With the recent upsurge in dietary health awareness around the country, many restaurants have been trying to keep up by cutting fats and carbohydrates from their menus.
But an alternative to such reduced rations is opening in Prince George’s County: the growing smoothie chain, Robeks. The new College Park location, located next to Ikea on Route 1, is only the fifth in Maryland.
Franchise co-owner William Jones is a Bowie native and he hopes to root this new venture firmly in the county where he grew up, along with his partner, Nate Williams.
‘‘I wanted to be able to offer something to my community, to Prince George’s County – a healthy alternative,” said Jones, an athlete who left the world of real estate investment to search specifically for a smoothie enterprise.
The company, which offers a range of all-natural fruit and vegetable smoothies with self-branded nutritional boosts, as well as ‘‘healthy eats,” opened in 1996 in California and now boasts more than 150 locations in 18 states.
Robeks markets its smoothies as the ‘‘ideal meal” or a ‘‘meal replacement,” using fresh fruits and vegetables to provide optimum vitamins, minerals and antioxidants as well as nutritional supplements to help boost energy, build immunity and more. For Jones, running Robeks helps him maintain his own healthy lifestyle, he said, while allowing him to offer a different kind of dining option in the community.
‘‘It’s something that folks can pick up easily and enjoy on the go,” Jones said. ‘‘It’s an easy way to get your daily vegetables and fruits.”
Aside from these fresh blends, Robeks also offers a range of low-carb wraps ($5.99 each) and salads ($6.25 each) that showcase savory combinations of color, texture and taste: the Mediterranean tuna salad wrap includes pine nuts, Roma tomatoes, cucumbers, red onions and feta cheese wrapped with the salad in a spinach tortilla, while the Napa Valley chicken salad features blue cheese, grapes, pecans, carrots, red onions and balsamic dressing. Low-fat, high-energy gourmet pretzels ($2.99 each) or muffins and cookies ($2.49 each) can round out a meal here.
In the interest of boosting healthy lifestyles, Robeks sells one- and two-ounce ‘‘shots” of green tea ($1.50, $2.50) or organic wheatgrass juice ($2, $3.50) – freshly blended, intensely green, with a grassy tang and distinctly sweet aftertaste. If the customer prefers something milder, Robeks’ ‘‘energy bowls” ($4.99, $5.99) feature a deep-purple, smooth sorbet made from the Brazilian acai berry, considered the highest-antioxidant fruit in the world.
But if you’re just here for the smoothies, there is something for everyone here. Berry and Tropical Smoothies come in 12-, 24- and 32-ounce sizes ($3.49, $4.49 and $5.49, respectively) and include such luscious combinations as ‘‘Banzai Blueberry,” with fresh-squeezed orange juice, blueberries, strawberries, raspberry sherbet, nonfat yogurt and ice, or ‘‘Passionfruit Cove,” with passionfruit-mango juice, strawberries, peaches, pineapple sherbet and ice.
Any of these smoothies can be enhanced with one free nutritional boost, or you could just try a ‘‘power smoothie.” These come only in 24-ounce ($5.49) and 32-ounce ($6.49) sizes, and feature Robeks brand nutritional boosts. The ‘‘Pro Arobek” smoothie, for instance, contains apple juice, bananas, raspberry sherbet, nonfat yogurt and ice plus three supplements, and totals 30 grams of protein. And the ‘‘Exotic Smoothies” ($4.75 for 24-ounce, $5.75 for 32-ounce) feature antioxidant-rich açaí, pomegranate or green tea.
Free samples of these smoothies will be given away at Robeks’ grand opening, scheduled for 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturday.
