The blood oranges are abundant in the grocery store lately, and they just beckoned for some cocktail action. This recipe is a twist on the classic Screwdriver, with a custom juice blend to provide the right amount of sweetness and lemony “zing”.

What is a Blood Orange?

As the name suggests (the photos here demonstrate), blood oranges are red on the inside. The pigment in the red color comes from anthocyanin, a powerful antioxidant that appears as either red or blue in fruits and vegetables such as cherries, blueberries, eggplant, or red cabbage.

The blood orange is less sweet, but with a mellow flavor not unlike what one finds in cherries. High in Vitamin C (apparently up to 130% of the recommended daily allowance), it’s not a bad way to get a boost for your immune system and skin health.

Well, anyway… sounds like a good enough excuse as any for a zingy, brilliantly colored cocktail.

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If you’re like me, you frequently pass by the Exotic Fruits section at the grocery store and survey with wonder at some of the cool stuff lining the bins… but then keep on walking, because what does one actually do with these things, other than slice them up and use them as garnish?

It’s not like you’re likely to bite into a juicy Star Fuit to sate your hunger, or throw a Prickly Pear into your bag so you have something to munch when you’re on the go!

But turns out… these two exotic fruits made wonderful Mono-Smoothies! Both are quite delicate, not acidic at all (my youngest son: “Hey, this is really good, even after brushing my teeth!”). They each have a slightly exotic flavor, but it’s highly nuanced.

And that Prickly Pear… I did not know that the flesh of the this fruit was fuschia… one of my very favorite food colors!

So, the next time you’re passing by that Exotic Fruits aisle… pick a few Star Fuits and Prickly Pears up and whip up a few Mono-Smoothies when you get home. These are two smoothies that pretty much anyone will enjoy, kids and non-smoothie-drinkers alike.

The Lovely Star Fruit

The Star Fruit is loaded with Vitamins A and C, as well as antioxidants, amino acids, and a host of healthy minerals. And it’s apparently been used as a home remedy for treating fevers, headaches, and even hangovers!

You can read more about the health benefits of the Star Fruit here.

The Prickly Pear

Cutting into a Prickly Pear (the fruit of a particular cactus plant) is a delight, because the flesh is a vibrant shade of bloody-fuschia, and very tender, like a melon.

And turns out the fruit is rich in magnesium… a wonderful piece of information to know! Instantly makes me wonder how this would fare combined in a dessert with raw chocolate, because cacao is the most potent food source of magnesium, so good for the heart, for hormonal regulation, for metabolism, for soothing tight muscles, relaxing a stubborn colon… and for just general well-being!

The Prickly Pear Mono-Smoothie is so dang gorgeous, who wouldn’t feel better walking around sipping from a bottle of this stuff!

I can guarantee that these fruits are going to become regulars in my kitchen from now on. What an under-appreciated fruit!

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If you’re a lover of savory fruit salads, here’s a good one, sweet with juicy pineapple, chewy with finely chopped kale, and pungent with both garlic and fresh ginger. A bit of fresh orange juice… and raw macadamia nuts to make a dense, almost mayonnaise-texture dressing… and this becomes an extremely versatile dish.

You can eat this straight, as a salad. You can use this as a salad sandwich filling. It makes a wonderful salsa-like dip for raw crackers or organic tortilla chips. And would be a colorful and unique side dish for a buffet or raw pot luck!

Not the best salad to munch before going out dancing, though.

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Click here to see more fabulously healthifying Mono-Smoothie recipes!

I happened to catch a bit of the Dr. Oz show earlier this week and saw him speaking on the subject of the list of foods he has assigned to his “Anti-Cancer Diet“, and he was highlighting three foods I’ve mentioned more than once here on the Live Green Smoothie Diet site as being well-known to be anti-cancer foods: turmeric, cabbage, and broccoli.

These three seemed like no-brainer candidates for Mono-Smoothies… and so here they are!

I decided to make a point of categorizing the foods on my site that fit into Dr. Oz’s program, so I created two new website categories: “Dr. Oz” and “Anti-Cancer Diet”, so check them out over the next few weeks after I go through all the recipes on my site to file them under those two new categories.

Also, funny coincidence… I see that on the main page for Dr. Oz’s Anti-Cancer Diet he has chosen to use the exact same purchased stock photo of fresh fruit and vedge that graces my own main page! Great minds thinking alike… obviously.

Anti-Cancer Diet TURMERIC Mono-Smoothie

Anti-Cancer Diet SAVOY CABBAGE Mono-Smoothie

Anti-Cancer Diet BROCCOLI Mono-Smoothie

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A great thing about Mono-Smoothies is that, as long as you have at least ONE type of fresh fruit, vegetable, or leafy greens in the house… plus a bit of raw honey (or even dates… medjool dates would make brilliant natural sweeteners)… you can crank out a 32-oz (3-quart) batch of Live Smoothies. Take it with you on-the-go, start your day with it, or even drink it out of a lovely cocktail glass for an evening refresher… and it doesn’t have to be complex in the least.

Fresh herbs make great Mono-Smoothies, and no doubt offer various naturally medicinal benefits depending on which herbs you select.

Check out these four new Mono-Smoothie recipes:

Meyer Lemon Mono-Smoothie

(Made with whole fruit, not juice!)

Fresh Pear Mono-Smoothie

Fresh Dill Mono-Smoothie

(Dill…? Yep… :D)

Fresh CILANTRO Mono-Smoothie

(Like a refreshing, aromatic cocktail… and sweet!)

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These Mono-Smoothies are a revelation, and something I’ll be drilling into my kids over the next year, as they have determined that this is the year which they want to learn all about how to navigate the kitchen and feed themselves (and their prospective guests in the future) under the auspices of their own acquired knowledge.

Live Green Smoothies and raw smoothies may be super-easy, but these Mono-Smoothies are in a whole new category of easy! Complete and utter no-brainers.

And they are DELICIOUS… light, sweetly refreshing, and just the very essence of freshness!

And Not Only Are They Both Delicious & Easy… They’re Cheap, Too!

And for anyone who has a concern about the cost of radically jacking up the raw and living fruits, vedgies, and greens in their diet, being able to make use of this easy smoothie-making technique will be a budget-saver!

I’m introducing 4 Mono-Smoothie recipes here, and I have 4 more to follow… and I will be sharing boatloads in the coming days so that my readers and subscribers truly gain an understanding of how valuable and useable the Mono-Smoothie concept is.

What do you need to make a Mono-Smoothie?

To make a Mono-Smoothie, you need a single kind of fruit, vegetable, or green (fresh and uncooked should go without saying…), some raw honey, spring water, and ice (ice is optional, according to your preference).

If you don’t want to use raw honey, that’s your business — do what works for you. But I’m an advocate of raw honey and all things made by bees. It is not “just another sugar” (can’t in any way compare with white sugar in my opinion, sorry).

It is rich with living enzymes, is a natural anti-inflammatory agent (read up on its helpful effects for people with asthma and arthritis), and has been famed for ages for its health-promoting, longevity-enhancing, and various healing properties. It is also included in a list within the TCM (Traditional Chinese Medicine) paradigm of foods that are recommended, as a part of “food therapy”, for diminishing candida-causing yeast and mold in the body.

I use raw honey generously. You use it according to your own taste and health requirements.

Pineapple Mono-Smoothie

Red Pepper Mono-Smoothie

Pumpkin Mono-Smoothie

Mint Mono-Smoothie

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With this one recipe you have a few options — with or without greens, super-lemony or just mild, and dessertly sweet or just sweetly average. Personally, I’m partial to With Greens, Super-Lemony, and Quite Sweet to off-set the lemon… but you pick your fave combo!

Any way you do it up, tho, it’s a great combination. Super way to take advantage of the yummy pineapples and Meyer lemons currently overflowing the grocery bins!

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If you’re not a drinker, no worries… this is a GREAT combination to enjoy without alcohol! Just wonderful!

There is no tangerine in this delicious martini cocktail, but it tastes like pure tangerine. Made of fresh cantaloupe juice with Meyer lemons and fresh orange juice, this cocktail does not taste like cantaloupe in the least! Some kind of mysterious taste alchemy occurs… and it is one of the prettiest drinks of any kind I have ever seen.

Very delicate. Don’t overdo the vodka. Great for a party. Have enough on hand for a second batch.

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You’ll be so surprised how this tastes… no one would ever suspect that there’s fresh, raw zucchini in it! Talk about a reason to over-plant your garden with squash this year!

You can even make this rich, creamy smoothie utterly non-fat… or luscious-it-up with a bit of raw cacao butter, which really makes a fabulous difference in taste.

What a great, healthy way to get your chocolate fix!

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Fresh, raw zucchini added to a smoothie is a revelation, and especially when added to a simple, plain vanilla smoothie, which thrives on having as much of a neutral (as well as a creamy) backdrop as possible. This is just lovely. And there is zero fat in it!

Anyone who follows along with my recipes knows I’m crazy about vanilla and am utterly delighted when I find a way to enjoy vanilla in raw vegan recipes, without the use of dairy products. This is an excellent on!

I’ve used bananas in this recipe. Don’t like bananas? Use raw honey instead, and possibly add a bit of coconut oil to gain some of the texture the bananas provide.

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