Friday, April 27, 2012

From Scratch

Yesterday,I made a whole lot of stuff from scratch, without even realizing(until later) that over at Inner Pickle, Fi has set a MONTH of making things from scratch. So I guess I started early.
I made a big plateful of picklets for the kids.Made from whey,yoghurt,milk,water,gluten free flour and two eggs. They were delicious (yes- I snuck a couple,despite my Paleo diet! I'm afraid it's not always perfect).
After that I made  "cream cheese" (yoghurt labna) into marinated cheese. I put balls of the stuff into a plastic container (which happens to have a little basket in it), along with sprigs of thyme,lemon rind,garlic cloves and seasoned salt (no msg or nasties).Then I covered it in a good quality olive oil.

I love marinated feta,but I'm always disappointed that the shop bought stuff is marinated in a mix of olive and canola oil. And canola oil is best left for bio-fuel.

 My marinade ingredients.
 The cream cheese which had been on the bench for 24 hours- no muslin,so I used tulle - works just fine!

 Popped the marinade ingredients into the container,added the cheese,topped with oil. Sorry the photos are so bad.I just can't seem to get a decent pic with my camera when it is dark.Always too much flash or not enough!
 Then I used the whey to make sauerkraut. I got the idea from Sarah Wilson.But I also have the recipe in my Nourishing Traditions book, by Sally Fallon. So I cut up the cabbage, pounded it for ten minutes and popped everything in the jar. I hope it all works out,because I'm not a big fan of shop bought sauerkraut, but after reading about how great it is for our bodies,I'd like to eat more of it.
So, there you have it - all made from scratch.

What's next? I don't know. I don't have a working oven at the moment,so no baking.But we are managing just fine with the stove top, rice cooker,weber and barbeque.Charlie is a large consumer of rice crackers - perhaps I ought to give that a shot? I believe Inner Pickle has a recipe....I'll check it out after netball this morning. Must dash...