Red Velvet Cake

Does anyone not think about cake?  I don’t mean constantly but perhaps in fleeting moments?  Like when you are out running or walking in the early morning and you pass that neighborhood bakery that’s gearing up for the day and pow! you get a face full of warm, caramelized-sugar, bakery air?  It always makes me think, “yeah, cake, I love you” in an internal Barry White voice.  Full disclosure here, I probably think about cake more than the average person:  

I used to be a pastry chef in one of my previous careers and I’m still somewhat obsessive about cake…actually since I’m getting this all out, really I am a PIE person, as in “last meal” wishes and all.  Show me a blackberry-nectarine pie and I will make the time for it.  Me and pie, we have a thing going on (ok not Barry White, but the same idea).

To abruptly change the subject (sorry Mr. White, et al) I recently obtained a juicer.  I’ve been juicing the hell out of everything.  If I could get blood from a stone I would put it in the damn juicer.  It turns out that I love juice!  Of course there are the usual suspects (carrot, apple) and the perhaps more daring (kale, turnip) and so far I like it all.  Somehow is seems kinda fancy to be drinking my veggies from a glass now and then.  Wasteful you say?  Oh noooo, all of that leftover pulp goes into other things (chili, spaghetti sauce, meatloaf, homemade veggie crackers).  Pretty much nothing is wasted.  Every time I juice, the pulp either goes directly into some food thing or I pop it in the freezer for later use.  This has resulted in quite a bit of experimentation.

Ok so what the heck is cake (pie, pastry, etc) doing in a blog post for Juno “Fitness” other than the fact that I’m kind of a chazzer, and what the heck am I doing luring you in with talk of “Red Velvet” when there is clearly no damn cake to be had?  And what is all this about juice?  Well, I was recently considering baking a red velvet cake I found out that in addition to a red color producing reaction between (acidic) buttermilk and cocoa, beets are often used bump up the red color.   Thankfully I managed to talk myself out of making (and eating) an actual cake but in the interest of science (and yumminess) I decided to try and make a red velvet smoothie that would satisfy both nutritional needs and a little of my sugar-mongering-piggishness.  Enter Red Velvet Beet Smoothie!  With this smoothie you won’t get that that tactile springy-moist-white-flour-refined-sugar cake crumb on your tongue but you also won’t end up with it on your ass.  Plus it’s pretty to look at and tasty too.

Red Velvet Smoothie

Tasty and RED!

1/2 - 2/3 C fresh beet juice (from ~3 medium beets, raw, peeled)

1 C kefir (you could go old school and use buttermilk I suppose but I had kefir)

1/2 scoop whey protein powder

2T golden flax seed meal

2T cocoa powder

1 tsp vanilla extract

optional/to taste:

additional sweetener (I used a dash of stevia, but use whatever you like)

water

ice

Put everything in a blender, blend the heck out of it, and enjoy

-Willow