
Chilled smoothies, iced sodas and an evening by the poolside – that’s about as pleasant as times can get in the sweltering summers! Read ahead to find out about calories in fruit smoothie along with a couple of recipes to try out this season!
Ah, summer, what power you have to make us suffer and like it. ~ Russel Baker
Indeed! While we all dread the harsh sunlight this season brings along, we also cannot help but look forward to it with eagerness in order to indulge in beach activities, water sports and to be able to wear light, comfortable clothes! Another appeal of this season lies in indulging the taste buds in the cooling caress of chilled beverages and iced drinks, coursing slowly along the tongue towards the throat, tracing a good part of the esophagus, as if with an icy finger, before it finally flings headlong towards the stomach! Fruit smoothies made from summer fruits such as watermelon, cherries, various berries, kiwi, grapes, figs, apricots, mangoes, plums, peaches and melons are always a popular choice when it comes to cold beverages during summers! Besides their overall cooling effects and fresh, fruity taste, these smoothies pack a lot of nutritional value, making them an excellent choice when it comes to making up for the lost water and minerals from the body owing to the heat and perspiration that accompany soaring mercury levels. That being said, let’s take a look at the amount of calories in fruit smoothies that come along with all those vitamins and minerals in those attractively colorful and mouth-watering chill-pills!
How Many Calories are There in a Fruit Smoothie?
The number of calories in a standard fruit smoothie can widely vary, depending upon the fruit used, presence or absence of a dairy medium (milk, yogurt, fresh cream, etc.), the type of sweetener used (sugar, honey, artificial low calories sweetener, etc.) and the size of the serving. Due to this reason, it is not easy to pen down the exact amount of calories present in fruit smoothies in general. Therefore, here, I am providing the calorie and nutrition information of a few varieties of fruit smoothies so that you get a general idea, give and take a few figures here and there.
Calories in Fruit Smoothie that Includes Dairy
A standard one-glass serving of a fruit smoothie which is made by using fresh fruit juice and a dairy base (mostly yogurt) without using any sort of sweetening agent (whether natural or artificial) will contain somewhere near 300 calories. This figure can be more or less by about 50 to 100 calories depending upon the fruit whose juice is used. If the fruit happens to contain high sugar levels (such as bananas, figs, mangoes, cherries, etc.), the calorific value will tend towards the higher side while low sugar fruits (like apples, blueberries, grapes, kiwi, tangerine, strawberry, etc.) will bring the calorie count significantly down. Also, a low-fat dairy product will also considerably keep the number calories low as opposed to a fresh or full cream dairy product. Here’s a nutritional break up of a standard fruit smoothie that includes a dairy medium:-
Nutrient | Content Per Serving |
Calcium | 44 g |
Iron | 12 g |
Vitamin C | 212 g |
Fats | 8 g |
Sodium | 0.11 g |
Carbohydrates | 84 g |
Proteins | 8 g |
Potassium | 0.73 g |
The number calories in a fruit smoothie that does not have any dairy content is bound to be lesser than one which has a dairy medium. However, here too, the sugar content of the fruit(s) used and the presence/absence of a sweetening agent makes a difference to the overall calorie count. On a general note, such a fruit smoothie will typically have anywhere between 200 and 250 calories, given a standard serving size of one smoothie glass. Let’s take a look at the nutritional value of a dairy-less fruit smoothie made from whole fruit pulp or fresh fruit juice.
Nutrient | Content Per Serving |
Calcium | 5g |
Iron | 10 g |
Vitamin C | 130 g |
Fats | 0.60 g |
Sodium | 0.8 g |
Carbohydrates | 68 g |
Proteins | 2 g |
Potassium | 7 g |
Please note that all the nutritional values provided in the above two tables as well as the number of calories in fruit smoothie mentioned in the preceding paragraphs are all approximate figures as any change in the ingredients or proportions thereof inter se can dramatically alter these figures. Also, the nutritional value of a fruit smoothie made at home using fresh ingredients and that of a commercial product (which may or may not be fortified by adding artificial vitamins) are likely to vary significantly. All said and done, there is absolutely no doubt that a chilled fruit smoothie – whether served on the rocks or topped with crushed ice – is the most wholesome way to beat the summer heat and replace all the vitamins and minerals that your body loses as the mercury touches new heights as each day of the summer passes by!