I keep tweaking my diet to make it as ‘clean’ as possible.

My mom has arthritis, so I asked her to try giving up dairy to see if it improves how she feels. She does not have access to almond milk where she lives, so she decided to make it at home. She  liked it so much that she insisted I try the same.

I decided to give it a try, since the store bought boxed version has a lot of ingredients, beyond just almonds and water.

I looked up a recipe, and it’s fairly simple. 1 cup almonds soaked overnight; rinsed and blended with 4 cups water. I added a dash of vanilla essence as well.

I used cheese cloth to strain it into a bottle, and voila! I now have clean, ‘ingredients-I-can’t-pronounce’ free almond milk!

To be honest, it tastes good. It’s just not as thick as the store bought version.

I read that oat milk is thick and creamy, so I decided to try the same method. 1 cup oats soaked overnight; in the morning rinse and blend with 4 cups water.

It turned out thick, and tasty. The next time I’d probably add 5 cups of water as it was a little too thick.

So when I made both of these, I was left with all that ‘residue’ /almond meal/oat flour. Whatever you want to call it.

The oat flour was easy, I incorporated it into my ‘chapati’ dough.

The almond flour gave me a couple of good uses.

I used about 1 cup of it to make a bread spread. In a blender, mix together the almond flour, a tablespoon of olive oil, ½ tsp Italian seasoning, a dash of garlic, salt and almond milk as required to adjust the consistency. I blended it for a while, till it turned into a smooth creamy paste. It tastes fantastic! I used it on a slice of whole grain topped with shiitake mushrooms, kale & onion. Delicious!

I used 1 ½ cups of almond flour to make strawberry banana walnut scones.

Ingredients:

1 ½ cups almond flour

1 cup baking flour

¾ cup cut strawberries

1/8 cup sugar

1 banana

1 egg

3 tbsp olive oil

Pinch of salt

1 tsp baking powder

Walnuts for topping

Preheat oven to 400˚F.

In a large bowl whisk together both flours, baking powder, sugar and salt. Add oil. Add strawberries and mashed banana. Combine with one beaten egg.

Line baking tray with parchment paper and transfer the mixture to the tray. Shape as desired.

Top with crushed walnuts.

Bake for 30-40 mins. Serve warm.

I hope you enjoy and benefit from some of my experiments. I would love to hear yours, so please leave a comment or drop me an email!