Pineapple Smoothie Boats with Special guest Gabriella Quattrone
Intro: Courtney…Courtney Uncooked. I’m Courtney Uncooked cause that’s how I like my food. The vitamins and the minerals, you know they all get through. Absorbed into the body so that nothing gets lost when you start eating raw of your health you’ll be the boss. Raw vegan for my health and you know that health is wealth. To help you stay your best, we will welcome special guests. So let’s go make a recipe and have lots
of fun, your healthy living journey has just begun cause I’m Courtney…Courtney Uncooked.
Courtney: Hi, I’m Courtney Uncooked. And this is my dear sweet friend, Gabi.
Gabi: Hello.
Courtney: Fresh off the boat from Cali. It’s so good to see her. I haven’t seen her in the flesh in two years. We see each other and talk all the time on Facebook and on the phone but I have not seen this beautiful face in two years so today is my lucky day.
Gabi: Happy to be here. Thank you for having me on your show today.
Courtney: Yay!! And Gabi also has her own cooking show on YouTube, called…
Gabi: Excited to Eat with Gabriella Quattrone, check it out.
Courtney: And it’s awesome. And Gabby’s going vegan soon, tell them Gabi.
Gabi: I am thinking about going vegan soon to reduce my impact on the environment.
Courtney: Good for you, Gabi. I’m so proud of you. So definitely check out her YouTube channel. And I hear that you’re writing a book.
Gabi: Yeah, I’m writing something I like to call the Vanlife Cookbook, which highlights low refrigeration and single pot meals…
Courtney: Smart.
Gabi: Which are perfect for life on the road, or if you’re living in a van.
Courtney: Because you used to live in a van.
Gabi: Yes. When I first moved out to California, I lived in a van for two months.
Courtney: I was like no, you can’t live in a van, you’re so cute. Someone will get you.
Gabi: It’s crazy amounts of people living in vans out there.
Courtney: Really.
Gabi: But I have a beautiful apartment now. It’s good.
Courtney: Yeah, but you liked that time in your life?
Gabi: It was, you know, just waking up every morning and being like, the only thing I have to do today is exactly what I want and that’s pretty much it.
Courtney: Wow, I want that.
Gabi: It’s beautiful.
Courtney: Where’s the van let’s go buy one!
Courtney: We’re going to buy a van. Well, cool, I’m so glad you’re here and I know you love pineapple, you’re even wearing a pineapple dress so I had to throw on my pineapple dress.
Gabi: Love it.
Courtney: So, I actually created a pineapple recipe with my dear friend, Paige Welch of Empowered Plant cakes just for you. So, this girl loves to sit on the beach and eat pineapple…
Gabi: Yes.
Courtney: All day long and so I thought you would love this. So, this is just a little bit different because we’re actually going to use the pineapple shell and the entire crown of the pineapple to be our bowl. So, it’s cool, you can recycle the shell and use it as a bowl. You know, I mean it’s better than eating it out of a bowl…
Gabi: Yeah.
Courtney: And before you compost it. So, I did this beforehand because I always get nervous on camera when I’m cutting things. But all you need to do this I swear, is a big sharp knife and you can just slice right through a pineapple, easy-breezy, as long as your knife is big and sharp, then you want to get yourself a little paring knife and then just go around the outside but you always want to make sure that the paring knife is at an angle because if you go straight down, you’re going to go right through your pineapple and then your smoothie bowl is going to get everywhere. So, you want to make sure you go around it at an angle and then this nice little thing down the middle is our pineapple core and you definitely don’t want to eat the pineapple core. So, we’re going to go around one side and then around the other side, again, with your knife at an angle, and you want to freeze this pineapple meat. I usually do this overnight and I keep the shells in the refrigerator so everything is just nice and cold and delicious…
Gabi: Love it.
Courtney: For the next day. So, you’re just going to go around the pineapple core the same way. We’ll get rid of that. Got this beautiful bowl, you really want to get a melon scooper and make sure you get all the delicious meat out of this. You’re just going to scrape in there and just get out as much as you can. And again, we’re just going to freeze all of that and viola that’s it. So, I did the same thing here, went ahead and did it save us some time, and like I said, I also did this last night, so I’ve got my frozen pineapple right here.
Gabi: Wow.
Courtney: So, we’re just going to put in one large pineapple, which gives about three to four cups depending on the size, but you definitely want to get the largest pineapple you can get. And a lot of people say, I don’t know how to tell if a pineapple is ripe, if it’s ready and the way to tell is, if you can just pull a leaf easily right off the top of it, it means it’s ready to go.
Gabi: I did not know that, that’s cool.
Courtney: Yes, that’s all you have to do. There’s actually little tips and tricks for every fruit and vegetable to tell if they’re ripe. So, if you ever have a question, you know, you can just go on duckduckgo.com and find out that answer. So, we’ve got our whole frozen pineapple and then we’re going to do one whole avocado and Gabi,
Gabi: Yes.
Courtney: If you were a fruit, do you know what you’d be?
Gabi: What kind of fruit?
Courtney: Girl, you’d be a fine apple.
Gabi: I love that. That’s hilarious.
Courtney: All right. I won’t quit my day job, okay. So, I’m putting in a whole avocado and then our secret ingredient is going to be 10 basil leaves. It’s delicious. This is just a light and refreshing surprise to have that basil in there. And then a cup of plant-based milk. Your favorite, what is your favorite?
Gabi: Oat milk, I love oat milk. It’s so good.
Courtney: I love oat milk too. But I have to watch my weight so I use almond milk, but I love oat milk and coconut milk would be great with this too. Just coconuts are going to have more natural fat. So that’s it. Those four things are what’s going to go in the boat of our smoothie and that’s it. We’re just going to put them here and our trusty Vitamix which you can now buy at courtneyuncooked.com. I’m always going to start off on low. Look at that. So, it’s turning into such a nice smoothie bowl base.
Gabi: It’s going to be creamy.
Courtney: This has such a nice and sophisticated taste with the basil and the avocado. Very sophisticated tasting, not really sweet. This is not a smoothie bowl you can buy. I mean this is a very unique flavor. I really like that. Look at that.
Gabi: Look at the color.
Gabi: Yes. It’s good. Got to love that Vitamix.
Courtney: Yes. Yes. I love my Vitamix that I purchased for myself at courtneyuncooked.com. So, you’re just going to take this and then empty it here in your smoothie bowl, look at that.
Gabi: That’s such a nice color.
Courtney: Yeah. And you can take that one…
Gabi: Okay.
Courtney: Right there and then you’ve got your topping bar and you can put any toppings on this that you fancy. I like to get some color in there. I like the blue and the blueberries and the red in the strawberries. Anything would taste great with this. So, look how simple that is. And isn’t that so much more fun than like a glass bowl?
Gabi: And it’s such a beautiful color.
Courtney: There are so many recipes that you can just make with a mixing bowl and a knife that are raw and delicious. Oh, man! I forgot the coconut at first. Oh yeah. I just love coconut. So, I’m just putting that… Look at that. That’s like the 4th of July right there. Red, white, and blue right there. That’s pretty.
Gabi: I love that. So beautiful.
Courtney: But I am going to… oh,
Gabi: It’s like a fun craft.
Courtney: Yours is better than mine.
Gabi: Oh my God. It’s just so fun.
Courtney: It is like a craft. And then seeds and nuts because you definitely… you want to get that protein in there. It’s going to be delicious and so good for us.
Gabi: Beautiful.
Courtney: Oh my gosh. Are you ready to try it?
Gabi: Yes, let’s do it.
Courtney: Look at that.
Gabi: Cheers.
Courtney: Okay.
Gabi: That is so creamy, refreshing.
Courtney: Thank you Paige for helping me with this. It’s just so inspiring and just gives me this reggae, rasta, Caribbean vibe.