Follow me on Twitter Lacto-fermented Asparagus
This is my first try at lacto-fermenting asparagus. I used the general lacto-fermenting recipe from the Nourishing Traditions book.
For more real food ideas check out Real Food Wednesday at Kelly the Kitchen Kop
May 112011
Ingredients:
2 sticks butter
2 cups spelt flour
2 cups rolled oats
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 Tablespoons whey
Combine ingredients into a food processor. Pulse until crumbly. Cover and let sit overnight (12-24 hrs.)
Add:
1/2 cup finely shredded coconut
1 cup sucant or rapidura
In a saucepan combine:
1 cup fresh strawberries, chopped
3 cups fresh rhubarb, chopped
3/4 cup honey
3 Tablespoons of arrowroot powder dissolved in 1/4 cup of water
Bring to a boil stirring constantly until fruit is soft. Set aside to cool. It will thicken as it cools.
Meanwhile, divide dry ingredients in half. Press the first half into a 9 x 13 baking dish. Spoon the fruit over the crust. Sprinkle the remaining dry ingredients on the top. Bake at 350 degrees for 20 min.
These are delicious warm or cold. We enjoyed plain morsels of this rhubarb delight right out of the oven, and then later in a bowl with milk.
For more Real Food recipies check out Real Food Wednesday at Kelly the Kitchen Kop
Oct 132010
We eat endless eggs around here since we gave up eating breakfast cereal. So we keep looking for ways to keep it interesting. 
I put my homemade cottage cheese on the eggs and it was delicious. The homemade cottage cheese melts slightly, unlike the commercial kind. It is also drier so it comes out 1/2 way to feta. Once I made feta with a few changes to the recipe and it was good too.
In the picture you see my homemade bread. This is my first successful loaf without a bread pan. I like the shape. Next on my list to try is biscotti. At the last Weston Price meeting someone brought Lemon-Ginger Biscotti. I don’t know if she’ll give up the recipe or not.
My homemade cottage cheese recipe got deleted off the internet. Stay tuned and I will get it up again soon.
For other real food recipes and ideas check out Real Food Wednesday at Kelly the Kitchen Kop.
Other Nourishing Real Food Breakfast ideas:
Sep 022010
My journey with real food has been a long one. My mother did her best to feed us real food when I was growing up. I am thankful for that. When I had my own family I wanted to feed them well but I got caught up in the modern health foods. I bought packaged organic cookies. I paid extra money to buy organic ultra-pasteurized milk. Imagine my surprise when I found out that I was spending lots of money on inferior products. Foods better for my body were available locally at a reasonable price.
Month after month I attended the local Weston Price meetings finding out what real food is and how to fit it into my life. Turns out that eating real food is simple after all.
It took me years to figure out that my mother had been right all along.
Kelly the Kitchen Kop put together a class online that is packed full of information that took me years to figure out. You can listen to her class and then go back and listen again. Shortcut your learning with a condensed class. Real Food Rookie Class
Someone asked the question – “can I make sweet pickles wihout refined white sugar?”
In the book “Eat Fat, Lose Fat” by Sally Fallon, she has a recipe for Lacto-Fermented Sweet Pickles that calls for honey or maple syrup.
Lacto-Fermented Sweet Pickles
7 cups thinly sliced pickling cucumbers
1 cup thinly sliced mild onion
1 cup fresh lemon juice
1/2 cup Homemade Whey
1 cup honey or maple syrup
3 T. sea salt
1-2 T. celery seeds
2 tsp. turmeric
1 T. yellow mustard seeds
In a lg. bowl, mix cucumbers with onions and place in a 2 qt – sized wide-mouthed mason jars, pressing down lightly with a pounder or meat hammer. Combine remaining ingredients and pour over cucumbers, adding more water if necessary to cover. Keep the top of the liquid 1 inch below the top of the jar. Cover tightly and keep at room temperature 2 days then refrigerate.
This year we tried all kinds of cucumbers soaked overnight in pickling lime. The pickles were very nice and crispy, crunchy. This seemed to work well with the lacto-fermenting.
Has anyone else tried soaking cucumbers in lime then lacto-fermenting?
For more real food information visit – Real Food Wednesday
Jul 212010
One Jar at a Time.
Recipe for 1 pint jar of lacto-fermented dill relish.
1 cucumber, about 7 inches
1/4 cup onion, organic
1/4 cup green pepper, organic
1/2 tsp Real Salt
1/4 tsp mustard seed
1/4 tsp dill seed
1/4 tsp dill weed
1 Tblsp whey
1/8 tsp tumeric
Coarsely grate the cucumber, (for 1 jar I seeded it, the other jar I did not) chop the onion and the green pepper into tiny pieces. Stir in remaining ingredients, mix together. Spoon into a pint canning jar leaving 1/2 inch head room. This mixture will bubble up slightly (some more than others) meaning that the lacto-fermentation process is working. Put the lid on lightly. Leave out in the counter for 24 hours. Tighten lid to store in cool place (the fridge or celler)
I have found that the rubber seal on the canning lids keeps the air out of my lacto-fermented foods. When I store them with a non-airtight lid, they turn a darker color on top. With my saurkraut I just took a fork and romoved the top layer of kraut and ate the rest. Not at one sitting. Lacto-fermented foods are made to eat in small quantities.
For other interesting Real Food topics visit Kelly the Kitchen Kop for Real Food Wednesday.
Jul 062010
Goal: Lacto-Ferment Zucchini
This July my kitchen will be busy with the harvest from my garden. I have exchanged my old heat canning methods with lacto-fermentation. I like it better because I can preserve my veggies one jar at a time instead of a huge batch. When I would wait to get enough cucumbers to make a heat canned pickle batch, the first cucumber would start to go bad (a problem with a small garden).
Sauerkraut and Kraut slaw with peppers
Pickled Cucumbers dill or spicy
Now I looking for a recipe to lacto-ferment zucchini. Can anyone help? Have you lacto-fermented zucchini before? What other lacto-fermenting have you tried?
This post is part of Real Food Wednesday.
May 192010
The asparagus is ready in my garden! I have been anticipating this all winter. Asparagus really livens up the eggs we love to eat. Mostly me, I eat eggs almost every day for breakfast. I feel better when I do. The kids get tired of eggs every day so I have other real food options for them, Soaked Granola, Soaked Pancakes, Kefir smoothies, Cinnamon Swirl Sourdough, and Sourdough treats.
Asparagus Omelet
1 egg, beaten with 1 T. cream
1 stalk fresh asparagus, cut into bite-sized pieces
1 slice of cheese
Butter
Stir fry the asparagus in 1 tsp of butter. I use a cast iron skillet. When the asparagus is crisp tender, pour the beaten egg over the top. When the eggs is set on the bottom, flip it over, add cheese to 1/2, fold over and serve. 1 omelet.
This post is part of Real Food Wednesdays
Pancakes are a favorite breakfast here. Now we have this season’s fresh Maple Syrup.
4 cups freshly ground spelt flour
1 cup all purpose flour (sometimes I use oats or another kind of flour)
4 cups of water
4 Tablespoons of whey (I use kefir whey from homemade cottage cheese you can use yogurt, buttermilk, kefir, or apple cider vinegar)
Combine these ingredients in a large glass bowl and leave overnight covered with a towel.
In the morning I usually have a layer of water on top of the soaked flour so I pour that off into the sink.
In a separate bowl combine -
4 eggs, beaten
1 stick of butter melted
1 cup of buttermilk (more or less depending on the consistency you want)
2 teaspoons of vanilla
Mix well and add to the bowl of soaked flour. These are difficult to combine, just keep stirring.
Add -
4 teaspoons of baking soda
1 teaspoon real salt
1 teaspoon cimmamon
1/4 teasoon of nutmeg
Pour onto a griddle. Serve with butter and maple syrup. We also like nut butter, bananas, and cottage cheese. Soaking the grain breaks down the phytic acid and unlock nutrients making the food easier to digest and absorb. The Nourishing Traditions book has much more information and recipes using soaked flours and grains.
This post is part of Real Food Wednesday 
Mar 032010
Kefir Grains
Look at these kefir grains! They are the largest kefir grains I have ever seen. I was over at a friends house when she was straining her kefir. I have a few tiny grains that seem to have stayed the same for years. I make kefir once a week to use in my homemade cottage cheese. My friend has been making kefir everyday. Maybe I need to pick up the pace. I know the grains are supposed to grow and multiply but mine just don’t.
Can any of you kefir aficionados help with some questions?
Is it better to store the grains in milk or water?
I have tried both and it doesn’t seem to make a difference to mine. I have heard that milk is better because it feeds the grains.
How long can I store them in my refrigerator?
I have heard up to six months. I read that when you bring them out of “sleep” that they need time to “wake up”. Allow the milk to sit with the kefir until resembles the consistency of yogurt. Strain and start a new batch. The new batch should “gel” in 24 hours.
Please let us know your experience!
This post is part of Real Food Wednesday
