just throw frozen fruit into the blender in lots of different combinations: plum and banana with some frozen apple juice concentrate. Canned pineapple and frozen strawberry with some frozen orange juice concentrate. Something tart with something sweet, you know? You can leave out the gelatin if you don't want to go to the trouble, but I like the smooth creaminess it gives to the finished product. You can make a very nice 'cheesecake' by using the gelatin, fat-free cream cheese, some dry milk powder and lemonade concentrate. Of course there's sugar in the lemonade concentrate. You can also make a 'chocolate shake' by using the gelatin mixture recipe, replacing the fruit with 1 cup water and another 1/3 cup of nonfat dry milk powder, and adding maybe a tablespoon of cocoa. I like to go to Allrecipes.com and I notice they're featuring a lot of smoothie recipes there. So if none of these appeal to you, try there. They have a search function you can use, just search on 'smoothie'. I'm not connected to them in any way, I just like the site. Oh, and BTW, lots of things can be frozen and eaten without thawing (besides cookies, but I'm digressing again...). Grapes are delicious frozen, as are blueberries, peaches and apple slices (dip the apple slices in salt water, drain and freeze, 1 tbsp to a gallon -- do the math for smaller quantities, you don't taste it and it keeps the apple from turning). Bananas can be frozen in the skin, but not for a very long tine. To eat, run water over the skin to thaw it a bit, score it down the length of the banana and pry up along one edge. It will peel right off, usually in one piece. The skin will have blackened but the banana inside is still yellow and creamy. My kids used to call frozen banana 'ice cream'. LOL You must eat it while it's frozen though because when it thaws it's not a pretty sight. Watermelon and cantaloupe make wonderful popsicles. The trick is to puree them first. Cantaloupe is wonderful blended into apricot jello for popsicles. I think they have watermelon flavor jello now but I haven't tried it. There are all kinds of possibilities for smoothies, and any smoothie can be made into a popsicle. If you're interested, I bought my popsicle push-up molds at organize.com (not affiliated with them either). They're called cool cones. I like them very much. They don't leak out the bottoms so when I freeze them I set them upright in the freezer and let the 'stems' hang down between the wires of the shelf until they're solid. I hope this helps! --Ilene

Lavenderlace: I tested the below research: https://stumptuous.com/fat-sugar-metabolic-derangement "High-fat (HF) and high-fat/high-sugar (HFHS) diets both raised blood lipids. However: only rats on HFHS (fat plus sugar) diet developed hyperglycemia, hyperinsulinemia, glucose intolerance and a diminished insulin response to a glucose load. " When I'm busy, I gulped one glass of juice for energy (100% juice with natural sugar) .. that kept my blood-sugar stabilized to finish a task for 1 hour longer. And a glass of soy milk (7 g. protein) & brewer's yeast & honey lasts me 4 hours without eating. Recently I did something different: finish the last bar of Klondite ice-cream (230 calories, 14 g of fat, 20 g white sugar) & sweet & greasy. Right after that, my blood sugar crashed, I was unbearably hungry and had to eat a meal immediately. I checked the ingredients: it has sugar & corn syrup (high fructose corn syrup). A little of fat plus protein is useful to keep one full. But fat plus sugar induce more hunger. I tested blueberry-smoothie made with 0% fat Greek yogurt versus 2% fat yogurt, and the 2% fat yogurt is more filling & last longer. CONCLUSION: Fat & protein & veggies is a good combo. Fat is needed to absorb the nutrients in veggies better. We have a friend who's a vegetarian and he ALWAYS USE full-fat salad-dressing, plus full-fat cheese on his salads, and he's just as skinny as husband in their late 50's. I used coconut oil to make banana muffin, and olive oil in my cooking. Here's what the Dean of Nutrition, Harvard Medical School said about coconut oil: http://www.health.harvard.edu/staying-healthy/coconut-oil "Coconut oil is about 90% saturated fat, which is a higher percentage than butter (about 64% saturated fat), beef fat (40%), or even lard (also 40%). Too much saturated fat in the diet is unhealthy because it raises "bad" LDL cholesterol levels, which increases the risk of heart disease. So it would seem that coconut oil would be bad news for our hearts. But what's interesting about coconut oil is that it also gives "good" HDL cholesterol a boost. But, for now, I'd use coconut oil sparingly. Most of the research so far has consisted of short-term studies to examine its effect on cholesterol levels. We don't really know how coconut oil affects heart disease. And I don't think coconut oil is as healthful as vegetable oils like olive oil and soybean oil, which are mainly unsaturated fat and therefore both lower LDL and increase HDL. Coconut oil's special HDL-boosting effect may make it "less bad" than the high saturated fat content would indicate, but it's still probably not the best choice among the many available oils to reduce the risk of heart disease. — Walter C. Willett, M.D. Harvard School of Public Health Department of Nutrition Harvard Health Letter Editorial Board" *** From Straw: Just tested Solgar Brewer's yeast (made from beets). It's less tasty than NOW brand (sold out at local health food store). Solgar BY has a "plastic" & artificial taste to it, and less acidic than NOW. So I'll use Solgar BY for my roses, and still need to buy NOW brewer's yeast when they stock up.

I love the green throat. Supposed to have 35 buds and 4 way branching! I may have to go to my HD. I had been wanting Orange Velvet