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soaked almonds |
Honestly, I don't have much use for almond milk. I don't eat "paleo cereals" and I don't make fancy latte's at home. If I do make a coffee or tea, I use either organic cream or coconut milk. Store bought almond milk always tasted like chalk to me and I was never entirely impressed with the added sweeteners, guar gums and carrageenans either.
Somehow this week, though, I got it into my head that I should make some. Just something to do in between my nutritional research assignment and various case studies that are due in the next few weeks.
I decided to start with a VERY small batch, just in case it was a fail or didn't like the taste. I viewed a number of recipes, all of which were basically the same and went to work.
- 1/2 cup almonds, soaked overnight and then rinsed thoroughly.
- 1 honey date (pitted)
- 1/4 tsp of vanilla extract
- 1 cup of filtered water
Add all the ingredients into a high powered blender (Vitamix/Blendtec) and blend until the almonds are a fine texture. (For regular blenders, almonds may need to be blended in divided doses).
At this point, I decided to taste the "milk". It was FREAKING AWESOME!
The "milk" was poured through a fine wire strainer into a clean jar. Ideally this part would be best done with a nut milk bag or or at least some cheese cloth. In order to get as much liquid separated from the pulp, I repeated the process of straining.
The portion is small and yielded about 1 cup. According to other recipes, it should be consumed within 3 - 5 days.
A total success and non-paleo husband approved! I really think the success of its flavour is based on the added honey date and touch of vanilla. Definitely trumps any commercial brand of almond milk, hands down! Now I just need to figure out what I'm going to do with it. Perhaps a homemade chai latte or added to my weekend morning coffee.
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Almond Milk Success!! |
And then I experimented with the almond pulp...
Not wanting to waste the almond pulp, I decided to try making some crackers.
I was left with a very wet pulp after straining. A nut milk bag or cheesecloth is key to getting a dryer almond pulp needed for successful crackers.
I thought I was completely out of cheesecloth, which is why I initially used the strainer, but I searched a little harder in the kitchen and found a six inch square of cheesecloth. I put my mushy pulp in and squeezed every last bit of liquid gold I could get out. It did the trick!
Because I had made such a small batch of almond milk, I was left with roughly 1/4 cup of dry pulp. Not really enough to follow a recipe, but enough to experiment with on my own. And if they didn't work out, then not much was wasted.
***Note: this was a trial run only. Still needs some work.***
Oven was preheated to 350 F
1/4 cup almond pulp
1/4 tsp sesame seeds
1/8 tsp garlic powder
1/8 tsp celtic sea salt
1/4 tsp dried thyme
1 tsp melted butter
1 tsp water
The consistency of the dough was quite moist and slightly sticky. I may add a bit of almond flour for the next test. I rolled it out to about a 1/4 inch thickness and cut with a small circle cookie cutter.
I placed them on parchment paper and in the oven for roughly 14 minutes, just until the outside was firm.
After cooling for a few minutes, I tasted one of the crackers. They were delicious but definitely not a cracker consistency. The texture was more reminiscent of biscuits or scone, slightly soft yet crumbly. The taste was incredible and I definitely got the seasoning proportion down for such a tiny batch. I'll definitely try and replicate this again, but on a larger scale. This made 5 whole crackers/biscuits. I might be able to achieve a better cracker consistency if I rolled the dough to 1/8th of an inch. That way they'll crisp up better in the oven.
Certainly some more experimentation is needed, but overall quite pleased with how they turned out.