I decided to make this a post of it's own because it is food recipes that I have found and used over the past week - and they are all worth trying! We are trying to get to the point that 51% of our food is raw. It is hard to reach that point, but we are trying!
We are also eliminating dairy and considering trying sprouted bread. Sprouted bread was considered a form of blasphemy to me for many years but at this point, we are trying everything. A majority of Crohn's patients have hidden sensitivities to gluten and dairy, soaked grains tend to be easier to digest. I have my doubts about eliminating grain entirely and will (hopefully) have a future post about making whole grain, home made bread. I am doing research and I encourage all of you, in this instance, to do the research for yourself and experiment - see what works for you and your families.
We have been starting the day with a water bottle full of water, then we make a smoothie with spirulina, banana, orange juice, and whatever frozen fruit we have on hand. It is a delicious and nutritious start to the day! We have been trying to snack more on nuts, seeds, and fruit throughout the day and then at night I try to make a nice, cooked dinner. I have been eliminating most of our starchy sides (the exception being potatoes because we have a lot of them on hand right now) and replacing it with a salad. Baby steps in the right direction.
Now for the fun stuff...
Kombucha
I want to start out with a picture, then I want to share with you all about this wonderful brew.
Kombucha is a SCOBY - Symbiotic Culture Of Bacteria and Yeast. (FUN FACT - a kombucha SCOBY can be used to make artificial leather... how cool is that?!?) It is a fermented tea with incredible health benefits. It contains acetic acid, B-vitamins, gluconic acid, malic acid, and more. Drinking kombucha leads to a Herxheimer Reaction - a dying off of pathogenic bacteria and yeast. Gluconic acid helps with liver detoxification and makes the liver function more efficiently. It has also been proven successful in helping with cancer treatment, it can help prevent the toxicity of some chemo. Kombucha can also be applied topically to heal leg ulcers and toe fungus.
Making kombucha is simple, the hardest part is finding a mother. You can find mothers online, make sure you are ordering from a legitimate business though as this is not something to mess with. For the most part, the drink is acidic enough to keep germs out but you still want to be careful as it is a living thing and can get sick. If your mother is sick, you will know. It won't have the distinct kombucha smell and you will see mold or pests growing on the mushroom (distinct kombucha smell = vinegar-y smell). We had an old bottle of kombucha in our fridge that had grown a baby SCOBY, I used that to start this batch. I don't necessarily recommend that for liability's sake, but I do not feel that this batch will be dangerous or make me sick. But back to making kombucha - you make tea, 2-5 tea bags for every 3 quarts of water. Boil your water and steep your tea, I used 4 bags and steeped it for 15 minutes. Then add 1 cup of sugar, brown sugar, molasses or evaporated cane juice. It is important not to use honey, stevia or xylitol to make kombucha as they can kill your mother. Once the tea cools, transfer it to a sterilized jar (I used an old pickle jar, sterilized in the oven for 25 minutes at 190 degrees), and add your starter. Most kombucha kits will come with everything you need and instructions on what to do, follow those instructions if that is the route that you go. I want to remind you all again that this is simply what I did, the batch is not done yet so I don't know if it was successful but it appears to be coming along nicely. Once my tea was cool, I added the entire bottle of old kombucha and waited. And waited, and waited. It has been nearly a month and I now have a solid mother. I am waiting for it to get a little bit bigger then I will harvest this batch and start the next one.
When I harvest this batch, I will take pictures and walk you all through it step by step. It is important to note that homemade kombucha is not recommended for the immunosuppressed, but if you keep the brew between 2.5 and 3.2 pH, it should be safe. It can also cause lactic acidosis in people with existing conditions. However, for a healthy individual, cultivating at home should be no problem.
A final note about kombucha - it contains alcohol. I have never gotten drunk off of kombucha as it contains less than 0.5% alcohol, too low of a percentage to be considered alcoholic. But it does contain alcohol for any readers that would be concerned about that. Otherwise, this is a wonderfully healthy drink that can help you reach optimum health.
Almond Milk
Nuts are good! Nut milk is even better! I found a simple recipe on TLC.com and another similar recipe on a raw foods site (along with some simple variations). My first batch was so easy to make and tastes great, it doesn't taste exactly the same as store bought almond milk but it is pretty darn close. The recipe is as follows:
1 cup raw almonds
4 cups filtered water
pinch sea salt
1 tbsp. vanilla extract
3 tbsp. raw honey or agave
Put almonds into a big bowl and cover with water. Soak for anywhere from 1 - 12 hours (I soaked mine for 12 hours). At least once while almonds are soaking, drain and rinse them.
When almonds are done soaking, drain and put into a regular or high speed blender. Add 4 cups of water and blend until nuts are broken down. You will want to watch your blender so that it doesn't overheat, if it gets warm, take a 10 minute break in blending.
Once nuts are broken down, strain mixture through cheesecloth (or nutmilk bag), add extra ingredients and stir well.
Almond milk variations:
Substitute -
Cashews for a neutral taste
Hemp for a protein rich drink
Macademias or pecans
Additives -
For chocolate almond milk, add to the above recipe 2 tbsp. of ground cacao nibs or unsweetened cocoa.
For chai almond milk, add to the above recipe 1 tsp. cinnamon, 1/2 tsp. garam masala, and 1/2 tsp. nutmeg.
For sugar-free almond milk, substitute stevia for the sweetener.
For my batch, I used 1 cup of almonds, 4 cups of water, a pinch of sea salt, 2 tsp. vanilla extract and 2 tbsp. raw honey. It is a little grainy but has an overall smooth consistency, I want to look into a nutmilk bag for future batches but until then, cheesecloth works fine. And I have to say it again - it is delicious! A wonderful substitute for cow milk.
Japanese Steakhouse Ginger Salad Dressing
We are big sushi fans here and I always look forward to eating a house salad with sushi because of the delicious salad dressing they use. I did some digging online and found a simple recipe that tastes better than the original. I found this on allrecipes.com.
1 cup olive oil
1/4 cup soy sauce
1 lemon, juiced
3 cloves garlic, minced
3 tbsp. fresh minced ginger root
1 tsp. Dijon mustard
2 tsp. honey
Pepper to taste
Mix together everything but the olive oil (I used a food processor and it worked great).
Once everything is mixed together well, add your olive oil steadily until it is incorporated. I recommend whisking this step, the liquid can make a mess if it splashes out of the processor.
Pour into a jar, shake well before use. Made about 3/4 of a Newman's Own dressing bottle.
In the future I will substitute stevia for the honey, as the honey coagulated in the bottom of the bowl and left the dressing rather tart. It was still good but I like it a little sweeter. Not only is this dressing simple, it is great on the stomach. Ginger and garlic are proven to calm digestion. It works! :)
Greek Tzatziki Sauce
When we were on our honeymoon, we ate a LOT of great food. It was wonderful, but fattening. We both came home with some extra pounds. On our last day in Savannah, we finally ate at a restaurant that almost every server we had recommended to us - Zunzi's. We had been told that it was a Greek/South African hybrid restaurant and we were expecting something wild. What we found was a small, hole in the wall with one of the most amazing meals I have ever eaten. I can't remember the name of the combo, but it was a bed of mashed potatoes with grilled chicken and vegetables on top, with a side salad, and all of it was covered in a South African sauce and tzatziki sauce. Have I mentioned how wonderful it was yet?
The other night I felt courageous and made our version of Zunzi's, which will now be a family meal of ours. I made garlic mashed potatoes (skins still on), baked some chicken with garlic and ginger, sliced it and served it over the potatoes. I then splashed on some balsamic vinegar and covered it with this homemade tzatziki. It was wonderful! We went to bed happy and satiated and belly ache free. I found the recipe on allrecipes.com (again):
8 oz. container plain yogurt
1 cucumber, peeled, seeded and diced
1 tbsp. olive oil
1/4 lemon, juiced
salt and pepper to taste
1 1/2 tsp. chopped dill
2 cloves garlic
Combine everything in a food processor and process until well-combined.
Let chill for at least 1 hour before serving. Recipe serves 4, but we have used it many times since this meal and still have a good bit left.
Spicy Lentils and Barley
The other night we had fajitas, refried beans, and lentils and barley in lieu of rice. It was a wonderful combination, my sweetie told me to remember to write it down so I would remember it for the future. *blush*
I took an old recipe and altered it, as I do with most recipes. Here is my version, you could alter this and serve it as a side with pretty much anything. It is verstatile, healthy and delicious!
1/4 cup lentils
1/4 cup barley
2 1/2 cups chicken broth
salt and pepper to taste
red cayenne pepper to taste
Boil lentils and barley in chicken broth until they reach desired done-ness. I boiled mine on high for 35 minutes and they were perfect. This served us both decent servings with a little left over.
Well, again I want to thank you all for reading. I am working my way through The Paleo Diet these next few weeks then I expect to return to researching with full force. If anyone ever has any questions, I would be delighted to answer them or try to point them in the right direction.
Be well, all of you. Thank you for reading! :)
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