Soy

I have never been a fan of soy. I find it disconcerting that it is in SO many products anymore. Have you read a food label lately? I guarantee that you will either find soy, soy oil or some derivation of the soy bean in the list you may also find high fructose corn syrup, or some form of corn in your product as well. By the way those are the two biggest crops in the U.S. so why not shove it into every possible food product on the shelves.

I was cruising around the web, as I normally do on the weekends looking for fun new food recipes to try to make and stumbled upon an informative web site (click on the title "soy" to be transported to knowledge). I found it to be extremely informative and will be searching for more information on the soy topic. If you are a non-dairy person that's fine, it's a smart thing to do and you are probably healthier for that decision, I personally try to limit my dairy intake as much as possible but I am on a quest to be able to do that without stuffing myself full of soy. It's hard, because of this new "health trend" I am spending more and more time in the kitchen making things from scratch I completely enjoy cooking so that is not the problem BUT I don't like that I am not able to choose to not consume soy when I purchase products from my local friendly grocery store and I refuse to just silently let this happen. This is my life and my health that is at stake, and I guarantee that the soy industry does not have my best interests at heart here.

Check out the web site, even if you are pro-soy, at least you will be making that decision knowing what you are actually putting into your body.

The anti-soy City Mouse

Beer

Ugh! I love our local watering hole. But the next morning I always ask myself "what were you thinking!?!" It's a little place where the locals always go, there is a juke box, a dart board and a pool table. No Food, just beer. Oh and did i mention that the beer is $1.50 for a mug and every third beer is free, and no you don't have your choice of hoity toity expensive microbrews or european selections to choose from, you get what you're poured and that's it!

As you can guess it is easy to get drunk......scratch that, beyond drunk there and it is the reason why this city mouse is sitting in her jammies at 3:30 in the afternoon! I mention this only because I am sitting here gripping onto my coffee cup with a searing headache which is the product of cheap beer and beer taps that are not cleaned regurarly. Yes, this headache was caused by the unfriendly little bacteria that live in dirty beer taps, I can always tell because it feels different than a hangover headache, it is slightly more persistent and makes me feel foggy and even my delicious coffee can not quell the waves of incompetence that are currently passing over me.

Well because of all this, Mr. City Mouse and I have decided to start making our own beer, I just got done ordering the supplies! YAY! Even if it fails miserably, it can't cause a headache that is any worse than the one that I have.

Stay tuned for the great beer making extravaganza! We will hopefully have a home brew in a couple of weeks!

Signing off
An Achy Little City Mouse

FRESH

Yes, I love food so much i even watch screeners about it. This was really pretty good and interesting. It is NOT something produced by PETA so you won't want to cry and vomit all at the same time.

It is a documentary about wholesome farming in America and the people who are doing it. The real kicker was that two of the farmers featured in the film were actually there to meet and discuss with the audience after the film, it was pretty cool and they were really informative, it is exciting to see people who go against the grain and suceed, even flourish because of it.

If "Fresh" is coming to a theater near you and you have a couple of hours to spare, check it out, you may find yourself pleasantly surprised. (the web site is embedded in the title of the post name if you're curious)

Now, who wants to go farm something?????

The Cinematic City Mouse

Almonds, Almonds Everywhere (pt2)

Well, i have a spread. But it is not the delicious nut cheese i remember from the restaurant.
It is a firm thick spread that holds a shape and has an interesting flavor, but i think i could have added herbs to it to enhance the taste. I am on the hunt for a more accurate recipe, any thoughts or ideas would be appreciated.

We have determined that this relegates a trip back to the restaurant for further tasting and analyzing of this mysterious nut cheese. Of course, in the meantime, the spread that was created will not go to waste, it will work well in some dishes or even just as a topping on a cracker.

Stay tuned

City Mouse

NOT Honest Food

When did food become so complicated? I find myself asking this questions more and more. Last night i was eating a Popsicle and thinking just this very thing. It was a fruit popsicle, coconut to be exact, so i naturally thought that i had found myself a nice healthy treat to munch on to cool off on such a hot day.

Oh but it was not so! The first ingredient? Water, funny because i thought surely it would have been oh i don't know COCONUT! Next came milk fat and non milk fat, whatever the reason for those i have no idea, and just what is "non-milk" fat? Third, my favorite ingredient, it shows up in everything these days and has absolutely no nutritional value and no business being in my food - high fructose corn syrup! Because, you kow, coconut is not sweet enough!!!! It is not until the fourth (count it 4th!) ingredient that coconut is even mentioned. then there is a slew of various "gums" and preservatives which follow my sad little 4th ingredient.

If i were to take a stab at making a coconut popsicle in place of plain old water i would try using coconut water, it is incredibly healthy and a natural electrolyte replacement drink (instead of gatorade) instead of milk fat i would use coconut milk, then i would use shredded coconut. And i would stop there! No high fructose corn syrup, no "gums" and no preservatives. Now THAT would be a coconut popsicle!

Hmmm maybe i will give this a try.

Signing off

A very frusterated City Mouse

The great yogurt experiment (pt 2)

We have yogurt! I am sitting here with a little bowl of it as i write this. Right now it is a plain flavor so i put a little splash of honey in it. The yogurt has great texture and is actually a little on the thick side, sort of like a custard, which i was hoping for. I think that by not straining the almond milk it made it thicker. This is very exciting, i have a ton if ideas for different things i want to try to make. Today i made plain yogurt, but who knows what tomorrow will hold!

Below is the recipe for plain almond yogurt:

The recipe is from a website which sells non-dairy culture, this time i used the yogourmet culture but followed these instructions, also my yogurt maker is set up for 1 liter (not 1 quart) but i just hopped online and found a conversion site that helped me out with that.

1.Fill your blender a little more then half way with water.

2. Add 1 1/3 cups of almonds to the water.

3. Add 2 tablespoons or so of honey to the mix.

4. Turn on your blender using a slower speed and blend the mixture for about 8 to 10 minutes or until the almonds have disolved. If you use a faster speed it is recommended that you let the milk set for 5 minutes or so and stir slowly to remove some of the air bubbles the blending causes in milk. The blending of the milk will heat it up enough to be able to add the yogurt starter and put it in the yogurt maker. Add water to measure up to one quart and blend for about 2 mins or so. You may have to run the milk through a sift or cheese cloth to remove tiny nut particles that the blender does not eliminate. If this does not bother you then you can leave them in the milk.

5. Make sure temperature of milk is 80F or lower.

6. Then add 1/8 teaspoon of GI ProStart™ yogurt starter for every 1 quart to the milk and give it about 5 or so long pulses with the blender. Making sure the yogurt starter mixes well with the milk. Make sure the starter is thoroughly mixed with the milk.

7. Plug in your yogurt maker and pour the mixture into your yogurt maker container or containers and ferment for 9 to 12 hours (i did 10.5 hours). We suggest you leave the lids to individual containers off and just put cover on yogurt maker. This will allow any water to dissipate from the yogurt giving it a firmer result.

8. Place in refrigerator for 4 hours then your yogurt is ready to eat.

http://www.giprohealth.com/makingyogurt.aspx

Here is the website for anyone who wants to check it out, it has other recipes and different methods (such as using almond flour or cashews instead)

Next time i will try using coconut milk to make yogurt.

Below are some additional pics of the yogurt making:


The yogurt unleashed (or at least
"unlidded")


See the nutty texture that it has?

Have a great memorial day!

The yogurt eating City Mouse

Almonds, Almonds Everywhere

So the cooking bug bit me today, it happens to be very hot and humid right now so i have been making food that does not require the use of my stove or oven. Last summer i had a stint of being vegan, just as an experiment, and no i could not be a lifer but i did learn a ton about other types of food and food combinations which i still use in my cooking today. One day my fiance and i went to a little vegan restaurant in Manhattan, they had this great "cheese" there that was actually made from nuts, i kid you not, it had great texture and flavor if i had not read the menu myself i would not have believed that it was not real cheese. I decided to try to make it today, currently it reminds me of something closer to almond butter, but it needs to sit and "ferment" for 8 or so hours so we shall see how this turns out.

Speaking of almond butter, i also made that today, it turned out great! i was really happy with it and so was my trusty taster. I started with a recipe from a cookbook written by someone called "The Hippy Gourmet" he's awesome, check him out on You Tube. In addition to his recipe i added a kiss of honey to make it just slightly sweet. It's great and thick yet spreadable. I use local honey in a lot of my cooking, it has great and healing properties, if you have allergies to pollens and plants try eating honey that was harvested in your area it is supposed to help with those types of allergies, and if it does not it is still yummy and not a chemical you are dumping into your body that your liver will have to struggle with later.

As a diclaimer, i am not a doctor, nutritionist or dietician, i am just someone who is deeply into food so i read about and experiment with it.

Ok, signing off, more on the nutty cheese tomorrow.

City Mouse

The great yogurt experiment

My mother bought me a yogurt maker as a birthday gift (don't worry, I actually asked for one).

About a year ago I discovered almond milk and no longer use cow or goat milk for anything really, except for my morning coffee if I am running around the city and don't have almond milk handy.

I digress, i got the yogurt maker in the hopes of being able to make a delicious almond milk based yogurt. I am on my second trial, the first one failed so i did some additional research and a little more web surfing to see what other experimentalists have been doing.

In my first attempt i used a commercial brand of almond milk and treated it as i would regular cow milk which was a mistake. In this experiment a few missteps i discovered were: 1. i over heated it. 2. i added corn starch. 3. i added maple syrup, the bacteria or culture need something sweet to eat while fermenting while cow milk has tasty things for the bacteria to munch on, non-dairy drinks do not 4. i put the little lids on making it so that condensation was formed.

The outcome? By heating the commercial brand of almond milk to the same temp i would have heated cow milk i changed the chemical composition and it separated, by adding corn starch (i thought it would make it nice and thick) it further aided in the separation. I am not sure about the maple syrup, i think i was actually ok to use that but am still looking into that, oh and i slept through the timer beep and did not get it into the refrigerator fast enough. Long story short i created something that smelled vaguely like yogurt but that is where the similarities end.

Today i decided to give this another shot. Instead of using a commercial almond milk which has additional ingredients that i cannot control i made the almond milk from scratch (it is SO easy!) some people would prefer to have it drained so that it is smooth, but i did not do that because i thought it had a great texture and would really help to give my yogurt good body.
In addition to making the almond milk i also did not heat it, through the process of making the milk it heated it up to approximately 90 degrees and i let it cool down to 80 degrees as directed before putting in the culture. I did not add any aditional thickening agents as i figure i will start with this and proceed from there based on how this batch turns out. I did add honey to the almond milk. currently my little bacteria buddies are munching away on some yummy honey and almonds. I will know tomorrow if it is the right consistency, oh, i also left the little lids off so that the excess water would not form little puddles on in each cup.

If this yogurt is sucessful or at least palatable i will be posting the recipe for those who would want to try it, the one thing i noticed is that there are many MANY people who would like to have an alternative to dairy based yogurt but not necessarily use soy as the replacement. I am in that crowd, i don't like soy and am not sold on the hype that is is truly healthy to have in large amounts, but more on that in another post.

As a last note i am using yogourmet freeze dried yogurt culture, i will be switching to a non-dairy based one once this one runs out, i don't see any reason to be wasteful. It is extremely hard to find non-dairy based culture as it normally is grown in a dairy environment, it is also very expensive, i found a couple of places in the web that sell it, i will be giving it a shot in the future.

Ok, let's keep fingers crossed!!!!

City Mouse