Alli Talley

January 17, 2022

Home, Food

Smoothie Time!

Alli Talley

January 17, 2022

Home, Food

Jude’s favorite time of the day (not kidding) is Smoothie Time! Every morning we start Jude’s day by making this smoothie in our trusty Vitamix. The sound of the blending beginning is the highlight of his day! It’s the best.

We make the smoothie in our Ascent Series Vitamix, but occasionally I (Bobby) make it in a big cup with the Immersion Blender. It really just depends how much you want to make.

Here’s our recipe:

1/2 cup frozen pineapple

1/2 cup frozen mango

1 teaspoon of flax

1 teaspoon of chia seeds

1 teaspoon of hemp seeds

1 scoop of Greek yogurt

1/2 cup of Almond Milk

Lots of spinach (2 handfuls?)

3 dates

A splash of water

We more or less just eyeball the ingredients based on who’s having a smoothie. We also modify with berries and almond butter when we have them. And we also like buying bulk frozen fruit from Costco, so in general we add about a total of 1 cup of fruit. When you have this every day, it’s nice to make a few tweaks :)

This smoothie is a great way to give your kiddos all the nutrients they need to kick-start their day (and you too). Let us know what you think!

Alli Talley

November 19, 2021

Home

Our Vitamix Story - Our (Mainly Bobby's) Journey to Being Vitamix Obsessed

Alli Talley

November 19, 2021

Home

We interrupt our normally scheduled program of travel tales to share about one of our kitchen essentials. Well, it started as one, and now it's turned into a whole fleet of essentials… our Vitamix machines. And before you move on since this isn’t our typical adventure in Alaska, there will be some wisdom to be gained in the following paragraphs. Stick with us.

The Backstory

Back in November of 2013, before we were the Traveling Newlyweds, we were a pair of young love birds planning a wedding and preparing for our life together. Of all the fun events leading up to a wedding day, registering for gifts was one we were most looking forward to. Who knew that it would bring out the worst in us (us being Bobby) and cause fights over items like blenders and popcorn makers? I’ll elaborate on the blender (obviously), but will note that the popcorn maker was based on Bobby thinking our tiny home would not have enough storage space for a big popcorn maker. And while he was right, he bought it for me that Christmas. Hehe, thanks again, babe.

Back to the blender. I wanted a Vitamix. To me, it’s a staple of the kitchen. But Bobby didn’t understand the utility, power, and durability of the machine. So to him, why not spend a fraction of the price to make our morning smoothies. And he won that battle. I knew he needed to see the light on his own, and I was willing to be patient.

Once You Vitamix, You Never Look Back

Fast forward 11 months to October of 2014. Now truly newlyweds and settled into our new rhythm of life, it was rudely disrupted one morning by our broken blender. (Piece of wisdom #1 for any couples out there… don’t say “I told you so”. It never helps. I didn’t say it, but I definitely thought it.) I gently suggested that maybe it’s time to give a Vitamix a try, and Bobby gave in! We purchased our first Vitamix in November, and never looked back! Our first Vitamix was an entry-level blender similar to their current E310, although now they have an even more streamlined product called Vitamix ONE that recently arrived.

From smoothies, to soups, to dips, to dressings, to nut butters, the Vitamix quickly became a part of our daily lives. And we never had any issues. We upgraded to an Ascent machine in 2019 and gifted our perfectly functioning original to some friends. (It’s now 7 years old and still going strong!)

Our Growing Vitamix Fleet

Along the way, we’ve slowly added other Vitamix products to our arsenal. Our first addition was the blending cup and bowl kit. We use the blending cups for smoothies and the bowls to do our chopping. The best! We added the 48 oz. Stainless Steel Container and the Food Processor Attachment last year. We were happy to ditch our giant food processor in exchange for a Vitamix attachment that works even better. One of our favorite additions to our Vitamix lineup has been the Immersion Blender. It is SO convenient and easy to blend in any container, and skips over the step of transferring between the Vitamix and the pot. If you’ve had an immersion blender before, you will be blown away by the power and quality of the Vitamix Immersion Blender. It's a dream.

Our Growing Family

In the same way that we’ve added to our Vitamix family over the past 7 years, you probably know that we have had additions to the Talley family. Little Jude Dakota arrived in March of 2020, and life has truly never been the same. I could go on and on about all of the ways that he's changed our lives, one of which being our breakfast routine. We make a smoothie every. single. day. Aside from being able to boast that we have some tasty smoothie recipes, we can also continue to brag about the quality of our blender and Immersion blender. Both have held up perfectly—being used daily! And we'll be back to making baby purees and applesauce in no time, as baby #2 arrives in January!

Closing this out with another piece of wisdom...

Vitamix products have a level of quality and power that you will not understand until you start using them. Bobby has been converted, and Vitamix is now part of our family’s story. If a blender is in the conversation for the holidays or your upcoming registry, we urge you to skip the fight and join the family! Happy holidays! :)

Alli Talley

January 27, 2021

Food, Home

While We’re Home - 5 Reasons We Use Our Vitamix Immersion Blender Daily

Alli Talley

January 27, 2021

Food, Home

It’s no secret that we’re big fans of our Vitamix and use it almost daily. We’ve even jokingly call it our other child (because we love it so much, and because since 2020 our humor has gotten REAL weird). But y’all, there’s a new appliance that we’re using (and loving) just as much— the Vitamix Immersion Blender!

It’s become an invaluable appliance in the Talley Household… and here are 5 reasons we use it every day!

1. Ease of Use (and Clean-up) - This is probably the most compelling reason for anybody to purchase an immersion blender. (Especially if you’re parents like us— ease is key!) It’s handheld, easy to maneuver, and takes up a fraction of the space of any of your other appliances. In terms of clean-up, you can scrub and rinse it in no time. The time that it takes to take out, press “on”, and be blending away is SO convenient compared to taking out the blender and it’s attachments. In fewer words… it’s just really easy.

Having fun with the immersion blender :)

2. Quality and Power - With so many immersion blender options on the market, you may wonder why the Vitamix is worth the investment? (Good question!) Upon opening, it’s easy to immediately recognize the amazingly high quality of the blender, built with sturdy plastic and stainless steel. It also has five power levels, which will allow you to blast through the more difficult textures like nuts and ice (most immersion blenders avoid against these… not Vitamix)!

Built with sturdy plastic and stainless steel

3. Compact - You may remember that we travelled with our Vitamix last year (With a carrying case!). What can we say, we love our smoothies! Considering we have a little more baggage on our trips thanks to baby Jude, we absolutely love how small this is. Aside from taking it on our next road trip, it takes up minimal cabinet space in our tiny kitchen. WIN/WIN!

4. Smoothies, Salsas, Soups - Between these three, we’re using the blender daily. All four of us (Sally too!) enjoy a healthy smoothie to start our day full of fruits and veggies. Switch out those sweet smoothie ingredients for some tomato, onion, garlic, and cilantro and you’re ready for chips and salsa. For those cozy nights in, butternut squash soup is our go-to (see a blog we did on it here!). We love how easily the immersion blender can whirl together a rich, creamy soup!

Jude waiting for his morning smoothie :)

It was a hit! And somehow the bowl ended up on his shoulder.

5. Waffles - There’s nothing like whipping up some waffles on a Sunday morning, (or any day, let’s be honest)! What used to be a monthly treat has now turned into a weekly meal thanks to our immersion blender. Not only does it whip up smooth, tasty batter, but it allows us to make smaller batches (Bobby may have waffles more than weekly). Thank you, Vitamix!

Point of the story: The Vitamix Immersion Blender is a new staple in our kitchen. It’s versatile, powerful, and easy to use for so many of our meals. Get one for yourself and start blending away!

Alli Talley

December 23, 2020

Home, Food

Cozy Winter Meals - Creamy Tomato Soup Using Our Vitamix Blenders

Alli Talley

December 23, 2020

Home, Food

For those of you that witnessed our pie making extravaganza a few weeks back, we went back in the kitchen for a new adventure last night. Except this time we knew what we were in for, and it turned out the way that we hoped. Meaning it took less than an hour instead of 6 hours (for our pie). It was a chilly winter night (50 degrees in SoCal), and we decided to whip up a creamy tomato soup along with some grilled cheese sandwiches. We added a small salad to feel better about ourselves… but really this meal is all about the comfort food :)

Overall, it was a great success! We used our Vitamix blender to whip up the Tomato flavor slurry (new term for us, ha!) and then our new Vitamix Immersion blender to blend the soup. The total time start to finish was about 20 minutes on the soup, and we made our grilled cheeses during that time too… so quick and easy!

For the tomato soup, we used this recipe by Amy Cakes. For the grilled cheese sandwiches, we used a fresh loaf of sourdough and a combo of white and yellow cheddar cheese. If it was healthy, this would be my meal of choice on every cold night :)

Here’s the play by play in photos...

Alli’s favorite part… slicing the onions.

Adding salt and pepper until it’s perfect.

Recipe was a win! The blenders make it easy to whip up and clean up. It’s the perfect meal for when you’re feeling cozy inside! Enjoy!

Alli Talley

November 26, 2020

Food, Foodies

Bobby's First Time Baking an Apple Pie (And Using a Food Processor)

Alli Talley

November 26, 2020

Food, Foodies

The holidays are upon us! Being 2020, we figured that we’d need an extra helping of pie this year, so I (Bobby) decided to give baking an apple pie a go!

I thought starting at 7 PM (when we put Jude down), would be a great idea. Turns out making a pie takes MUCH longer than I realized. It was super fun though, and it definitely gives me a new appreciation for pie!

Simplifying the lengthy process was our new Vitamix Food Processor Attachment. Ironically, this was my first time using a food processor too… ha! Vitamix’s version is on brand with the rest of their products - designed perfectly and incredibly easy to use. It made the pie crust prep simple and quick, making time for the rest of the journey.

We used two recipes to put this beauty together, one for the crust and the other for the filling. Here are the links to the recipes:

Food Processor Pie Crust

Homemade Apple Pie

The following is our journey in photos! Thank you to our Vitamix for the easiest part of the process :) Happy Thanksgiving all!