The Best 50 Smoothies Paperback – February 1, 1995

Nobody would confuse me with a good cook, but this book gets my total endorsement. Simple, straight forward ingredients that result in tasty drinks. Also includes helpful hints that were, not surprisingly, new to me.

This is a no-frills idea book. No pretty pictures, no gratuitous white-space, no full-page smoothie portraits--just a diverse yet basic collection of mostly common-ingredient smoothie suggestions.If it's bang for the buck you want, this book is money well-spent--especially if you aren't afraid to creatively enhance some of these drinks with what's on hand to make them your own.The simplicity of this spartan little book will set you and your blender free because this book is anything but intimidating; it begins with some helpful hints, several pages of possible garnishes, possible fruits, possible sweeteners, and an assortment of creamy bases.The book itself is lackluster and uninteresting but it works for me. Actually, I like the nuts-and-bolts approach. You're buying recipies here, not a smoothie video. If it's important that the color of your smoothie match your tablecloth and napkins, better try a different book.

`Ultimate Smoothies' by Donna Pliner Rodnitsky and `The Best 50 Smoothies' by Joanna White are the fourth and fifth smoothies books I am reviewing and it is appropriate to review them together and not review them in the same context as the first three, `The Smoothies Bible' by Pat Crocker, `The Ultimate Smoothies Book' by Cherie Calbom, and `Smoothies for Life' by Daniella Chace and Maureen B. Keane in that these two little books do not profess to be a comprehensive work on smoothies. They just profess to be little books on `the best' recipes.It is painfully obvious from the outset that the second of these two, `The Best 50 Smoothies' does not live up to its title. The first reason is that there is not a single recipe in the book with a vegetable ingredient. For those, in detail, you want to go to `The Smoothies Bible' or `The Ultimate Smoothies Book', especially the latter if you have a juicer and like to use it. The second reason is that this book contains no smoothies with any alcoholic ingredients. Even the smoothies with names copied from famous alcoholic drinks such as the Mint Julep contains no alcohol. I strongly believe that among the true top 50 smoothies are at least five containing alcohol and at least five with at least one vegetable ingredient such as either tomato or carrot juice. Thus, I dismiss this book from further consideration.The `Ultimate Smoothies' is a different story altogether. While it contains no vegetable ingredients, I will forgive it, as it makes no claim to being a collection of all the best recipes. It is only claiming to have 125 from among the best recipes for smoothies, freezes, and blasts. And, the book gets extra credit for including a very nice selection of recipes that include alcohol in some form or another. Even `The Smoothies Bible', the best general book on the subject has no `adult' recipes. I anticipate reviewing at least one more book on smoothies, but for the moment, if what you really want is just a collection of good, fun recipes, then `Ultimate Smoothies' is for you!Even if you are just into smoothies for the fun of it, this book has excellent nutritional information for each recipe, nicely located in a box at the bottom of the page, at the same place on each page so you can easily flip through the recipes with an eye on the calorie count to find ones which fit a particular calorie range or low fat recipes or low carb recipes or low sodium recipes or high beta-carotene recipes or high or low whatever the nutritional fad of the day may be. This feature justifies the otherwise annoying slim Jim book format where pages are more than twice as long as they are wide.A not inconsiderable virtue of this book is the fun names given to all the recipes, divided up into five chapters concentrating on:Back to Basics: Classic recipesSmoooothies: Recipes heavy on dairy.Rx Smoothies: Recipes focusing on especially healthy combinations.Outrageously Decadent: Lots of chocolate and sweets.Black Tie Only: An adult swim with rum, cordials, and other ethanolic pleasures.A second feature of this book not found in any of the bigger volumes is a chapter on garnishes. And, this is not a five-page throwaway. There are 29 recipes including the same nutritional analysis as we get for the smoothie recipe. This is a not inconsiderable virtue as some garnishes can easily double the calories of the serving, although many, such as the fruit chips are very low in calories.If you want only one book on smoothies, especially if you plan to use them with entertaining, this is clearly the best of the crop. It is entertainingly written and the recipes are clearly written, although I would have liked metric measurements to accompany the English units. If your primary interest is in health, get `The Smoothie Bible'. Otherwise, this book is highly recommended.

Waste of money. Could have saved money and searched the for what I paid. But my chlid is having a ok time.

many many selection of smoothies, very cooling and light for the summer by the pool or just home sitting in the hourse; try it for yourself you will enjoy the smoothies

I love making smoothies at home because I can put the exact amount of sugar and ingredients in them that I want. However, after awhile you run out of ideas. This book has plenty more recipes for your smoothie taste - fruit ones and vegetable ones too.

Simply put, this book is a little boring. It actually even looks boring. The colors are flat, and the design choices just seem really dated. As for the recipes themselves, there are some good ones. There aren't any I thought were "out of this world", but I have picked a few that are part of my regular rotation. However, I think the ingredient lists require quite a few different items. In other words, the recipes require you to have a selection of flavorings, frozen fruit, and the like, always on hand, some of which are a bit unusual. I wish there were substitutions listed to help me use common ingredients that I'm more likely to have on hand. So, I'd say that while I have used this book, it was something I could have also done without.

The recipes looked great, but I always just went with the basic stuff and never tried anything special. I don't know what ever happened to the book, but if you have the desire I'm sure you'll love it. I believe my sister did use it for a while when she moved into my house for a few months. She was always reading it and telling me about the recipes. She used to make some good smoothies.So if you have a wife or a sister that moves in, get her this book. She might make you some tasty treats.