Staples - Part 3 - Yogurt

We eat a lot of yogurt. After buying tons, and continually hearing how easy it is to make, I finally decided to give it a try. I got an inexpensive yogurt maker (which is not necessary, but makes it easier for me) and we make it about once every two weeks. I'm giving you the way I do yogurt - there a re a trillion ways and lots of opinions about why one way is better than another. This is the only way I have ever made yogurt, so I don't have any opinions about the other ways, but you can google the heck out of it and find videos and step by step instructions for just about every possible scenario. So just try it!

I use organic half and half or cream, or cream line milk, or whole milk. Anything less than whole milk makes a really runny yogurt. I prefer milk from a farm, with as little processing as possible. I have discovered the hard way and then had it confirmed by research, that ultra pasturized anything will be hard to turn into yogurt. So if you do get store bought milk, try to find one that does not say "ultra" anything.

I take about a quart of milk (or cream) and heat it on the stove (stirring occasionally) to about 180 degrees or until it starts to climb the sides of the pot. It should go without saying, but all of your cooking utensils should be really clean before you start. It would suck to add some random crummy bacteria into your yogurt.

While that is heating up, put two tablespoons or so of starter yogurt in a glass measuring cup.

This is to bring the yogurt to room temperature. You can use any yogurt, as long as it is not flavored. I prefer to use either a little of the yogurt from the last batch (which I never remember to save) or plain thick yogurt from the farmers market. I'll use Trader Joe's whole milk plain yogurt as well. I always use whole milk yogurt.

Once your milk reaches 180, pull it off the heat and let it sit and cool. I let it go to about 95-100 degrees.

Then take a cup or so of the milk and add it to the yogurt in the measuring cup. Gently mix it with a spoon or spatula, then pour the mixture back into the pot and gently stir it all together.
Pour the yogurt/milk mixture into your yogurt cups - my yogurt maker came with glass cups which again makes it easy. Load the cups into the yogurt maker and turn it on.

I leave mine for about 10 hours. Any less and it is too runny for me. I usually start yogurt at night after the kids are asleep. Then I get it into the yogurt maker before I go to bed and it is done when I get up. Once it is done, put it in the fridge with lids on the cups for a few hours - 3 or 4 at minimum.
I usually add fruit or nuts (if I add anything) when I serve it rather than try to flavor it before it gels. I would like to try adding some vanilla bean as it cooks, but I just haven't gotten to it yet. My kids eat this like crazy and it is not a sweet yogurt - it actually has quite a tang to it.

Staples - Part 1

There are several staples that I make regularly for snacking and meals in our home. I've continued to make the things that are hits for most or all of us, as long as they are pretty easy and healthy. Since I know there are many on a food journey, I thought I'd share a bit about our food prep with you. We strive to eat a grain free diet and we do limit dairy to some extent, and mainly eat only fermented dairy like yogurt and kefir. We avoid processed soy, artificial dyes and flavors, and generally ingredients that are hard to pronounce. We are not perfect and since we are not allergic to any foods (although Honey's consistent reactions to breads are debatable and we all have intolerances, so each of us has to decide if it is "worth it") we have the luxury of letting go a bit.

I make Coconut Muffins almost every week. My recipe comes from Many Paths, One Journey to Health, an HMN Cookbook. The recipe is one adapted from Bruce Fife's Cooking With Coconut Flour by fellow HMNer Jessica at CrunchyChewyMama. I like coconut, and I like this recipe because it is pretty versatile; I've added carrots, almond extract, raspberry extract, cocoa powder, and chocolate chips and I bet you could do any fruit or vegetable and it would be good. Depending on the additions, this can be breakfast, snacks, part of lunch.... anything you want. It's gluten and dairy free, and you can completely eliminate the sugar as well if you want. I found that the carrots added a lot of sweetness and I could cut the sugar and add a little cinnamon and they were great.

Here's the basic recipe:

WET INGREDIENTS:
3 Tablespoons melted coconut oil
3 eggs (warmed in water so they don't re-solidify the coconut oil)
2-3 Tablespoons sugar, rapadura, Sucanat, maple sugar or date sugar
2 Tablespoons of full fat coconut milk
1/4 teaspoon sea salt
1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract

DRY INGREDIENTS:
1/4 cup coconut flour - sifted
1/4 teaspoon baking powder sifted into the flour

Blend the wet ingredients together, then add the dry ingredients and mix until the batter is smooth. Add in whatever fruits, veggies or other flavoring you'd like. Spoon the batter into well greased muffin cups. I like using coconut oil in the cups whether they are metal or stone. The batter will stick to paper cups, so leave those out unless you like the taste of paper. Bake them at 400 degrees for 8-15 minutes.

I usually double this recipe and make mini muffins. A double batch makes 24 very full mini muffins. You may want to stretch the batter to 48 level mini muffins if you add a fair bit of veggies or fruit. My kids really like these and coconut flour is a great protein source, as is the egg, so I feel good about them having seconds and thirds.

These muffins get stored in glass jars (we reuse the ones from spaghetti sauce or use canning jars) in the fridge or freezer. I'd put them in the freezer for sure if they are not eaten within 3 days or so.

Yeah - it's my choice, but boy it can be a pain

One morning last week as I was squeezing fresh orange juice, making eggs and gluten free waffles, and realizing I'd be hustling to get the kids in the car and off to wherever it was we were going on time, I thought "why can't I just be normal?". Really, sometimes I just want to throw in the towel. Go for it - eat Cap'n Crunch and skim milk for breakfast. Have a frozen veggie puff (what is in that?), store bought fried chicken, a Lunchable, orange drink, white bread grilled cheese, granola bars all day, candy, ice cream, milkshakes, and yeah - let's just stop at McDonalds.

This crap is way tiring. We go out most mornings, and I pack snacks and lunch for the kids and myself. I feel like a freaking pack mule with all of these lunch boxes and glass containers with fresh healthy homemade food inside. Lately the kids are eating us out of house and home, so nothing lasts long, which means I carry more stuff. If they don't get and/or eat any protein with breakfast, the requests for snacks or lunch come fast and furious within the hour. Yeah sure, we can eat at a restaurant, but we are usually at people's houses and besides that - I don't have the funds for dining out every day. And yeah, I could wrap everything in tin foil or plastic wrap, but then I'd be tossing so much trash everyday...

Is it worth it? I have to believe it is. But sometimes I secretly wish it made no difference at all.

Apples and chocolate sand

I've been thinking about gratitude. I'm not one for thank you notes, but I do think letting people know that you appreciate them is important. We've been using the Thanksgiving holiday as a lesson in thankfulness for the kids, and I know the more they see the adults in their life expressing their thanks, appreciation and gratitude the easier it will be for them to integrate that into their everyday lives.

This time of year brings people to ask "what are you thankful for?" of each other and ourselves. Some of the answers are very pat and broad, and clearly what "should" be said. I think gratitude loses it's meaning or impact. I'd like to be more specific and clear about my thanks for big and small things, material and intangibles, for myself and as an example. Since it is easier to write (for me at least) I figured I'd start here. I am grateful for so much that I'm sure I won't manage to get it all "on paper", but I'll try to touch on some of them over the next few weeks.

I have a wonderful friend, A, who is a gift in and of herself. I could write an entire post (and them some) on how my life is enhanced by my relationship with her. But for now, I'll focus on her mother and father in law, who are two of the most thoughtful people I have met. The in laws brought me a gift of a huge box of apples last week. So you say, apples, so what? They have a 10 lb bag at Costco for 6 cents! Nope, not these apples. These are McIntosh apples that came from their own tree in upstate New York. The tree and fruit have never been treated in any way, and the harvests are varied. At the end of the summer, they brought some apples for my friend and she made some applesauce. I mentioned how great fresh apples would be and that my kids love applesauce. Well, they remembered this and stored as many apples as they could and drove them down here last week.

I set to work, making apple crisp (made with coconut flour - yum!), apple muffins (almond flour), apple bread (with the last of our regular flour), and applesauce. We used my tiny food processor for a batch of applesauce and the kids ate it all in one sitting. So I borrowed my friends food grinder and strainer to go on my kitchenaid mixer and set about making big batches of sauce. I think I froze 20 big jars of sauce and I have another 15 small ones in the fridge (it wasn't worth canning since we eat it so fast - we have already eaten 3-4 jars).

The gift of the apples was wonderful, but the gift of having my kids see how apples become sauce and getting to help me make it is so much more. I get to pull a jar out of the freezer and remember how the kitchen smelled of hot apples and cinnamon; that will warm me up on a chilly afternoon in February. Having a fresh homemade dessert that was "good for us" on Thanksgiving and being able to give loaves of apple bread to other people who deserved our thanks was lovely. The actual gifts people give lead to other gifts in our lives. And we in turn bestow gift on other people. It just feel good.

It didn't stop there. Peanut really loves the sand in M's (A's son) sandbox. She calls it chocolate sand because it is so dark and soft. Well, the in laws heard this as well, and yep - a huge load of sand came with the apples. The kids helped mix the sand in and then got to play around in it for a bit. I think Peanut didn't realize what she was getting until the third or fourth bucket of sand went into the sandbox - then she got really excited about it. So once again, a gift of thoughtfulness that will get to be shared and enjoyed by my kids and their friends. Thank you G and L for spending the time and energy to collect and load up apples and sand and drive it all the way here so my Peanut and Pumpkin could enjoy such treats!