December Challenge - Kale Chips

I know I said I was going Greek but that was a full month ago and now I want to eat kale chips HA! Go figure.

The recipe I am going to try to follow is on my younger sister's blog. She's got some great and sensitive taste buds on her tongue and is awesome at cooking. I'll be back in a couple of days with those kale chip pictures from my own kitchen. Tomorrow is Wednesday, AKA grocery shopping day. So... see you soon!

Oh Here's the recipe 

Going Greek

Next month, I am wanting to cook Greek food. My kids and I went to a Greek festival while my hubby was preaching in Atlanta. Now I am completely hooked on cooking their food. Go figure!

I want to make Domathes, Greek Lemon Rice, and Athenian Chicken. I have no idea what ingredients I will need yet. But I am determined to make a Greek meal for my family! SO FUN!

Greek Festival Pictures

November Challenge - Almond Milk

I had a hard time deciding what to do this month because I have so many recipes and things I want to try. I finally decided on seeing if I could make almond milk from scratch.

This is what you need
1. 1 cup Raw Almonds
2. 4 cups Water
3. Sweetener


Step 1
Soak 1 cup of almonds overnight

Step 2
Strain the almond and blend the almond with 4 cups of water

Step 3
Add sweetener (I used agave. You can use vanilla extract, stevia, etc)


Step 4
Strain the milk and put it in a container. Milk will last 3-4 days in fridge.

This water from soaked almonds can be used to water plants because of its high nutrient content!

This is the almond residue from the blended almonds. I baked it for almond meal! Click here for suggestions on how to use almond meal.

As you can see, my kids loved the almond milk I made for this month's challenge. It was so easy! Definitely try this one, y'all!!

Drum Roll Please..... Challenge #2

Balsamic Vinegar Pearls DONE!

Here's my step by step. I actually failed 3 times before I succeeded.

I put the olive oil in the fridge for 3 hours at first. After 3 failures, I decided to follow another set of directions from another video and put it in the freezer for 30 minutes. I forgot about it and left it in there for an hour. LOL

Remember the weird agar-agar? Read this post for more on agar-agar. I ended up using a coffee bean grinder and made them into about 4 oz. of agar flakes! I was so proud of myself :-)

 Now I heat 1 cup of balsamic vinegar at medium and whisk in 1 tbsp of agar flakes. I heat this mixture till it lightly boils. Then, I let it cool down till it is around room temperature.

 

 

As you can probably tell, these 3 pictures above are the failed attempts. This is what I figured out. As I put in more and more pearls, the temperature of the oil quickly ascends. And as the olive oil warms up, my agar pearls disintegrates! So the 4th and last attempt, I dropped the pearls slower and intermittently put the oil back in the freezer for a minute. And here it is!!!! Beautiful!!! When you put these pearls in your mouth, the agar  quickly melts on your tongue and gives you a potent dosage of balsamic vinegar. YUM!!!

Dried Anchovy

I KNOW what y'all are thinking!!! "What IS THAT?" "NAsty!" "Ewwww" hahaha Tell me I am right. I'm looking for a cooking syringe so I can make those balsamic pearls. And in the mean time, I have to keep my kitchen busy with experiments!

I got a pack from an Asian market this weekend because I have eaten them a long time ago in Hong Kong. Growing up, our maids from the Philippines always let us taste their meals, and this is one of the dishes i really liked. Then when I was in Malaysia, my Chinese Malay friends made something similar for me at my farewell feast. So I got curious and decided to satisfy my craving. 

It was purely an experiment but it turned out really yummy, and yes, people, FISHY! LOL I washed half the pack in water, put it in the pan with a little oil and a dash of salt. Now, here's the fun part, I remembered it tasted sour, so I experimented with fresh lime juices. I also put a bit of garlic and ginger in it and served it cool.  My little 3 year old had a problem with the fishy eyeballs at first, but quickly got used to them haha... My husband and kids LOVED this dish! Don't you want some? ;-) You know you wanna try this. 

Balsamic Pearls - Challenge #2

How did your sourdough starter come out? I was so glad to have made it. My family loved the bread and the pizza! So how about another challenge for October? I promise this challenge is shorter and less time consuming.

We are making Balsamic Vinegar Pearls! Watch this video! It's different than the first one I had found and posted but it actually gives us more details about it.

I went to an Asian market to find agar-agar. I had originally thought it was a type of sugar because in the video I saw, it was from a packet, like sweet n' low. LOL But agar is a red algae! It is a vegetarian thickening agent, compared to gelatin, which is from animal sources. Read on it here in this article.

Here are the varieties of agar-agar I saw. I was very surprised because 1. of their different colors and 2. they looked like bars of plastic!

Anyway, you know what I chose! I am a health nut! I got the one without the dye. In this challenge, I only need a tablespoon I think... so... I am not sure what I am going to do yet, but I will find out!

I will be back to post what I did and how I did on this challenge!

Breakfast WHAT?

Breakfast COOKIE!

A friend posted this online. No sugar, No gluten, No dairy!! 

Ingredients

1.5 cups of oats 

2-3 super ripened bananas

1 cup of unsweetened applesauce

a handful of craisins

and a sprinkle of cinnamon

Directions:

Just throw everything together, mix it up pretty well, throw it on a baking sheet at 350F for about 35 minutes

I am SO making this next month. This will be our challenge for November!!!

Sourdough Bread and Pizza Dough

 This is what my sourdough looked like. Bubbly and happy. I took out 2 cups of it and put it in another jar, added a cup of flour and water in it and repeated the starter process so I can keep making sourdough foods.

 We took out 3 cups of starter and mixed in whole wheat flour, salt and water. After a while, it turns doughy and that's when I started to knead it.

After a LONG time, it looked and felt perfect so I put it in a clean bowl and let it rise. Tomorrow I divide and bake. :) SO HAPPY!!!

This is a sourdough pizza recipe my friend, Becky sent me. We took the remaining cup and a half starter, put olive oil, and salt, mixed and kneaded and rolled out... VOILA, in the oven at 400F for however long it takes to bake but not burn, probably 30 minutes? I'll let you know. It IS midnight, so I am going to put it in the fridge and use it tomorrow.

Haha have you figured out that I do not follow recipes very well yet?

Anyway, CAN'T wait to make Balsamic Vinegar Pearls for October's challenge!!! 

 SEQUEL:

My sourdough got huge in the morning!!! So I just kneaded it and divided it into three pans and baked bread!

My Pizza from lunch :) It was awesome.

Onion snack

We love vinegar. Vinegar is so good for you. I grew up eating vinegar carrots, cucumbers, onions, cabbage, lol you name it! I love all sorts of vinegar, red, balsamic, apple cider, white, etc... This week, while I walked by these pearl onions at Sprouts Farmers Market, my mouth watered for those awesome vinegar onions we used to eat, so I bought these and just put them in white vinegar, water, salt, sugar, pepper. The most horrendous part is the peeling. It didn't make me tear up but my fingers were frustrated. I think I have to wait 2 weeks. but... YUM!!!!!! 

I think he saw and smelled the vinegar.... yes my husband went and got the vinegar cucumbers while I was making vinegar onions. lol my family loves this one. I put cucumbers, onions and garlic. What kinds of weird homemade snacks do you like to make?? Share your recipes with me!

Wreath Making

So.... I am not so much into decor either. But since I want my kids to "DIY", we are making a wreath together. We took a trip to Hobby Lobby and spent less than 20 dollars on a letter, wreath, leaves, and 3 fall decors (acorns, pine cones, flowers, corns, etc). It took less than 10 minutes to do this. Not bad, eh? Kids were happy, now we have something to hang outside our house! ;)