Strawberry Kiwi Smoothie

Every summer for the past 2 or 3 years I try to go sugar free for at least two weeks, or as long as my sugar addicted self can possibly stand without having a nervous breakdown ;) I usually wait until after my birthday, but this year I decided to take the plunge a few weeks earlier. I'm doing things a bit differently this time though, for the first week (I started yesterday...) I'm just cutting out extra sugar - like cookies, ice cream, and snacks that are high in sugar, instead of just taking every single thing that has sugar out of my diet without easing myself into it.
A few sugary things I'm keeping this week are coffee and tea... next week I'll cut out coffee - I don't enjoy black coffee, and somehow honey-sweetened coffee doesn't sound appetizing ;) And I'll start putting honey into my tea instead of sugar. During these times I satisfy my sweet tooth with fruit, smoothies and sugar-less juices. Usually my smoothies are just yogurt, strawberries and bananas, but I wanted to try something different this time. I looked up a few smoothie recipes, and found one that looked pretty good, but needed a bit of modification. Here's what I came up with. Usually when I'm on a sugar free kick, I have to add lots of honey to my smoothies, but this needed no added sweetness, it was absolutely perfect, with just a touch of tartness. Makes a beautiful pale pink smoothie, that would be perfect garnished with a bright slice of kiwi or a small strawberry.
Enjoy!

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I use organic cream top yogurt - it's the closest store-bought gets to homemade. I also used pineapple and orange juices that had no water or sugar added, just pure juice. If you're using frozen strawberries, omit the ice at the end, I just added it to give the smoothie a bit more texture.


Strawberry Kiwi Smoothie
Ingredients
• 1/2 a banana
• 6 strawberries
• 1 kiwi
• 1/2 cup plain yogurt
• 1/2 cup pineapple juice
• 1/4 cup orange juice
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla
• handful of icecubes

Directions

1. Peel kiwi and banana, cut tops off strawberries. Place ingredients in a blender and blend until smooth.