Make Your Own Rice Milk!

When the cost of manufactured almond and rice milk became more than I wanted to spend, I found a recipe for rice milk that works just fine.  I bought short-grain organic brown rice.  In a big pan I  put 4 qts. of water and 1 cup of the brown rice.  Bring it to a boil and turn it down to simmer for 1 to 1 1/2  hours.  Let it cool for a while and then stir it up and blend it, then strain through cheesecloth.  Wring out the cheesecloth when it gets about through and pour the rice milk into a pitcher or jar.  Keep repeating this process until you have finished.   I remove the residue in the cheesecloth and collect it for take-out.  I take it out to the hens, and they love it.  I also rinse out the cheesecloth between batches.  


I add 1/2 T. real maple syrup, 1/2 T. honey, and a dash of Redmond salt to each 2-qt. pitcher.  This makes almost 4 quarts of rice milk.   We use it mostly for smoothies or "hot chocolate" made with carob. It is quite good, and saves a bundle.

Soothing Handmade Soap

I started making soap several years ago because my sister told me I should!  It contains olive oil and coconut oil, very soothing to the skin and easy to make, once you have the ingredients.  The most fun is experimenting with different scents from essential oils and adding a few extras, like oatmeal, sage or tumeric, and superfatting with oils such as Vit. E and cocoa butter.  If you want to make a trial batch, here is a small recipe for a beginner:  

Wear goggles, and no young children around.  Use rubber gloves and a heavy apron. This is because of the lye being so caustic.  As long as you are careful, do not worry.  Have some ice ready in a basin or large bowl to cool down the lye water.  Your goal is to get the lye water and the oils at approximately the same temperature, and the lye gets very hot when you mix it into the water.  

Use plastic or stainless steel pans and spoons.  You will need an immersible thermometer for the liquids.  

Wearing your goggles and rubber gloves,  

Water:  1 C.                      Mix the lye carefully and slowly into the water.  Mix with a spoon, set in a bowl of 

Lye 1 C.                            ice and put a thermometer in the lye mixture. 

Coconut oil 1 C.

Olive oil  1 C.  

Vegetable shortening 1 C   

Measure the above 3 ingredients into a pan and heat on low until it is melted.  Allow to start cooling and measure temperature with a thermometer.  You can set the pan in a bowl of ice.  

You want the lye mixture and the oil mixture (still separately) to come to about 110 degrees.  While they are cooling, get your mold ready.  You can use a shoe box or a plastic box.  It is easier if the box has straight sides.  Line with a plastic bag, spread out to the corners and sides.  

When you get the temperatures right (and you may have to re-heat one or the other carefully), you carefully add the lye mixture into the oil mixture, stirring as you do so.  Take a wisk and stir the mixture until it traces, which is when you can drizzle a spoon of the mixture across the surface and see a trail.  This does not take too long at all, so get it in the light right so that you can see it well.  Here is where you could add a tablespoon of an essential oil and/or a superfatting oil like cocoa butter, melted already.  They would of course need to be stirred in well. 

When it traces, immediately pour into your mold.  Cover with plastic, then a blanket or towel.  It will be quite hot, and needs to incubate for 24 hours before you take it out of the mold.  At that point you can cut it into bars and let it sit in the air, bars separated, for about 2 weeks.  Then it is ready to use.  The soap goes through a chemical change so that it becomes very soothing (saponification).   

  

Fall Garden

Kale and Red Onions

Just about anything you would plant in the early spring (Midwest) can be planted in late summer.  You don't want the nights above 70 degrees and you have to allow time for harvest before frost--a little tricky.  However, the hardier crops, like kale and spinach, can be covered with clear plastic to keep them alive all winter.  Healthy eating!

Skillet Pot Pie

I like versatile recipes that can be used with many different ingredients, depending on what you have available.      It makes for creativity!  But it also saves the time of hunting for a new recipe.  For this main dish pot pie, use any combination of vegetables you have as long as they don't take long to cook, like potatoes, which you would need to steam ahead of time.

This is great for left-over cooked vegetables you have in the fridge and raw or frozen vegetables.  Cut them to bite-sized.  Onions and garlic, minced, will add good flavor too.  Oven at 425 degrees.  Get out your cast iron or oven proof skillet and lightly grease it.  Add the vegetables, and if they look dry, add a can of soup or canned vegetables, or make a white sauce using flour or cornstarch (recipe on the box). Season with whatever spices you like, such as curry, basil, marjoram, cumin, cilantro, parsley, garlic and onion powder, a dash of cayenne, etc.

Top with any biscuit, cornbread, muffin, or tortilla recipe. You can either drop it by spoonfulls to make a drop-biscuit type of topping, or spread it all over the top of the vegetable mixture.  Bake about 20 min. and sprinkle with a little cheese, some nuts, and serve with salsa or olive oil/vinegar dressing.

For this skillet pie pictured: My veggies were tomatoes from the garden, broccoli, steamed potatoes, onions and garlic.  The tomatoes were so juicy I did not need anything for moisture. I used a cornbread recipe for the topping, (from organic corn we grind ourselves and eggs from our hens).  Preparation time and baking took only a half hour total.