Peanut Butter

I wanted to buy peanut butter the other day, but when I saw that most of them contain at least 25% of sugar, I decided to make my own. I would have done that before if I knew it was that easy!




Ingredients

• 1 cup of peanut
• Honey or molasses (optional)
• Salt (optional)

Preparation

Take a large pan and roast peanuts. I have roasted a little bit more than I have to, so mine was a little darker. Roasting couple of minutes will suffice.

Then put them into a food processor and grind them until they become creamy. Add honey and salt if you want. Your peanut butter is ready.

Enjoy!

Date Snack

I bought some roasted chickpeas, I ate some of them and the rest has been on the shelf for couple of months. Then I realized I needed to find some other way to eat them and decided to mix them with dates. The good part of this recipe is you don't necessarily need chickpeas or dates, you can use any kind of nuts and dried fruit such as prunes, apricots or figs.

Ingredients

• 10 dates
• 100gr roasted chickpeas
• 1 tablespoon tahini
• 1 oz raisins
• Any kind of nut-I used couple of hazelnuts, some almonds and 3-4 walnuts

Preparation

Take out the seeds of the dates and put them in the water around one hour. I did not have food processor so I crushed the chickpeas and nuts in a mortar and pestle. I chopped the dates and raisins on the cutting board and mixed them all. If you want to use food processor, put tahini first add some water, when it got mixed add dates ad raisins and grind them together. Lastly add nuts and chickpeas and grind them altogether. Take out from the processor and put it on a parchment paper, cover up with stretch film and make it square with the help of a rolling pin. Bake it around 8 hours in the lowest heat like 150F until it gets dry. I only baked for 4 hours, it is still good.If you don't wan to bake it, just keep it in the fridge.

Almond Milk

I had two New Year's resolution, first one was to be vegetarian and second was to do a whole30. However, I realized these two do not work together well. So, I failed both. However I lost 10 pounds, while trying. It does not look like a failure at all:) During my six days of whole30 (that is right, I couldn't even survive one week), I have learned how to make almond milk and wanted to share.

Ingredients

• 1 1/2 cup raw almonds
• 4 cups of water
• 1 teaspoon cinnamon
• 1 dessertspoon maple syrup, honey or molasses (optional)

Preparation

Soak almonds in a water about one day. After one day, you will be able to peel them easily. 

Put them with one up of water in a blender and blend couple of minutes. Then add rest of the water and other ingredients and blend couple of minutes more. 

You can drain it with a cheese cloth and a strainer and squeeze. I did not do it, since I prefer a thick one. Enjoy!

Pickled Cabbage

Ingredients

• 1 green cabbage
• 3 cloves of garlic
• 4 tablespoons salt
• Apple cider vinegar

Preparation

Separate cabbage leaves (do not use first three layers) and cut each leaf into two to four pieces. Take a large plate or pan, put a layer of cabbage and add some salt, put another layer and add more salt.Continue this process until all cabbages are done. Cover the cabbages with a plate or pan and put something heavy on top.

Wait 5-6 hours until they reduce their size. In the mean time crush garlic cloves with some salt.

Then take a large jar and put as much as cabbage you can, it should be tight. Then add garlic and vinegar. I do not prefer to add water, but if you want, you can add some water, this will make it less bitter. I put some carrots on top of it. You can make different combinations with pickles, green beans, tomatoes...

Close the lid and keep the jar in a cool place like a pantry, it should not be under direct sunlight. Wait 10 days to 2 weeks without opening it. Enjoy!

Strawberry Jam

I want to show you how to make traditional strawberry jam, without using any preservers.

Ingredients

• 1 gallon of strawberry (I do not like this type of measurement, but they were selling as a gallon)
• 5-6 cups of pure cane sugar
• 1/2 lemon juice

Preparation

After washing the strawberries, take out their leaves and cut in two or three pieces and put them into a large pot. Then add sugar on top of strawberries. I have added 5 cups of sugar, but you can add more if you like more  sweet jam. The point here is to cover all strawberries with sugar. Like in the picture.

Wait couple of hours until the sugar melts, then put the pot on  medium heat and wait until it boils. After it is boiled there will be some foam on it, take out all this foam. Otherwise jam will not taste good and spoil sooner. Reduce the heat to low and boil it until  the jam become thick, then add the lemon juice and take it from the heat. This should take about one hour. Wait until it gets cold to put in jars and leave the jar open couple of hours. You can keep your jam in a place which is not exposed to direct sunlight. You do not need to put in fridge, unless the weather is too hot.

Enjoy!

How to make yogurt?

Today I want to show you how to make yogurt. Yogurt was consumed by medieval Turks in 11^th century and at first it was fermented with ant eggs.

Ingredients

•      1 gallon of whole or reduced fat vitamin D milk (it is best if you can find raw milk)
•           ½ cup of yogurt
•           A little bit sugar

Preparation

First take a large pot and put all the milk in it and heat it until it is boiled.  After that wait around 15 minutes (this time depends on the kind of pot and the amount of the milk) until it gets a temperature that will not burn your finger. You can check it with your little finger. The most important thing in making yogurt is to find correct temperature. So even if you cannot make it in the first time, you will be more successful after trying couple of times. When you find the correct temperature, add the yogurt and a little bit of sugar, like a teaspoon, in the milk. Then cover it with several blankets, as it has to stay in the same temperature all the time. Put it in a warm place and do not open it 8 hours. After 8 hours open it and check if is thick enough, if it is not you can wait another two hours.  After opening it, wait until it gets cold and put it in the refrigerator. If you want a thicker yogurt, you can put a clean, no color cloth on top of it to suck the water in it.  Your yogurt will be ready in couple of hours.

Enjoy!