Next time you’re in a smoothie rut, change it up and blend one of these smoothie bowl recipes! They’re basically a free pass to play with your food, and you can go wild with the toppings. Smoothie bowls are my favorite party trick when my kids have friends over. It’s better than boring old yogurt and similar enough to vegan ice cream to scratch that sweet tooth.
I’ve got ten smoothie bowl ideas to get your mind on a roll. If you’re looking for a fun one for girls’ night, check out my hot pink Dragon Fruit Smoothie Bowl. If you want a fresh take on brunch, blend up the Maple Green Smoothie Bowl and the Tropical Smoothie Bowl then load up the table with toppings galore (and invite me over)!
Smoothie bowls are a great way to nourish and hydrate your body quickly. I love smoothies, yet sometimes I like to eat my snack or breakfast with a spoon and a little crunch. That’s where smoothie bowls like this Fruit Smoothie Bowl or the Maple Oat Smoothie Bowl come in.
As long as you get the consistency right, there’s no wrong ingredient to toss in, just like with green smoothies!
Table of Contents
I’m sharing my ten favorite smoothie bowl recipes, along with some pretty epic smoothie bowl ideas that will have you running for the kitchen today.
11 Smoothie Bowl Recipes
Many people start their love for these fun blends with an açaí bowl they found on vacation or at that fun new smoothie shop in town.
The idea is similar to these, yet they are made with 100% real, whole food ingredients and no fillers or added refined sugars. They taste amazing and will hopefully spark your imagination to create the smoothie bowl ideas of your dreams.
How to Get the Perfect Blend
Unlike regular green smoothies that blend into a liquid fairly easily with my no-fail smoothie formula, smoothie bowls will remain thick in the blender and might take a little muscle. This is my method for blending:
- Add all the ingredients to the blender, then turn up to the highest speed to start the blending process.
- Once the ingredients stop moving on their own, use the tamper through the top to push down the fruit to engage the blade again. If you don’t have a tamper, then stop the machine and use a spoon or spatula to push the fruit back towards the blade and blend again. Be patient. This can take a few minutes to get everything blended. Thick is good, so avoid adding extra liquid.
- Once blended smoothly, scrape into bowls. Now, the fun part: adding the toppings.
The Best Toppings
While your smoothie bowl ideas can take you in any direction topping-wise, my favorite toppings are a combination of protein, healthy fats and juicy fruit. While you feel like you are spooning out ice cream, you can still add healthy ingredients to maximize the benefits of the natural fruits you just blended:
- Protein: gluten-free granola, sliced almonds, hemp hearts, chia seeds
- Healthy fats: almond butter (or other nut butter), shredded coconut
- Juicy fruits: kiwi, strawberries, blueberries, raspberries, pineapple
- Extras: cacao, bananas, cinnamon, goji berries, freeze-dried fruit, shaved chocolate
- Natural sweeteners: maple syrup, honey, agave syrup, banana slices
I love toppings that can pull double-duty. My healthy granola recipe tastes amazing and adds crunch, protein and healthy fat! Coconut whipped cream provides healthy fat and that extra bit of sweetness that is the cherry on top. Mixed berries (fresh or frozen) add a pop of color along with a load of antioxidants.
Easy Smoothie Bowl Boosters
My smoothie bowl recipes are already great, but there’s always room for more! If you want a more filling recipe then you’re going to want to add on. Here are a few easy ways to do just that:
I like using my homemade protein powder as it is virtually tasteless and adds an additional 10 grams of protein to any recipe. It can also act as a natural thickener, so you may need to add just a bit more liquid after putting in a serving of this powder.
Speaking of liquid, you can change up your liquid base depending on what you want in your blend. I love using almond milk or oat milk since they are fairly easy to find. Coconut milk brings a tropical flavor to any bowl while hemp milk is more subtle and super creamy. Find the non-dairy milk that works best for you.
Easily boost a bowl using nut butter or seed butter. I love adding a scoop of peanut butter to my bowls either during the blending or swirling it in right before I dig in.
Superfoods can easily bump up the nutrition and more. Try some flax seeds, spirulina or cacao depending on what nutrients you want to see.
Tips For the Perfect Bowl
We’ve all seen the beautiful açai bowl creations at smoothie bars, with their vibrant colors, fascinating swirls and fresh toppings. You can achieve this at home. I’m serious! Here are my tips for the smoothie bowl ideas of your dreams.
- Start with a strong blender game. That’s right! A high-powered blender allows you to blend these ingredients into a lusciously smooth final product. Plus, most of these machines come with a tamper to help you push down the ingredients during blending to keep the blades moving.
- Use frozen ingredients. Whether you buy them frozen or freeze your own, these frosty fruits are what help make that sorbet-like texture you want. Learn how to freeze bananas and how to freeze spinach to help facilitate this.
- Use natural thickeners. Foods like chia seeds, hemp hearts, avocado, frozen bananas and nut butter naturally thicken your bowl while blending so you get the scoop-able finish you’re looking for.
Smoothie bowl Recipes FAQs
There are several things you can do to make your smoothie bowl nice and thick. First, use frozen fruit. Second, start with a small amount of liquid and only add more when your blender blades stop turning on their own. Third, use ingredients like chia seeds, hemp hearts or nut or seed butter to help naturally thicken the blend.
Just like with regular smoothies, smoothie bowls can be good for you if you put the right stuff in them. Use only whole food, plant-based ingredients to start. Stick to unsweetened dairy-free milk or water as the liquid base to avoid the added sugar from fruit juice. Add in protein powder, leafy greens or superfoods to boost the nutrients, protein, healthy fats and fiber in your bowl. Top with nuts, seeds and fruit for a delicious and nutritious finish.
It’s not totally about the kind of liquid you use and more about how much liquid you use in a smoothie bowl. If you are using fruit with high water content like melon or citrus, hold off on adding extra liquid unless you need it to get your blender blades moving. Otherwise, a bit of dairy-free milk or even water will work great in your bowl. Choose the liquid based on what flavors you want.
Now that you’ve learned all my best tips and tricks, let’s get blending!
Which one of these recipes has you running for the kitchen? Drop a comment and let me know!
Love the tip about letting frozen fruits thaw slightly before blending. It really helps!
I love switching to smoothie bowls once in a while. It’s always fun to make them pretty. 🙂
I love changing up my daily smoothie with a bowl!
Thanks for the tips! I was nervous when making this smoothie bowl because it was so thick, even in my Vitamix, but it turned out to be the perfect texture. Now my toddler is HOOKED on smoothie bowls.
I can’t believe people are complaining about the amount of sugar in this recipe when it comes naturally from fruit!
Well Char, as you know, naturally occurring sugars are much different than refined sugars. 😉
Yet if folks are looking to decrease the amount of natural sugars, we advise using less fruits and more leafy greens + veggies.
I tried making one and I still can’t get it SUPER creamy… It’s like it takes me so long to blend it that my frozen fruit starts melting or something… Any tips? I love the flavors and recipes though!
I’d start out by using less liquid and see if that helps. 🙂
Like the others have said, this is pretty high in sugars for me. Yet I could totally see enjoying it after a long run when my body is depleted. I did try this recipe today and just made a smaller portion for myself to decrease the sugars- and it was perfectly filling with my toppings. Oh, and I also added homemade protein powder for some protein and it was still really tasty! Would love to see some low sugar smoothie bowl recipes.
Hey Dani. Like I mentioned to a few other folks, there are many ways you can tweak this recipe to decrease the amount of fructose. Looks like you already did tweak it a bit for that reason. Also, the Cauliflower Smoothie Bowl (link on this page) has 29g sugar and the Cacao Dessert Smoothie Bowl (link also on this page) has a mere 13g sugar. And don’t forget, you can always take *any* smoothie recipe and turn it into a smoothie bowl. 🙂
39 grams of sugar in that smoothie bowl? No thank you!
Hi Jennifer. Pineapple and mango both have higher amounts of fructose than other fruits. (Fructose is much different than sucrose, which is found in refined sugar.) If you are looking to decrease the amount of fructose in your smoothie bowl, decrease the amount of higher-glycemic fruits you use and/or use only nuts + seeds for your toppings. Additionally, there are three other smoothie bowl recipes in this post that may appeal to you so def check those out.
Seriously? 39 g of sugar in your smoothie bowl for breakfast, when the RDA for women is 25 g.
Could you please give some recipes that are not so heavy on sweet fruit? Healthy is not high sugar no matter
how good it may taste.
Hi Bev. Pineapple and mango both have higher amounts of fructose than other fruits. (Fructose is much different than sucrose, which is found in refined sugar.) If you are looking to decrease the amount of fructose in your smoothie bowl, decrease the amount of higher-glycemic fruits you use and/or use only nuts + seeds for your toppings. You can also add veggies like spinach and cauliflower if you like. 🙂
I have just found out my diabetes -> fatty liver -> cirrhosis = need high protein + 64 years old
Do you have a smoothie for that? This is the last thing I thought I would be worrying about at my age…my 2 boys are so mad at me. Their dad died of a glioblastoma multiform4 in his left temporal lobe and they don’t want to be orphans. Guilt!
Also I was thinking a better blender would be a good idea but I couldn’t find the “Vitamix” you were talking about. Sorry to pester you about that. I clicked the link but couldn’t find one under $300.
I have list these foods as protein “hotties” but would like to add a suitable milk product…cannot have too much fat. * 1 cup peanuts: 41 grams of protein.
* 1 cup pumpkin seeds: 39 grams.
* 1 cup cheese (Swiss, mozzarella, Colby Jack): 36 grams
* 1 cup tempeh: 34 grams
* 1 cup low-fat cottage cheese: 28 grams
* 1 cup oats: 26 grams
* ½ cup tofu: 22 grams
* 1 cup non-fat Greek yogurt: 22 grams
* 1 cup kidney beans: 21 grams
* 1 cup white beans: 19 grams
* 1 cup pinto beans: 19 grams
* 1 cup lentils: 18 grams
* 1 cup edamame: 17 grams
* 1 cup lima beans: 15 grams
* 1 veggie burger: 11 grams
* 2 tablespoons peanut butter: 9 grams
* 1 cup tofu yogurt: 9 grams
* 1 cup cooked quinoa: 8 grams
* 1 cup skim milk: 8 grams
* 1/2 cup edamame: 8 grams
* 1 cup soymilk: 7 grams
* 1 egg: 6 grams
* 1 tablespoon miso: 2 grams
Sincerely, Shirley
Hi Shirley. We have some awesome smoothie recipes with plant-based proteins as well as an article about the best low-sugar fruits to use in smoothies. If you click on the “Recipes” link at the top of the page, you can enter certain key words into the Search bar and find some things that I think can really help you. I’d start by searching “protein” and also search “low sugar.” We have a delicious berry protein smoothie that combines the two and that could be a great one for you to start with. 🙂
As far as the Vitamix sale… unfortunately, that has expired. But Vitamix often lists refurbished blenders on their site (so you could look into that) and we love to team up with them on sales and giveaways. Subscribe to our newsletter and you’ll be the first to know when we have another one!
Love how simple this recipe is. I’m gonna have to get some freeze dried fruit for topping!
Making designs with the toppings is one of my favorite things about smoothie bowls!