A small McDonalds Shamrock Shake will set you back 460 calories and 64 grams of sugar! Do your health a favor, and make your own delicious and healthy shamrock shake recipe at home.
How to make a healthy Shamrock Shake
The popular McDonalds Shamrock Shakes are back again.
And although those mint milkshakes might taste good for the few minutes they last, even the smallest size shamrock milkshake is full of empty calories and sugar, chemicals, additives, and food dyes.
So here is a quick, simple, thick, and super creamy recipe for how to make your own homemade healthy shamrock shake, right in your own kitchen.
Readers also love these Black Bean Brownies
Watch the step by step healthy shamrock shake recipe video above
Homemade healthy milkshakes
While I’ve always believed indulging in unhealthy food every once in a while is fine, I’ve also never been big on moderation.
If I enjoy something, I want it all the time!
With these healthy shamrock shakes, you don’t have to drink them in moderation.
The easy recipe takes under five minutes to make, uses natural ingredients to get that classic green hue, and it has NO refined sugar whatsoever.
Think of how much sugar you’re saving by drinking ZERO grams of refined sugar instead of 64. This healthy shamrock shake recipe is also way under 460 calories.
Trending right now: Vegan Hot Chocolate
Vegan shamrock shake ingredients
The recipe calls for the following: milk of choice, frozen spinach (or a few drops of food coloring), pure peppermint extract, chocolate chips or cacao nibs, and a frozen banana.
There’s no matcha required, and a banana free option is also included in the recipe.
While they don’t taste exactly like a McDonald’s thick shake (although if you use canned coconut milk, they are surprisingly milkshake-like), I actually like these vegan milkshakes even better. They don’t give you the lethargic consumed-too-much-sugar feeling when you’re done.
Feel free to use your favorite milk of choice here. Sometimes I use coconut milk for a more decadent shake, but more often I will use nondairy cashew milk or almond milk.
Lately when I’ve been making the plant based shakes, I haven’t bothered to turn them green. The white ones are still just as good, although admittedly not quite as fun.
*If you’re a chocoholic, try the Chocolate Shamrock Shake Recipe.
Healthy shamrock shake serving suggestions
These healthy green smoothies are great for breakfast, snack, or dessert.
Try serving them with a Tofu Scramble or these whole grain Banana Oatmeal Cookies, for a healthy breakfast you’ll want to make all year long.
Or enjoy one as a festive St. Patrick’s Day dessert. You can even add a scoop of your favorite protein powder to turn it into a high protein post workout treat.
One shamrock protein shake will have around 25-30 grams of protein!
What’s your favorite milkshake flavor?
Mine’s always been mint chocolate chip. Although I do love the flavor, it’s the vibrant green color that enthralls me more than anything else.
Think of those gorgeously green Shamrock Shakes from McDonalds or the bright mint chocolate chip milkshakes from Baskin Robbins.
It goes back to when I was three years old and loved anything blue. Since our local Baskin Robbins didn’t make blue ice cream at the time, mint chocolate chip was the next best choice.
I went through a phase in middle school where I’d drink a Baskin Robbins mint chocolate chip milkshake every single day after school.
And now?
Well now it’s been over seven years since I first came up with this vegan and healthy shamrock shake recipe, and yet here I am still making them for myself at least once a week!
Try topping your Shamrock Shake with homemade Coconut Whipped Cream.
The recipe was inspired by this Green Smoothie Recipe.
Healthy Shamrock Shake Recipe
Ingredients
- 1 cup milk of choice
- 1 frozen banana (or make this banana-free Avocado Smoothie Recipe)
- cacao nibs or chocolate chips, as desired
- 1/8 tsp to 1/4 tsp pure peppermint extract
- 1 scoop protein powder, optional
- 1/4 cup frozen spinach, optional
- I usually add scant 1/8 tsp salt to bring out the flavor
Instructions
- *If you can’t get on board with the green smoothie thing, you can opt for green food coloring or just drink a white peppermint shake, which is just as delicious. Or add a pinch of spirulina!Feel free to use your favorite milk of choice. Canned coconut milk will give it a rich milkshake-like taste, but I also really love the lighter results of using cashewmilk or almond milk. Make sure the banana you use is at least somewhat brown so you don't get that unripe earthy banana flavor in your mint chocolate shake. To make the shake: Blend all ingredients in a blender until completely smooth. You can add the chocolate chips either before or after blending. Be sure to use pure peppermint extract, not imitation.View Nutrition Facts
Video
Notes
Healthy Drink Ideas
Strawberry Smoothies ( NO banana)
Katie-
What an amazing shake! I Just had post workout. Its so nice to still have favorites without the guilt or gut bomb! Thank You for this blog !!
I LOVE this recipe! I used peppermint extract and threw in a few chocolate chips and it tastes EXACTLY like a mint chocolate chip shake! And I love that it has spinach because it helps me sneak in one of my five servings a day.
Hi Katie!
This may be a silly question but how do you measure 1/4 c with a frozen block of spinach? Also, I want to add chocolate protein powder that doesn’t taste yucky-have you tried any that you liked the taste of?
p.s. Thank goodness for you and your recipes! I am studying for the bar exam and find myself lacking an appetite (probably due to stress), but I love that I can come here and find something completely nutritious, quick, and tasty to nourish myself 🙂
Thaw first ;).
Thank you for this recipe. I seriously make this almost every day. I get very depressed when we run out of frozen bananas and I have to wait for some more to ripen. I use chocolate soymilk/almond milk and a scoop of chocolate “whole food” powder. That way its good for me but SUPER chocolate-y. It is delicious!!!!!
I read somewhere that you can put them in a very low oven temp and it turns them ripe immediately! Haven’t tried it yet, but I want to :).
Do you have any nutritional values for this shake?
I don’t. But off the top of my head, I think it’d be around 140 calories for the whole recipe.
I just made this for the first time, but with turnip greens from the garden! (I blanched the greens then rolled them into ice-cube size balls & froze them.) This is the best way ever to eat turnip greens 🙂
Sooo Good! I love it, I left my shake white and it reminds me of Breyers mint chocolate chip ice cream
I really love your website. And I don’t usually pass on sites to other people. But I have shared use over and over again!! And I can’t say enough about your mint shake. My pickiest son EVER (he won’t eat things because of color, texture, look, etc) absolutely LOVES this. 😀
Mine turned out brown instead of green from the greens- what happened?!?! I used a Vitamix, too!
It’s been said before, but Katie is a genius. Someone give this girl her own TV show!
Yum! The mint masks the banana, too, so this is perfect for bananaphobic brothers. 😉
hello!
i am in love with your website i love everithing that you have here!
i live in colombia. Here i dont have xantham and guar gums and it is impossible to find, i am not vegan and i dont have an special diet, but with what thing can i substitude these ingridients? i know they are not necessary but i like the texture that they give to the shake.
thankyou so much and i hope you have a solution. because i want to try this with the texture that this ingridients give.
sorry if i have grammar mistakes but it is because i speak spanish ind i am bad speaking english… 🙁
Frozen spinach is cooked first isn’t it?
OK, stupid question… wouldn’t spinach make it taste kind of weird? I’ve never had it in a shake, so I honestly can’t say, but it just seems strange to me. I’m willing to try it but does it throw off the mint taste? I’m a huge fan of mint though, so I’m pretty excited about this. lol
@Melissa, that’s the magic: you can’t taste the spinach at all. Mint trumps everything. Trust me, my children are verrrrrry suspicious of such experiments, and we all agree: it’s mint & chocolate.
Oh my god. This is phenomenal! I haven’t had anything like this in over 5 years! A gluten, free, refined sugar free and dairy free mint shake that tastes delicious?? Preposterous! Yet… true. Thank you.