A good example of a tincture is vanilla extract. That's in one of the jars.
If you read the label on a McCormick for example, you might just find that it also contains corn syrup. We won't be putting that in ours. Usually you sweeten your baked goods with their own ingredients, guys. We're not eating the extract straight up, so it doesn't need to taste good by itself. (Who's running these companies?) Here's a post about it if you want to see more label voodoo.
What's really nice about making tinctures, is 1) it's fun to say and 2) you need Vodka on hand. If you notice in the picture, the bottles and jars are pretty small, so there's leftover vodka.
While we're talking about beverages, shakes, healthy food, blah, blah, there's one more. {Just one?} Water kefir.
“I’m so excited about yeasty bacteria!”
I can't possibly do this better than Crunchy Betty did with her post, but I do have a cool video that shows the grains dancing around in the jar.
What do we do with the water kefir grains? We make the juice kefir with 100% juice. After the first day, you get a soda. {That's fun, but what if you keep those yeasty things in the juice longer?}
After 2 days, you get something {hic!} a little more fun. {hic!} Friends insist we bring the juice kefir to the weekly potlucks. There was almost a riot of concern and wild speculation about what had happened to me the night I missed. {Were they concerned about my absence or just sore about not getting the juicy juice?}
It's becomes an adult beverage, if you needed me to spell it out a bit more. Pour the juice through a sieve to collect the grains to use on the next batch. You'll be able to share with your friends and they'll be able to be able to make some for themselves.
Those really aren't words I thought I'd ever hear. I didn't see them coming. I didn't really think about sauerkraut very much. I knew that I liked it, but that was about it.
Paying attention to the moon apparently helps fermentation As the moon is "born" or grows, you plant or start things that grow. Otherwise, it's the opposite. Things just don't grow as well.
This kraut is a mix of purple and green cabbage. Together it ends up being pink. The green bit at the top is just a leaf to keep actual cabbage below the water. It's not mold.
It's really tasty on its own or on a salad. We throw just about anything in a salad these days. Hold the sauce though, with enough wet things, you don't really need it.
Below we have some samples of the other ferments. These are what the smaller batches of mead look like.
If you think you're interested in fermentation, there's a way lot of information out there, but we started a small Google+ community for our Juicy People friends to share with. Join in and share with us. We had a link to a few sites and other books. The ladies met up with, Sandor Katz, one of the authors of these books a while back and he actually inspired our current adventures in krauting.
Rescuing this post with way too many links, from the drafts folder, but after a year sitting there, the topics are coming up again. This one's for Papa Ho Ho.
The Juice:
The Juicy People at work and my extended family were interested in the movies we've been devouring about food, so it was time to dust off this post and prep it for release. Welcome back, SFDada.
We're on our 3rd device for juicing and think we've found a great gadget. A little mortified by the infomercial, with David Wolfe, but the Nutribullet is just so fast and easy, it really allows for no more excuses to juice up.
David Wolfe is in a few of the movies I'm listing below, so even though the infomercial was a bit repellant I at least knew who he was and knew he has a lot of interesting things to say about nutrition and the health of your skin.
I ordered ours at Amazon, but my mom picked one up at Macy's with a big %-off coupon and got the best deal for about $70. I don't know this guy, but he does a great job talking about the thing in 8 minutes.
The old post on the movies:
A few years ago, Red1 wanted to go vegan. Over the years we've been watching a lot of documentaries on Netflix on the subject of food and health. A good friend at work also writes a vegan blog, "Healthy Living on a plant based diet", so we seem to have really good support now. I think we're now in the market for a good juicer.
Red1 has enjoyed them all. She became quite over the top after watching Food, Inc. So much so, her friend's mother asked us to try to get her to stop lecturing their family about the cows who stand in their own poop and the sad little chickens and turkeys the fast food farms in America.
Today we spent a good amount of time at the supermarket buying some good fruit and vegetables to restock the kitchen properly. Last night, after watching a double feature of Fat, Sick, and Nearly Dead and Forks over Knives, I went through the kitchen and cleared out some of the worst junk on the counters and cupboards.
Gerson The Beautiful Truth... which is the one about the Gerson Therapy, if you haven't really heard about it, it's worth looking into. It's pretty much the cure for everything. The film will lead you to more related films available at Netflix.
Here's a copy of Fat, Sick and Nearly Dead that's currently streaming at Hulu with no account needed. (and still is.)
