I am a breakfast type of person. I rarely skip breakfast and always enjoy the morning ritual of preparing and serving breakfast. My breakfast tastes though change with the seasons. In the cold days that make for almost 2/3 of the year down here I prefer energy-dense foods that keep me warm and give me extra energy for the day like wholegrain porridge, oatmeal, home-baked muffins, occasionally pancakes, etc. When the hot weather hits and the temperatures start raising my appetite turns to light breakfasts that referesh me and keep me hydrated. Enter fresh fruit smoothies. They are my most preferred summer breakfast. Not only are smoothies easy to prepare but the variety is so rich that you can never get tired of trying yet another smoothie. Basically, a good smoothy has three main components:

• A base – this could be any fleshy fruit – a banana, a pear, a melon, etc
• A flavor – it is best achieved by berries – strawberries, blackberries, blueberries, raspberries or a combinations; but you can also try with cherries, figs, pineapple, etc
• A booster – this might be a nutritional booster like a superfood e.g. bee pollen, maca, spirulina, cacao nibs, wheatgrass, etc; and/or a taste booster – a spoon of honey, a couple of dates, stevia or agave, a spoon of coconut butter or almond butter etc

All of the above components now need some liquid to be blended together. You may use either nut milk, freshly squeezed fruit juice or coconut water. A nice trick especially for the summer is to freeze the base fruit for a few hours in advance. Thus your smoothie will be cool and creamy beating any milkshake you have ever tried! Now picture my perfect morning – early hours, the air is still fresh, the birds are chirping outside, the morning sun is creeping through the window and a loving couple of sun beams is dancing on my dining table. I slowly sip my smoothie savouring each tasteful gulp. This is my time of the day, my 15 minutes of peace, silence and pleasure. After I finish breakfast, I love to spend a few minutes in meditation or reflection, or just mindlessly watching the dance of the sun beams or reading a few pages from a favourite book. Such peaceful mornings tune me perfectly for the day to come. And even if later I face some stressful situations I react much less emotionally compared to the way I would do after a hectic, breakfast-less morning. Mentioning favoutite books, I have been a huge admirer to poetry since my teenage years. At that time I didn’t have constant Internet access and there weren’t many paper editions of poetry books in the bookstores in my home town. Occasionally, I visited the English book-store in the nearby city with some friends and always looked forward impatiently to this trip! I clearly remember how in my pursue for good poetry books I took the single copy of Emily Dickinson’s poetry from the local library, made a photocopy and filled a scrape-book with the copied poems and letters. Later on, when my English teacher gave me as a present a hard-cover collection of English poets, I was happy beyond words. And still keep it. And still open it now and then, flipping through the yellow pages, marveling the verses, feeling both grateful and elated from touching that source of inspiration… And then the baby wakes up! Time to go, guys! See you next time and enjoy your smoothie!

Strawberry-banana smoothie

Ingredients:

• 1 frozen banana
• 1 cup fresh strawberries, preferably organic
• 1-2 dates
• 1 tsp almond butter (optional)
• ½ tsp bee pollen (only if you are not allergic)
• 1 cup non-dairy milk

Preparation: Place all ingredients in a blender and blend until smooth. Serve immediately.