Brainy Strawberry & Vanilla Smoothie Bowl
A yummy creamy bowl of smooshed up berries, seeds and silken tofu which make a totally delicious and filling breakfast for families in a rush. This recipe takes less than a minute to whizz up! Also makes a great after school or after sport snack for hungry kids. Eat out of a bowl with a spoon, slurp through a straw in a cup or freeze and make into ice lollies.
Silken tofu is a key ingredient to nourish plant-based families with calcium and iron. 100g of silken tofu contains 350mg calcium and 5.4mg of iron which is about two thirds of toddlers’ daily need. Ideally buy organic tofu if possible. Suitable from the early days of weaning from 6 months.
It also helps to nourish children’s brains with healthy fats called phospholipids which keep the membranes of brain cells flexible and able to communicate with each other – this is called neuroplasticity. Neuroplasticity is how the human brain can adapt to new environments and situations, master new skills as well as store memories and information. Neuroplasticity also explains how the brain can recover after a traumatic brain injury.
Phospholipids are super important for concentration and memory as well as speech development. They also help with emotional regulation, stress response and healthy sleep patterns.
Silken tofu and hulled hemp seeds are two of mother nature’s sources of phospholipids. You can swap these to cream cheese, peanut butter or sunflower seeds if you prefer, which are also packed with brainy phospholipids.
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Brainy Strawberry & Vanilla Smoothie Bowl
Ingredients
- 1 Bananas (fresh or frozen)
- 225 g Strawberries (fresh or frozen)
- 150 g Tofu (Silken tofu, eg. Clearspring organic)
- 1 tbsp Hemp Seeds (hulled)
- 0.5 tsp Vanilla Extract
Instructions
- Peel and chop the banana and remove the leaves from the strawberries.
- Place all the ingredients in a blender and smoosh up for 30 seconds if the ingredients are fresh or a minute if the fruit is frozen.
- Serve out of a bowl and decorate with extra banana and strawberry slices and a sprinkle of hulled hemp seeds.
Notes
Per serving. Nutrition content in food is never consistent, so take these estimates with a pinch of salt! Also, our recipes tend to use low-GI carbs and sugars, so these values are not directly comparable with shop-bought UPFs.
Thanks for the recipe! You mention cream cheese as a good alternative to hemp seeds. Does that include brands such as Philadelphia? I never know if it’s good or bad! Thank you
Try and get a carrageenan-free cream cheese – most own supermarket versions are free from carrageenan
My daughter does not like banana, can it be substituted for something else?
It does not taste much of banana, so it could be a good (re)introduction to banana for her! – but if you want this banana-free then swap to half an avocado and 2-3 dates (stones removed). I hope she loves it!
She asked me if there was banana in it… used half an avocado and 3 dates!
Thanks for the recipe. I’ve just made this for breakfast for my 8 and 11 year old who loved it!
Hi Lucinda, my little boy is 3 and has low iron levels so I think this will be a fantastic one for him. Also I was really interested in the nutritional information here as you mention phospholipids. I was recently diagnosed with Antiphospholipid syndrome and wondered if you knew anything about the condition that might help?
Hi Jane – I hope the iron helps! In terms of antiphospholipid syndrome, this is when antibodies generally target certain proteins in the blood which bind to phospholipids – so the additional dietary phospholipids are not necessarily going to help – but tackling the underlying autoimmunity might. I hope this is helpful.