Health guru Gwyneth Paltrow blessed the universe this week with the recipe for her daily morning smoothie. There is only one slight problem: the ingredients in the smoothie rack up to $200. That’s right, a one serving smoothie she supposedly drinks every morning costs more than my monthly utilities. Let’s just take a moment to address what you can buy for $200. For the same price of Gwyneth’s smoothie, you can get roughly:
- 18 large Pizza Hut pizzas
- 28 Chipotle burritos
- 45 grande Starbucks mochas
- 105 large McDonald’s fries
Photo courtesy of Layne Murdoch Jr.
So how do you even make this insane masterpiece? For starters, the base of the smoothie is made of almond milk, almond butter, and coconut oil. Now, I can’t fault GP for these ingredients because I can get down with almond milk when it’s less than $3 per half gallon. Plus, if you don’t already have coconut oil lying around, you should.
It seems like a pretty simple smoothie so far, right? Well, here comes the crazy part. The next ingredient is vanilla mushroom protein powder, which may seem normal at first, but trust me, it’s not.
The protein powder GP recommends is sold by a company called Moon Juice. The site calls their product “raw, sprouted & bio-fermented fortifying intelligent plant protein” and for $35 a jar, it better be intelligent. If you’re attempting this smoothie at home, maybe just stick with a cheaper protein powder. What Gwyneth doesn’t know won’t hurt her.
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After the protein powder comes four ingredients I still can’t figure out how to pronounce: maca, ashwagandha, ho shou wu, and cordyceps. Honestly, at first I thought Gwyneth just slammed her hand against her keyboard to name some of these ingredients, but after further investigation, it turns out they are real.
First up is maca, which is a root belonging to the radish family. According to Moon Juice, health benefits of maca include thyroid and adrenal support, energy boosts, increased libido and enhanced mood. Well, Gwyneth, if increased libido is what you are after, there are several other ways you can get that in your life.
The second made-up sounding ingredient is ashwagandha, an Indian herb which supposedly contains amazing stress release properties. Nothing helps me manage stress more than coffee, so I’ll skip the ashwagandha and add in a shot of espresso, thank you very much.
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Next up for the smoothie is ho shu wu, an Asian tonic herb. After a quick Google, I found out that ho shu wu is great for increasing sex drive and reversing gray hair. Looks like we found GP’s secret to keep her hair flawlessly blonde.
Our final what-the-heck ingredient is cordyceps, a fungi known for boosting immunity and stamina. After all of these ingredients comes the most ridiculous of all: moon dust. Now, GP being the open-minded woman that she is, gives us options for which moon dust we want to add.
There is everything from Action Dust (designed to regulate vital energy) to Sex Dust (in case you weren’t getting enough libido from your maca). I read the description for moon dust, and I still don’t fully understand what it’s made out of, but I do know I’m just going to crush up some Pop Rocks, dump it in my smoothie, and call it even.
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The smoothie is finished with a pinch of Himalayan sea salt, because clearly it wasn’t ridiculous enough without this added ingredient. Now I’m sure this smoothie is delicious and riddled with health benefits, but as a broke college student, it’s hard for me to take a $200 smoothie seriously.
Enjoy your drink, Gwyneth. I’ll just be casually hanging out over here sipping my red wine smoothie, wishing I had your money. Don’t worry about it.