Triple Post! Ice Cream, Shakes, and Green Tea Powder!

This is going to be a pretty huge post, but its three things that all sort of consist of one another.

This is the end result:

A home-made vanilla and strawberry ice cream green tea milkshake.  :)

We're going to start off with green tea.  I just bought some cheap green tea bags and used a mortar and pestle.  The general idea, if I understand correctly, is that consuming the entire leaf of the green tea is healthier than just drinking it as a tea.  Thus, my idea here, is to add some healthy-ness into my completely un-healthy summertime shake addiction.  :)

 

I snipped off the top of the bags using some scissors, poured the contents into a mortar and pestle, and ground it until it was as fine a powder as I could get it.

 

Not too bad.  You can stop at 2tsp of powder if you want, because that's what it took to make the two large shakes, but I kept going...

I did a whole box of them and poured them into a container so I would have a supply. >.<  Now, if you don't like the flavor of green tea, you can stop there, but I love it, so I took 2tsp of the powder and put it into 4tsp of water in a cup and put it into the fridge to sit until it was shake time!  If you aren't fond of the flavor, I'd imagine you wouldn't really taste it much, if at all, if you just add the powder flakes straight to the shake at the end.

On to the ice cream!!

 

First, slice up about a cup of strawberries.  You may chop if you prefer.  :)

 

Then, take a teaspoon of vanilla...

 

...and add it to a pitcher with 2 1/2 cups of milk...

 

...and one can of sweetened condensed milk.

 

 Pour half of that into your ice-cream maker and put the other half in the fridge to make later.  Unless, of course, your ice-cream maker is bigger than mine!

 Then, add half the strawberries and let the ice cream maker do its thing.

Here's where I got lazy on pictures, but once its done, add it to the blender with the green tea mix or 2 tsp of the powder, whichever you choose, add a little milk, blend it up, and there ya go!  This made the two big shakes you see below.  Your milkshake just got a bit healthier.  I can't wait to try this with spinach or kale powder added as well, but I need a dehydrator first!

Isn't it pretty?  Since I soaked the tea, it did have a light but distinct green tea flavor in the background.

<3
Wookie Wifey