More sprouts!

The sprouting Jar -- kept on its side so the grains get more air

Last night (Tues) I started some more sprouts. This time I'm trying oat groats and buckwheat groats. I'm so glad I found these instructions before I started. You're only supposed to soak them for 20-30 minutes because otherwise they get water logged and won't sprout. I was going to soak them overnight, whew! The other important thing about these is that you have to rinse the water until it runs clear or they won't sprout. This morning, my buckwheat groats are already sprouting a bit. I'll "harvest" them tonight.

 Sprouts in Action! 

These are buckwheat groats. You can see a tiny white bud coming off the pointy end.

What to do with the almond pulp?

It's seems like a shame it get rid of the almonds leftover from making almond milk, so I've been experimenting with ways to use it. But first, this is what I do with it:

1. After the all the almond juice has been squeezed out, I spread the almond pulp out on to cookie sheets, try not to have more than 1/2 inch or so.
2. Place in 170 F oven until dry. About every 1/2 hour, I gather it all into the center of the cookie sheet with a spatula and mix it a bit then spread it back out to ensure it all dries relatively evenly.
3. Place in a container and store in the frig.

If I'm going to use it in a recipe, I sift it first, most of it will go through, but there will be some bits left, probably. I learned the hard way not to try to grind it in a coffee grinder, it turns to almond butter and clogs the grinder! Aaaggghhh!

Nutty Cracker - Take 2

Nutty Crackers – Take 2

1 t. chia seeds, ground + 2T water

1 1/2 cups sifted almond pulp (leftover from making almond milk)

½ cup dried almond pulp (leftover from making almond milk)

1/3 cup sunflower seeds (raw), coarsely chopped

1/3 cup pumpkin seeds (raw), coarsely chopped

½ t sea salt

4 T coconut oil, melted

4-6 T water

1. Add the 2 T of water to 1 t of ground chia seeds (make sure they are food grade). Allow to sit until thickened. This acts as an egg substitute.
2. Mix all dry ingredients together.
3. Mix in chia seeds.
4. Mix in oil.
5. Mix in water 1 T at a time. You want enough until you can form a ball.
6. Roll out on to cookie sheet. I put a silicone mat on my cookie sheet, shaped the dough into a log, placed wax paper on top and rolled it out to 1/8 – ¼ inch thick. I sprinkled just a bit of fine sea salt over the top.
   
7. Bake at 350 F 20-30 minutes until lightly browned.

The dough is still a bit crumbly and difficult to handle, perhaps another teaspoon of chia seeds next time.

Here's what I tried the first time.

Citrus Juice

I'm a little behind in posting! This past weekend we had guests and I know they like orange juice, so I wanted to make some fresh squeezed citrus juice for them, something I had at another friend's house about a month ago. For some reason, though, mine is quite a bit different. It turned out pretty good anyway! This is what I did.

Citrus Juice

3 Pink Grapefruits, squeezed
2 Lemons, squeezed
3 Limes, squeezed
6 oranges, squeezed
9 T agave nectar
6 packages of stevia (PureVia brand)

Mix it all together in a pitcher. I added a little bit of the orange pulp to add a little fiber and because I like it!

It's a bit too grapefruity. I think next time I would only use 2 grapefruits. I'm sure the 9 T of agave measures out better somehow, but I was adding 1 T at a time to taste.

Price comparisons

Yesterday, Carlos and I (sans Kira who was off with Papa and Mimi for the weekend) went to Tijuana Flats over by USF and got a Carnitas chimichanga and chips and queso...yummy! We'd never had the carnitas version before and really loved it, definitely our favorite! We had a great time being just the 2 of us. It reminded us of when I was pregnant with Kira, we were both working at home and could just get up and go whenever we want. It was one of the best times of our marriage.

After lunch we went to Abbey's Health and Nutrition and Whole Foods to check out their prices and compare them to Chuck's and Nutrition S'Mart that we checked out last week. Overall, My favorite place is definitely Whole Foods. They have the best selection, the best produce, a cafe, yummy samples. However, the best prices are generally at Nutrition S'Mart. Abbey's was good, they had stuff there that I hadn't seen elsewhere. I've heard from others that they are very knowledgeable. Chuck's is ok too, but their produce is generally the worst and it "feels" messier than the others. For us, Chuck's is the most conveniently located and a great thing about them is that they have 20-50% off everything in the store on Super Tuesday, which is the second Tuesday of the month. The price savings otherwise, though, definitely warrant an occasional trip to Nutrition S'Mart.

There were some snacks at Whole Foods that I definitely want to try. I can't wait! They were generally a mix of different seeds (flax, sunflower, pumpkin) and fruits (dates, raisins). I will post my experiments as I try them.

Almond Milk - Take 3

I found a recipe for Brazil nut milk, so I thought I would adapt it to almond milk since I have almonds and no Brazil nuts (which, by the way, are good for the alkaline diet, too). So far this is definitely my favorite. I made a lot (total of 6 cups, fills up my pitcher, but I tried to add ingredients so that the amount is divisible by 4, you'll have to adjust a bit if you make less). I call it Coco Almond milk, but the coconut flavor is barely there.

Coco Almond Milk 

4 cups of soaked almonds (probably about 3 to 3 1/2 cups dry)
4 cups of water
2 T amber agave nectar
1 1/2 t vanilla extract
about 3 dashes of sea salt
3 capsules of soy lecithin (520 mg each)*
2 t coconut oil

1. Soak the almonds overnight in water in the frig.
2. Rinse well in running tap water over a colander
3. Process the almonds (do 1 cup of almonds at a time)

• Place almonds in blender
• Add 1 cup of water
• Blend on high for 1-2 minutes until well blended
• Strain the almond mixture**
• Pour the almond milk into your pitcher, put the strained almond pulp in a bowl for use in other recipes. See here for what to do with it.
• Repeat with remaining almonds
• I rinse out the remaining bit of almonds in the blender with the almond milk I've already strained and strain it again.

4. Add 2 cups of water to your pitcher, mix.
5. Pour 2 cups of almond milk back into blender (rinse blender well first to remove almond bits).

The following is not the order I did it because of a minor disaster I had (see * below), but is what I intend to do next time:

6. Add  agave nectar, vanilla extract, sea salt and soy lecithin. Mix well on high.
7. Add coconut oil, 1/2 t. at a time. Mix well on high (I think!)
8. Pour mix in blender into pitcher and stir. Hopefully, it's all blended, still working out the kinks of mixing in the coconut milk.

* The original recipe calls for adding lecithin powder, which I didn't have, so I tried without it....BIG MISTAKE! After mixing everything together, the coconut oil was a big glob on the top of my almond milk, yuck! As my background in chem teaches me (duh!) oil and aqueous solutions, don't mix! Lecithin is an emulsifier, meaning it enables water and oil to create a homogeneous mixture. We don't have the powder, but my dear hubby did have capsules in the cupboard for cooking purposes. So I added those one at a time until the coconut oil was mostly mixed in. Next time, I will add the lecithin to the aqueous solution first to make sure it's well mixed and then add the coconut oil a bit at a time so ensure I don't overwhelm the mixture. Hopefully, that will be more successful.

This recipe makes a good base for smoothies, to put in cereal, etc. For just a plain ole yummy glass of "milk", you might want to jazz it up a bit. Carlos made a yummy concoction. He added 1/4 t vanilla and 1 t agave nectar to about 8 oz, yum, yum, yummy!

**I actually took pictures this time so you can see what I do! When I strain the almond mix the separate the milk from the pulp, I put 4 layers of cheese cloth over a strainer which is sitting on a 4 cup measuring cup (LOVE that measuring cup, very handy!)

 

Blending the almonds

Straining the almonds

Getting ready to squeeze out the milk

The almond pulp

Chickpea Sesame Crackers

Today Kira and I made sesame crackers using chickpea flour (besan) using this recipe (gotta scroll to the bottom), but modified a bit because I didn't have all of the ingredients. You can buy chickpea flour, but I chose to make it instead. I bought dried chickpeas and ground them in a small food processor as much as I could (it was really loud and took a long time to grind). I seemed to have a hard time getting it into flour texture, but I was able to get enough to experiment with by sifting it. The remaining bits are about 5 mm or less; I'm going to try grinding them in a coffee/spice grinder and/or grain mill, when I get one or the other.

I also used almond flour using the leftover almond pulp from making almond milk the other day. I had already dried the pulp in a 170 degree oven and stored it in the frig. Before using it in the cracker recipe, I sifted it. Here's what we tried:

Chickpea Sesame Crackers

1/4 cup chickpea flour
1/4 cup almond flour
1/4 t salt
1 T toasted sesame seed, lightly ground
1 t toasted sesame seeds
1/4 t soybean oil
about 3 T water (add water until it forms a ball)

1. Mix all the dry ingredients well.
2. Mix in oil.
3. Mix in water 1 T at a time.
4. Knead the dough well to mix all the ingredients.
5. Wrap in plastic wrap and set aside to rest for 10 minutes. Meanwhile, preheat oven to 350 F.
6. After resting, roll out. I put it on a silicone mat, put wax paper on top and rolled with a rolling pin.
7. Cut into the shape you want.
8. Poke each with a fork.
9. Bake 15-20 minutes.

They taste pretty good, but there is an after taste that I can't identify....