Dairy. Ok for some. Not so great for many others.
Thankfully if you struggle with dairy in your diet you have alternatives. Soy Milk. Coconut Milk. Rice Milk. Almond Milk. Just to name a few.
Of all the alternatives I tend to like the nut milks (or milks from seeds) the best. They tend to have less sugar and do not pose the issues that legumes (soy) present on the body. Plus they can be easier to make at home, which always has a certain appeal.
Interestingly the world of nut-milks goes a long way beyond almond milk. Many of the most delicious nut-milks are not sold commercially, since the most nutritious seeds and nuts that create milks have a short shelf life. Luckily they are easy to make, and worth the effort.
Today we will make a milk from sunflower seeds and sesame seeds, two of the most nutritious nuts in the pantry. Sesame seeds are hard to work with, so we will use tahini, which is nothing more than a ground sesame seed butter (think peanut butter made with sesame seeds).
Tahini is a great food, with a great, slightly sweet taste. It is high in protein, and even if you think you’ve never eaten it, think again. Add tahini to mashed garbanzo beans (chick peas) and you have hummus. Ever have a falafel wrap at a Mediterranean restaurant? The white sauce is mostly tahini. Add a bit to your favorite vinegar and oil salad dressing, and you suddenly have an exotic and delicious salad dressing.
The instructions here can be modified to make milks using pecans, walnuts, pine nuts, almonds and pumpkin seeds. Use organic ingredients when you can.
1/3 cup raw sunflower seeds
1 Tablespoon ground flaxseeds (flaxseed meal)
3 teaspoons sesame tahini
1 Tablespoon honey (optional)
1/3 cup mashed ripe banana (optional)
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
3 ¼ to 3 ¾ warm water
(If you do substitute another nut or seed, basically replace the sunflower seeds with your preferred nut. For an easy substitution, use hemp seeds. If you want a milk that is just the flavor of that nut, you might also want to remove the Tahini as well.)
Preparation:
1) Boil about four cups of water. While it cools, prepare the rest of the ingredients.
2) Grind the sunflower seeds in a coffee grinder or small food processor till finely ground. Put the ground sunflower seeds and the flaxseed meal into a blender. Add the tahini and other ingredients to the blender and pour in about ¾ cups of the warm water. Blend on a medium speed till well blended and almost pudding-like. Add about 2 ½ to 3 cups more of the warm water and blend a bit more to mix. The amount of water will depend on the texture you want for your final milk. This is a matter of taste.
3) Strain through a fine mesh strainer into a bowl or container. You will need to stir and mash the material to force it through the strainer, as it will be a bit thick. Cover and refrigerate if not used immediately.
4) As an option, use sprouted sunflower seeds, sprouted for no more than 24 hours. Hemp seeds also work well.
5) Remember that the shelf life for these will fall shorter than what you might buy in the store. It is the benefit of not having extra preservatives included.
6) YIELD: In general this should create about 3 ¼ to 3 ¾ cups of milk – depending on the thickness.
Try out the recipe and let us know what you think. Leave a comment below with the results of your experiments.
Until then – To Your Health.
