Clean Food, Is It?

Choosing a clean food diet is a personal choice. It is a choice that I made to help with my digestive issues, and I’m 100% sure that it has helped me stop the Prilosec.

The Z Man and I are not 100% clean food people, we are probably more around the 75% range. But it is a conscious effort for us because we want to know what we are putting in our bodies. Still there are times we backslide a bit. We are human. But honestly when we do eat something out of the norm for us, more often than not we immediately regret it and wish we hadn’t.

Sometimes even the healthy choices can be deceiving. For example during the busy summer months when I was working 6 days a week I would sometimes swing by the grocery store for a bag salad to have for my lunch.

An entire bag salad complete with croutons, dressings, fruit, nuts (you get the idea) is $3.00 whereas a salad from a restaurant would run around $7.00
Choosing a salad for lunch IS a healthier choice than restaurant food and most certainly healthier than any drive thru food.
A bag salad is quick and easy, just dump in a bowl and eat which is very convenient.

Take a look at these pictures of what actually comes in a bag (caesar) salad.

Take another look at the ingredient list for this bag salad in the second picture. YIKES!!!!!!!!!!!!

Granted that the unwanted ingredients are mostly in the dressing and croutons, but even the cheese has unwanted, unclean ingredients.

That is why I make my own dressing.

A simple but great basic salad dressing is:

1 tsp dijon mustard
1/3 cup balsamic vinegar
1/3 cup olive oil
1 tsp. honey
salt and pepper to taste

Combine all the ingredients in a jar and shake to blend. Done!

Then you don’t have all those unnecessary and unwanted ingredients in your salad, and you are eating clean.

The basics of a clean food diet for us is

Five or less ingredients on the label.
No unpronounceable ingredients. If I can’t say it and don’t know what it is then I don’t want to eat it.
Natural sugars such as raw honey and pure maple syrup.
Cook real food – think of it as what your grandmother or great grandmother cooked and put on the table.
Cook your own food so you know what’s in it even if you have to do weekly or bi weekly meal prepping.
Read ingredient labels, read all ingredient labels even on the simple items. Trust me, you’ll be surprised!
No meals received through a drive through window.

Like I said earlier, eating clean is a personal choice and one I’m glad I’ve made for me and the Z Man.

And if you decide to try it, then I hope these few tips will help you get started. Just remember, it’s not about being perfect it’s just about being comfortable with your choices.

Till next time,

Lori

Peeling A Fresh Egg

Have you ever tried to peel a fresh boiled egg?

I mean a egg that came straight from the chicken into your house, bypassing the grocery store where they may be a month or more old.

Well let me tell you that peeling a fresh egg can be quite challenging because the shell and membrane does not want to separate from the egg.

Quite often they tear apart or big chunks peel off with the shell and it is very frustrating.

Usually this is how they look.

Not a pretty sight, especially for your deviled eggs that you want to look beautiful and delicious.

Well let me save you from the frustration and tell you how to peel a farm fresh egg perfectly.

Instead of boiling your eggs in water, you need to steam them in a steamer for 20 minutes.

That’s it! That’s the secret to peeling a fresh egg.

I imagine that any type of steamer would work, but I use a stove top steamer.

Steam your eggs then rinse them in cold water and peel away just as you normally would and the shell will come right off the egg.

You’re welcome 🙂

Till next time,

Lori

Waste Not Want Not

Waste not want not was a very important way of life back in the day. It was imperative to make the most out of every bit that you had.

I never remember my grandmother hauling garbage cans to the road, because there was no waste in her house. Now most houses have one or two garbage cans out front on pick up day.

Last week I was telling a friend about all the grapes hanging on the vines and how I really hated to see them go to waste.

She said, well…. “waste not want not” So, I got busy canning more grape jelly.

I will admit that it doesn’t come naturally for me to think “what else can I do with this”. I sometimes struggle when a situation calls for ideas outside the box, or an improvisation. This is because I like a plan and I am not always the most patient person. 😉

Sometimes I get so eager to get so much done that I forget to stop and enjoy the process or think outside the box of how can I make this even better.

So, when my friend said “waste not want not” it stuck with me.

Take a look at my latest waste not want not project.

Take a guess at what it is.

Go ahead, I’ll wait 🙂

It’s corn cob jelly Y’all!

Now, I know how crazy that sounds but hey, why not?

Remember I told you about me canning all that corn this past weekend?

I saved the cobs, cooked them overnight in the crock pot to get a beautiful golden corn broth.

Look at that color in those jars. That lovely golden yumminess!!!!

Oh come on, I know you’ve sucked on a corn cob after eating it to get the sweet juice out of it. Everybody has. I know you know what I’m talking about….

Anyway, once you’ve got your corn stock made all you do is bring it to a boil then add pectin and sugar and you have a golden jelly that is a very strong resemblance to the taste of honey.

Once I finished this batch I was so excited that I immediately started jotting down ideas on what type of herbs I could use in it. For example maybe a rosemary thyme jelly or maybe a lemon or orange citrus hint to it. I think that would be lovely too.

This corn cob stock would also make a great starter for vegetable stocks or chowders and soups. Endless possibilities here Y’all.

I think waste not want not worked out pretty good here.

Now, I need to go make some biscuits for this jelly. YUM!

Corn Cob Jelly Recipe

3 cups of corn cob stock
1 box of fruit pectin
4 cups of sugar

Pour corn stock into a heavy bottom pot and add fruit pectin, stirring frequently on medium heat, bring to a boil. Continue to stir the mixture and add sugar, return to a boil on medium heat, boil for 1 minute. Ladle the VERY HOT mixture into jars and water bath for 5 minutes.

That’s it! How easy is that?

This jelly is a great starter recipe for a beginner canner, or for kids too.

What a sweet way to start your canning hobby.

Till next time,

Lori

Homemade Yogurt

I started making my own homemade yogurt about a year ago when I ran across a recipe on the Frugal Girl website.

I still use this same process because it’s easy and now that I’ve done it so many times I’m able to whip it up pretty fast.

I like making yogurt mainly because it taste so much better and it cost a lot less than store bought.

It’s easy as could be, all you do is

heat up milk
cool it down
add a cup of prepared yogurt
pour it into jars
let the jars sit in a cooler with warm water for several hours.

I can get local raw milk so that’s what I make my yogurt with, but you can use commercial whole milk too.

The yogurt keeps for a month in the fridge so I just use a whole gallon of milk which turns out 5 pints of thick greek yogurt and 2 quarts of whey for me.

Yep, whey. You know that protein whey that everyone wants in their diets now and most people have to buy the powdered stuff at the store. Well, make your own yogurt and you’ll have plenty of it. (more on that later)

The ingredients you’ll need is:

1 gallon full fat milk
1 cup of non flavored yogurt (your starter yogurt)

The equipment you’ll need is:

A heavy bottom stock pot (not cast iron)
A thermometer
A Whisk
Canning funnel
Measuring cup or ladle
Quart size mason jars (preferably wide mouth)
A cooler

This is what I do:

Pour your gallon of milk into a heavy bottomed stock pot
Gradually bring the temperature of the milk up to 190 – 195 degrees while gently stirring occasionally (do not scrape the bottom of the pot as it may scald a bit and you don’t want that in your yogurt)
Fill a sink with ice cold water while milk is reaching temperature
Gently lower the pot of milk into the ice water to cool the temperature down to 120 degrees
Remove the pot from the sink of water on to a towel on the counter
Thoroughly whisk in your starter yogurt
Ladle the mixture into your jars and put the lids on tight
Put the jars in a cooler and pour 2 quarts of warm water into the cooler
Keep water in cooler at 120 degrees for 4 hours
Remove yogurt from cooler and refrigerate

At this point you have yogurt that is ready to eat.

However if you want a thicker yogurt like a greek yogurt (especially if using raw milk, which tends to make a thinner consistency) then continue on doing this:

Let yogurt refrigerate overnight in the jars
Strain all but 1.5 cups yogurt through a fine cloth to release the whey (I have to do this in batches and it usually takes a few hours)

Whisk the 1.5 cup of thinner yogurt into the thicker yogurt to end up with a perfect creamy textured yogurt.
Spoon yogurt into jars, put lids on and refrigerate.