Apple Pie Smoothies are No Apple Pie (but that doesn't mean they are bad)

As evident from my Chunky Monkey Smoothie blog post, I have become very into healthy smoothies as part of my diet. I have exasperated the spinach laden smoothies and wanted to try something different. I had seen a pin for an apple pie smoothie than sounded interesting, but after perusing my boards I realized I hadn't actually pinned it (rookie mistake). I then started to search for it and came up with a whole mess of recipes for apple pie smoothies, but initially not the one I remembered seeing. Finally after a bit of hunting through lots of not so healthy smoothies and changing my search terms (apple pie smoothie and almonds) I found the one I was looking for. After looking at their recipe I decided to tweak mine a bit, so of course I'll tell you both.

The original- 5 raw almonds, 1 apple (cored, sliced, but not deskined), a whole banana, 3/4 cup of 0% Greek yogurt, 1/2 cup skim milk, 1/4 teaspoon cinnamon- Estimated calories 382

Mine- 5 raw almonds, 1 apple (cored, sliced, but not deskined), half a frozen banana, 1/2 cup 0% Greek yogurt, 1/2 cup Light Vanilla soy milk , 1/4 teaspoon(ish) cinnamon- Estimated calories 234

Banana is for visual purposes, mine was frozen

Everything in the blender cup and ready to roll (make sure there are no apple seeds, apparently they have a chemical in them that when metabolized by humans turns into some type of poison, just a scary FYI for you)

Blending (I let it go for awhile since it had to pulverize apple skins and almonds)

After blending (still had bits of apple skins but it didn't affect the taste but it did affect the texture a bit)

Ready to drink

I would give this recipe a C+. I tasted like apple pie, so they were right in giving it that name. The cinnamon and apple flavors really came out in the smoothie and the banana flavor was minimal at best. I know that this smoothie is super healthy and way easier to consume that eating all of the ingredients separately, I just didn't love it. I will say that for a smoothie it was pretty filling, much more so than some of the smoothies I've tried. Also for only 234 calories it makes a great snack or lunch replacement and you could probably add a scoop of vanilla protein powder to up the protein content (but also the calories). I would probably make it again if I was out of my normal smoothie ingredients but it's not high on my list to try again soon. I have found with smoothies though, a lot has to do with personal taste so one person's meh is another person's favorite, so don't let my opinion sway you. If you make it please feel free to comment and let me know what you thought.