Overnight apple oats and a peanut butter green smoothie, for summer

It might not be the official start of summer here yet (although we are only a week off) but summer is very much in the air. The days are super long (it is light at 10pm!), the sun is shining, and the temperatures are tipping 25'C (hot for England!).

With this summery vibe, I have moved into hot weather territory for breakfast and snacking. In other words, I have re-introduced overnight oats and smoothies to my kitchen. Today's post shares the first of each for this summer season, and I hope you can draw some summer inspiration from them whatever your own weather is doing.

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Cinnamon vanilla latte

As the pictures in my last post showed, we have had cold weather here lately. Two days of snow were followed by nearly a week of below freezing temperatures and very frosty mornings. It is weather for hot drinks and I have been drinking a lot of hot drinks.

Spiced ginger latte

With this liquid consumption comes drinks that extend beyond my usual tea and coffee choices. I've been enjoying repeat cups of my spiced ginger latte as well as easy hot chocolates. Today's cinnamon vanilla latte will now be added to my rotation. It is easy, delicious and fit to rival flavoured coffee shop lattes - for a fraction of the cost and with less sugar.

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Creamy blackberry vanilla smoothie

If I had to compile a list of the top 10 things I love about the UK (and it would be a difficult list to compile), I suspect picking wild blackberries would make it on there. To someone raised in Australia, blackberries are a novelty in their own right. To be able to walk 20 minutes from my house and pick them freely from bushes is amazing.

This smoothie features blackberries picked in such a way, but if you're not able to gather wild berries yourself, store bought, frozen or a different type of berry could be used instead. The other ingredients are simple: kale (for nutrition), avocado (for the creaminess), and vanilla (for a delicious flavour). You can make this with water or your milk of choice. It's not a super sweet smoothie, but it is sweet for a green smoothie in disguise. If you like sweeter drinks, adding a few dates or some liquid sweetener would do the trick.

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Chocolate raspberry green smoothie

Like so many things, my smoothie consumption goes through phases. I'll be obsessed for a while, then forget about them, then resume my love affair. With the warmer spring weather, I think a smoothie phase is starting up. This one was the perfect blend of nutritional benefits and delicious taste.

As the colour shows, I didn't use a vast amount of chocolate flavouring, but you definitely still taste it. I combined regular cocoa powder and cocoa-based protein powder (the same mix I mentioned earlier in the month). If you don't have protein powder, cocoa powder alone will suffice.

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Vegan orange hot chocolate, for snowy weather

Last night brought our first real snow of the winter. It is still not particularly heavy - it is rare for snow to be heavy in south-east England - but it is more than the light scattering we had in early December.

After exploring the snow in many layers of running gear, it seemed like the sort of day for hot chocolate. I rarely make or drink hot chocolate, not because I don't like it, but because usually I am just as happy with tea. However, with all the seasonal hot drinks advertised across winter, the idea of an orange hot chocolate lodged in my mind some time ago. Today the idea turned to reality.

I made this using three forms of chocolate (!), which, if you can do it, I recommend: dark chocolate, cocoa powder, and the orange flavoured sugar-free Choc Shot syrup. I am a little abashed to be mentioning Choc Shot again, but it is such a useful product that I do use it an awful lot. I ought to get some sort of sponsorship deal with the company. However, if you don't have access to the syrup I am listing a way to make this without it. My orange flavour came primarily from grated orange zest, but you could use orange extract / essence if that is easier.

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Peach and mint green smoothie

I've had a slow start to smoothie drinking this summer. I accepted that as a phase and was confident my smoothie love would surface again eventually. Fortunately, it now has and I'm keen to make up for lost drinking time!

This peach and mint green smoothie was what heralded the switch from "I guess I could use up these greens in a banana smoothie, but I'm not sure I can be bothered" to "I really can't wait to whiz these ingredients up and drink them". It's a great summer smoothie, with the mint and peach pairing together beautifully and conjuring up images of beach-side cocktails.

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Homemade chai latte and caramel latte

Until last week, I didn't realise it was so easy to make cafe-esque hot drinks at home. I suspect I'm behind the times and everyone else has been chai latteing and caramel latteing in their kitchen for years. I don't have a coffee maker, but it turns out you don't need one to turn a cup of tea or coffee into something special.

I actually gave up milk in my coffee a few months ago, finding that I quite liked it black and very much liked the convenience of not needing specialist milk at work. Recently, though, autumn weather has made all hot drinks appealing and the (non dairy) milk varieties have drawn me back in.

Home made chai latte

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Carob latte

Today's post brings a very simple recipe, for the simple reason that in this case, simple worked best. (Enough simples in that sentence?) I initially made a carob and lucuma powder latte, but contrary to my expectations I didn't like it at all. I am not sure if carob and lucuma aren't the stellar combination I thought they would be, or if they just don't work in hot drink form. Regardless, for my second carob hot drink, I went back to basics and kept the flavours simple. Carob.

Now, I do know that many of you proclaim to dislike carob. I doubt this will be the post to convince you otherwise. Personally, I love it (love it), and was delighted to quench my carob desires when I visited London's largest Planet Organic store last month. I managed to buy carob powder, dairy and sugar free carob buttons, and two dairy free carob blocks. It was a happy day.

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Sweet potato and strawberry smoothie

I think I have used my NutriBullet daily since its purchase. It has produced a lot of smoothies, a few batches of frozen banana soft serve, and some ground almonds. The small size and easy clean up (aided by being able to drink smoothies from the jars they are blended in!) are fantastic perks, and make it really appealing to use. Plus, we seem to have brought a bit of Western Australian heat to the UK. Smoothies and frozen bananas are just right.

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Spiced ginger latte

This spiced ginger latte is so simple that it barely deserves its own post. However, I am a little bit in love with it, so it is getting a post anyway. It might be one of my favourite drinks ever!

It is unusual for me to rave about a milk-based hot drink. I don't drink hot chocolate (or iced chocolate for that matter) and I find most commercial lattes too milky and too sweet. This drink isn't overly sweet, but it is milky. (I am using 'milky' to refer to non-dairy milks here.)

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