Making Homemade Yogurt

One word - delicious!  If you've never tried homemade yogurt, you don't know what you're missing.

I've made a few batches now and it's really a simple process:

1 quart whole milk (you can use pasteurized or raw, but not ultra pasteurized)
1 tablespoon organic yogurt (from the store) or 1 packet of yogurt culture starter
1 teaspoon gelatin
1/2 cup white sugar, sucanat, or honey (your choice)

Heat the milk to 180 degrees on the stove in a stainless steel pan.  Use a candy thermometer to watch the temperature.  Stir frequently.
When it reaches 180, remove from the heat and let it cool back down to 105 degrees.  Tip:  Place your pan in a sink of cold water.  This speeds up the cooling process a LOT. 

Add the gelatin and whisk in vigorously.  Make sure the gelatin is completely dissolved.  Add 2 tablespoons of organic plain yogurt (or 1 packet of yogurt starter) and gently stir.  (You want to be less vigorous with the cultures).  Add the sugar, sucanat or honey and stir well.

I strain this mixture through a sieve into a large measuring cup and then pour into 6 half-pint jars.  Cap the jars and place in your dehydrator.  (Preheat the dehydrator a few minutes at 115 degrees). 

Six hours in the dehydrator seems to be the perfect time for my yogurt.  Remove from dehydrator and refridgerate.  Enjoy!

Food Journey, Part Two

We have a good farmer's market in our area that's open 3 days a week.  We've been pretty regular customers for the past few weeks.  We've found the prices on vegetables and fruits to be very reasonable, and we've tried a few new recipes as a result of our shopping.  I'll admit it does take a bit more thought and planning to eat more seasonally and locally, but I can say we've enjoyed it so far!  Several things are becoming more of a habit and not so "new." 

Eliminate Processed Foods -
So right now we're still cutting out more and more processed foods.  I'm planning to have a go at making my own mayonnaise.  I'm really trying to eliminate the high fructose corn syrup.

We've been eating our own homemade yogurt!  (More about that in another post.)  Snacks are usually fruit and/or granola.

Switch to Whole Grains -
Haven't gotten very far on this one.  I'd love to work on my own bread making, because let me tell you, it needs help.  Every batch of bread dough I've made so far is so sticky it's not even funny.  Must have more practice!

Switch to Raw Dairy -
We're making some progress here.  I bought some raw cheese a couple of weeks ago.  So far, no raw milk.  We do have a local dairy that sells pasteurized milk from grass-fed, pastured cows.  And you can buy raw goat's milk here in Arkansas (directly from the farmer) but I haven't gotten up the nerve to try that yet.  Who knows....we may love it!  Raw cow's milk is sold as "pet milk" here. 

Yes, we have no microwave

We got rid of our microwave a couple of months ago.  We haven't missed it.  About all we ever did with it was melt butter or heat up leftovers.  After reading a few blogs about them, we decided it wasn't used enough around here to worry about.  So, out it went (currently in the tool shed).  We both grew up without microwaves in our house, so it's not as though we don't remember life without one.  I remember very clearly when we got our first microwave, because it was a gift from my mom's boss.  It was a monster, an Amana RadarRange.  It took up half the countertop.  But it was so cool.  Nowadays, not so much.

I love not having the microwave sitting on the counter.  I love heating up leftovers on the stove or in the oven.  The food actually gets hot all the way through and stays hot.  What a novel idea.  And guess what, it only takes a couple of minutes to warm up leftovers, with no cold spots.

If you're interesting in reading what others have said about doing without a microwave, here are a few links:


Naturally Knocked Up

Homestead Revival

Keeper of the Home

Of course, I'm the girl with no cell phone, no facebook, no TV...and lovin' it!

Food Dehydrator

We just got a food dehydrator in our house.  I'd been reading about all the things you can do with one, not just drying herbs and whatnot.  You can, of course, dry your own herbs.  But you can also dry vegetables, fruit, beef jerky.  You can dry soaked grains and nuts.  You can make yogurt.  It's great for letting bread dough rise, and I'm sure there are lots of other things I'm not aware of.

We gave ours a test run with some banana chips.  They don't need any pre-treatment, other than a little spritz of lemon juice to keep them from discoloring.  And even that's not necessary, it's just for looks.

I got my bananas with some green on them.  I sliced up 4 bananas, which filled about 3 trays in the dehydrator.  They dried for about 8 hours, and they were done.  About 2/3 of a quart jar.  And yum!  Very concentrated flavor.

I can't wait to try some yogurt!

Have Some Real Food

Below is an excerpt from Dr. Mercola's blog.  This is so true:

The world is rife with evidence that the non-pharmacological approach can accomplish as much, and in many cases more than pills. This concept also makes perfect logical sense, if you remove the thrill of scientific discovery long enough to think that far.


Your body is exquisitely equipped for self-healing, as long as its systems are in good working order.

So how do you ensure that?

With man-made chemicals in doses your body has never encountered or dealt with before?

Were you to ponder this logically, you’d quickly realize the inherent fallacy of the promise of health from using many prescription drugs.

You simply cannot achieve optimal health through drugs. It’s impossible.

You can use drugs as band-aids, temporarily suspending a symptom or two, but then there are side effects… Your body tries to compensate and heal, but the more chemicals you throw down your gullet, the more off-kilter your body gets and the more ill you become. Conventional medical doctors typically respond to this by prescribing you yet another drug, and another, and another…

This is why the average American senior now gets 30 drug prescriptions!

Meanwhile, adverse drug reactions from “properly prescribed drugs” are the fourth leading cause of death in the United States. And overdoses from prescription drugs rank second only to motor vehicle crashes as the leading cause of accidental death.

Additionally, many medications create life-long dependency upon the drug, despite the damage and suffering they’re inflicting, since drug withdrawal exacerbates your symptoms until the drug is completely out of your system.

The current medical paradigm, with its focus on a drug for every symptom creates a mind-boggling amount of needless suffering and premature death.

Optimal health requires optimal FOOD, not more drugs.

It really is that simple.

Once you feed your body the nutrients it needs instead of chemicals, “health” becomes the norm rather than the exception.

I'm always amazed at how many people run to the doctor for every little thing.  And, of course, the are given drugs (usually antibiotics) which wipe out the beneficial bacteria in their gut, which makes them susceptible to every germ that comes down the pike, which makes them go to the doctor, and on and on. 

The article has a lot of good information, check it out.  And then go eat an apple.

A Food Journey

We're on a food journey.  We've always been pretty good eaters (or so I thought).  Not a lot of fried foods, not a lot of fast food, take out, or even restaurant eating.  We tend to eat at home, with most meals cooked from scratch.  But, still, a lot of things sneak in there.  Just how much sneaks in, I never really realized until I started looking. 

So, we're trying to be more conscious of eating healthfully.  Simpler, wholesome, traditional. UNPROCESSED.  I've found a lot of good information on several blogs:

http://thehealthyhomeeconomist.blogspot.com/
http://homesteadrevival.blogspot.com/
http://kellythekitchenkop.com/
http://www.kitchenstewardship.com/
http://www.keeperofthehome.org/
http://nourishedkitchen.com/

It's amazing the information that is out there, and the number of people who don't know about it.  I know I sure didn't until recently.  I'm hoping to share our process as we go through it and any kernels of information I learn along the way. 

So right now, we're pretty much on Step 1:

 - Eliminate overly processed foods
This has been harder than I thought.  Mostly because we're not "processed" food eaters, or so I thought.  I mean, we don't eat boxed food.  But condiments will getcha. 
 - Use good fats
We've made good progress here.  Real butter, extra virgin olive oil, coconut oil.  Toss out that canola!  And no more margerine.

I'm excited about the road ahead!

A Change in Attitude

I'm starting fresh with a new blog, here. Sometimes it is easier to start with a clean slate. I'm leaving my old blog Lamplight and beginning a new start here.

I'm drawn more and more to cooking and gardening these days. I'm sure there will still be some sewing and knitting around here, just not as the main focus anymore. And of course, everyone I know is interested in helping the budget go further!

So, let's go!