Banana Chutney

I know, this sounds different and it is something I would probably not have put together myself - however I came across a mention of banana chutney as being really nice with left overs from a big meal. Such as often happens when we have a feast!

Usually during any feast I am cooking up a storm and have found myself standing in the kitchen in my pajamas late in the afternoon having virtually not left the kitchen since my eyes opened in the morning - spending my day cooking.

The is serious stuff here for us and I wanted to try out some new tastes, textures and combinations of foods over this next little while. So, when I got to reading up on what to do with extra dates, I found a mention of this banana chutney which of course includes dates and a few other things.

Tonight, I decided to dive into making some and perhaps late next week we'll see how it tastes (it should be left to sit for about 10 days or so). It certainly smells lovely and even looks nice in a chutney sort of way.

Fruit and vegetables for Banana Chutney

For the chutney I mashed bananas, chopped apples, dried dates and apricots, sliced onions and diced garlic - this all went into apple cider vinegar to bubble away over half an hour or so. In the meantime part way through the cooking I added in some date syrup, water whenever it looked too thick, and spices (allspice, turmeric, ginger, salt, pepper, cumin).

Banana Chutney steaming away as it slowly cooks 

Once this was placed into jars and processed in the boiling water bath it turned out well and the jars sealed up. I am finding the larger jars take longer to seal and I really do prefer the screw top Kilner jars as opposed to the flip top lids. However, I will use anything that comes into the house at this point!

Apparently banana chutney is very nice served with cheese and crackers, leftover meat such as duck or lamb, salad and stirred into yogurt. When we have a feast day there is always lots of food left for the next meal, a nice chutney (or a couple of them) will add some interesting flavours to these meals and I can't wait to try them.

Well that's my story today - day 9 of my August cleanse, I was itching to cook something interesting and found it. Perhaps I will do some further searches to see what else I can find...

Have a healthy day!

April

Big jar of Banana Chutney

In A Pickle

Yesterday I was back to making my final batch of pickles using up cucumbers I had on hand and to get some more experience working with vinegars and another method of canning food. The funny thing is that once again I was really hesitant and reluctant to make them, however once I got started it was a whole other story!

I really liked making pickles, perhaps more than making jams, chutneys and sauces. Maybe it is just me, I actually like savory foods far more then sweet ones, however there may be other elements of the process at work here too.

Making pickles is far more involved (at least it is for me so far) then making jams etc. Part of that may be because I have not made them before, the other part is the creativity. I enjoy using my brain and thinking about flavours, colours and how to influence the final results.

As usual I did lots of research before I started, found some general guidelines and then adapted, tweaked and did my own thing. To start with, cucumbers need to be soaked in ice water with sea salt to keep them crisp. Preferably this should be for 4 to 8 hours or overnight.

Cucumbers on ice in salted water

While the cucumbers soaked in the briny solution, I prepared some pickling spice - there are many variations, but I decided to use; cinnamon, mustard seed, bay leaf, dill seed, cloves, ginger, peppercorns, juniper berry and cardamon. Mostly because these were on hand.

I placed the spices into a small bag and tied it, then put this bag in with the water, salt and vinegar solution which was gently simmered for 15 minutes. As soon as the jars were sterilized and ready to go, I placed the sliced cucumbers inside, with dill and garlic then filled each jar with the vinegar brine. 

Cucumber Spears in jar

The last bunch of cucumbers I decided to make into a sweeter variation of pickle, so I added some honey, lemon and water to the vinegar solution along with dried dill herb. After thinly slicing these (with some shallots) and cooking for a few minutes in the solution, I placed them into a jar and poured the rest of the hot honey vinegar into it. 

Then processed each jar in a boiling water bath according to the recommended guidelines. Each jar sealed right up (I love when that happens) and now that job is behind me.

In the end, I made two types of pickles - 2 jars of garlic/dill  and 1 jar of bread and butter pickles. Each   smelled very different, but looked delicious! These are 1 litre jars, so we now have plenty on hand for the coming feasts and celebrations. 

And today I am looking around me wishing I had more cucumbers to make into pickles! The house always smells and feels warm, fuzzy and full of love when I am cooking. It's a great sense of accomplishment to see the cupboards full of homemade goodies as well.

Now, I have a feast to plan for next week - and everyone wants something different, so this will be fun!

Have a healthy day,

April

Finished jars of pickles.... cooling down

Food Safety....Means Living Food

Issues of safety have been coming to mind over these past few weeks while I have been filling my cupboards with all sorts of jams, sauces, preserves, pickles and so forth. Of course, when it comes to food hygiene I am from a food background and there are stories I can tell!! LOL

So, down to the basics - what do I really think and believe about food safety and all of this anti-bacterial, highly sterilized stuff that we are supposed to eat? Not a whole lot. For instance I do not feel it is proper or right to drink sterilized, chemically treated water... and the list just goes on from there, I can assure you.

All of the attention paid to using anti-bacterial soap, dish liquids, even clothes (socks etc.) is doing far more harm then good. These are not necessary in the kitchen or anywhere else for that matter. We are living beings, that means inside as well as outside - when you deliberately kill off these organisms, on our bodies and in our food chain - disaster results. 

Our bodies, hands, skin, guts, and everywhere else is supposed to be ALIVE with bugs (that means bacterial colonies) to enable our immune systems to function properly as well as digest our food, make vitamins, essential fatty acids, participate in removal of toxins, keep inflammation in check and play a role in recovery and repair. 

Now does that sound like something you must eliminate at all costs from your body, food and life? Without these little critters, there would be no life. 

To get back to our food, I have seen things that would make your hair stand on end - perhaps another time, I will tell some stories from the food industry. However, suffice it to say, a lot of this resistance that I have been experiencing (energy that is not my own) has been focused on issues of food safety.

And I am tackling them one at a time while I continue on with my glorious journey into creating my own homemade foods. Food that we cook ourselves is perfectly safe - of course, we are not idiots, some things must be cooked, surfaces need to be clean (hot water and soap works for me), I do sterilize my jars and process my preserves according to instructions. 

However, there also comes a time to be reasonable as well. For instance, yesterday I mulled over what to do with the 2 jars of jam that did not seal. I know that they will keep perfectly well in the fridge for a few weeks, but I didn't want too many jars in there either.

When I went online to read up on re-processing the jams to see if they would re-seal, the amount of FEAR that I encountered in peoples' comments was astounding. You can't do that, you mustn't do this, the jam will go off, the jar is no longer sterile, there is risk, this is a food hazard blah blah. 

It would have been laughable if it wasn't so sad. These same people were sterilizing their jars with bleach, had jams with twice as much sugar as fruit, were using paraffin wax in their sealing and treated tap water to cook their produce - they had all bought into the food safety scare mongering. 

But, with not a clue that the chemicals in bleach, water, and wax and of course sugar are far more toxic! There was one lone voice amongst the melee, an elderly woman who mentioned that she had been making jam for many years and of course as long as you follow the procedure of canning, there is no problem. 

I wanted to bring this up for one main reason - the jams that I have been making at home are lasting far longer then the ones (superior quality) that we used to buy at the shops. The only reason I can put forward at this point, after having made quite a few jars myself, is that I am using ripe organic healthy fruit, no preservative, sweetener or pectin, with clean (living) water....

I have a feeling this plays a far larger role in our food chain then anyone would want us to think. 

Have a healthy day,

April

Coriander seeds coming up

Sweet & Sour Honey Pickled Beets

Today I am making pickled beets - with some old larger jars that I had on hand but had not used as they are nearly too large for my canning pot. But, they do mostly fit, so I have been giving it a go to see if I can get these to turn out.

By the way, my jam I made yesterday in the flip top jars, failed to seal in 2 of the jars. Now I know what I don't like about these jars! Because there is no lid that 'pops' when it seals, you do not know if the seal has taken until the next day when you can undo the clamp and see if the lid opens.

I can re-process them again in boiling water or leave them in the fridge and we'll have to eat them sooner. Before I started to become negative about it, I stopped to remind myself that my first try with the other type of jars did the same thing, so perhaps this is all part of the learning curve.

Even as I write this, there is another jar of sweet & sour honey pickled beets in the canner. The entire process of making pickles is far more involved and messy - but again it is something that would only be done a couple of times a year and we would get to enjoy more yummy foods made at home.

1 litre jars for the beets

For the beets I read and read what other people have done and finally decided on a few ingredients that I would enjoy with the beets. These are very sweet vegetables, so I was amazed at the amount of sugar people were putting in with their pickling juice. 

Boiling water bath with the larger pot and jar

Of course, no sugar here, so to keep it from being overly sour I added a little bit of honey, cinnamon, cloves and the vinegar. It certainly smelled lovely, but it takes a couple of weeks to cure before it should be tasted. 

Chopped cooked beets ready to go into jars - hot

As I am fasting for the next week, that is not a problem, but once again I am looking forward to tasting these foods that I am making. Oh and by the way, the jars with the beets sealed right up (popped) a few minutes after coming out of the boiling water bath, music to my ears! LOL

Off to go figure out a recipe for these gherkins....

April

1 litre jar of pickled beets 

Making Preserves

Yesterday was a preserve day, I made nine jars of different kinds of preserves with the fruit that I had on hand. And, as usual I wanted something a little different from the ordinary jams that I had been eating all along. 

First of all, there is a slight difference apparently between preserves and jams - preserves are thicker, chunkier and usually contain other ingredients such as dried fruit and spices. As opposed to a jam which most often contains only fruit and water (in my house anyway!). But, both are fruit based and these terms are often used interchangeably.

With all of the types of fruit that I had in the house this week, I thought that it would be great to make something a little different and to keep expanding my own learning and methods of working with each type of preserve. I also wanted to make something that was chunkier and could be used as part of a meal rather than only being suitable for toast and crackers.

Since I had a few apples and pears in the house I ended up making a great smelling spiced apple/pear preserve that was not blended as much as it normally would leaving it quite chunky and very thick. The only spice that I used was cinnamon for this one just to keep it simple and because cinnamon goes very well with anything related to apple.

Raw Apple and Pear ready to cook

The end result is similar to an apple sauce, but with the presence of pears, will give a softer, fuller flavour. This type of preserve will be great on crackers with cheese or on the side of a veggie rice stir-fry as a sauce. I am enjoying the versatility of these foods and can imagine endless possibilities and ways to use them.

Jars of spiced apple & pear preserves 

Next, with all of the apricots, nectarines, peaches and more apples, I decided to make what I ended up calling Apricot Raisin Preserves because that was the dominate fruit. Again I wanted to try my hand at making something a little different to give us various flavours, textures and tastes to enjoy in the coming months. This one I can't wait to taste!

There is something about the delicate flavour of apricots that draws us in and awakens the senses, when combined with a few spices and some other equally delightful flavours, this should turn out to be a wonderful addition to any meal. 

For this preserve I chopped and chopped everything that was to go in the large pot (I ended up making a lot of this) and then put in some apple juice, raisins and spices with a little water because the dried fruit would soak up a lot of the liquid. Again as with the mango chutney, I had to keep stirring because it was quite heavy and would settle on the bottom of the pot.

Chopped fruit and raisins for the preserves

I also let this mixture cook for quite a while to get the goodness of all these fruits well blended throughout the preserve. I decided to add pumpkin pie spice which I made up myself from cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, cloves and allspice. Of course the smell is magical and this will taste great with a meal , on bread and crackers or any where else that I can find to use it.

A big batch of preserves 

Today I am off to make some ice cream from left over bananas and some of these fresh preserves,

Have a good one!

April

Mango Chutney

Yesterday I made my first mango chutney and it was a curious thing...because, I have never eaten mango chutney and it would probably be the last thing that I would go for on a table. So, I have no idea why I wanted to make it. Except that now I know that I can make anything and I wanted to give it a try.

We now have 3 jars of mango chutney that is supposed to sit for at least a month to allow the flavours to blend - after which it will supposedly taste even better. I am not certain that it tastes great at the moment, because I have absolutely nothing to compare it to, like I said, I have never tasted mango chutney before.

To make this type of preserve I did a fair amount of research - mostly to see if I could use dried mangoes instead of fresh ones (which are hard to get here in Ireland). I then soaked the dried mango for about 12 hours or so while I thought about the ingredients that should go into this chutney.

Dried mango soaking in water

I found lots of idea and recipes online - but in the end decided how it should taste. I did things a little bit differently and of course used the ingredients that I had on hand. I think it turned out ok, in about a month perhaps I will open a jar and try it. But, as of right now I am not entirely certain that I even like the stuff! LOL

This is an interesting place to be because I can't say that the smell was lovely or that the flavour was great - it was interesting, vinegary, tangy with sweet mixed in. The flavours were all still unblended - and even though the cooking takes far longer then a jam, it tasted like it still needed work - thus the mellowing process, I guess.

For the chutney I sautéd onions and garlic, then added these to mango, sultanas, chopped apple, apple cider vinegar, lemon juice, apple juice, ginger, cumin, salt, pepper and for the first time, I had to add water. The mixture is quite heavy and will stick on the bottom of the pot if you are not stirring constantly. 

Mango Chutney cooking

However, it does look nice and I am sure might even be a taste that will grow on me once I try it properly with a meal. The great thing is that I did it, even when I am not certain that I will like it (hubby loves this stuff) and I feel as if my thinking around food is expanding once again. Branching out into new, otherwise unknown areas and using vinegars.

One thing that I kept coming across was mention of vinegar proof lids - to make sure that your lids are coated and therefore able for the vinegar. I actually find this very funny mostly because I remember as a child, pickles and all kinds of foods being preserved in the very old fashioned Mason jars - and I am sure that they were able for vinegar. 

So, what has changed with newer lids and jars that they are not able to withstand the vinegar or is this an entirely different issue we are talking about here with the 'fear' being put into those of us who want to make these types of foods at home? It did seem a little fear based (some of the comments about home canning) because foods have been preserved in some manner, for as long as humans have been here.

And indeed where I grew up (and perhaps when) many food were still being preserved, cod was being salted, caplin dried, jams and jellies preserved in jars, pickles and even meats were all canned for the coming winter. I absolutely loved this time of year and enjoyed seeing the results of the work as the jars lined up and I still do get a great sense of satisfaction from all of this. 

Absolutely anyone can preserve food while being creative at the same time, making foods that are far superior to anything that could possibly come out of a factory. Well, that's my rant for the morning! LOL

Lot's to think about when it comes to food,

April

Mango Chutney in Jars

The Story So Far....

Today I have been taking stock of what I have learned and managed to change during these past few weeks of deliberately not buying and using the remaining processed foods, that were in our diets, as much as possible. There are a few things that stand out, some of which surprise me.

The main and perhaps most important thing is the taste - I think that I had either forgotten or somehow, never fully realized that homemade jams just taste far better. For some strange reason, I had it in my head that I would not be able to duplicate a good quality shop bought jam or spread as far as taste is concerned. 

Of course, the very first thing that we all noticed about my homemade concoctions was the flavour bursting through, the fragrance spills out as soon as the jar is opened and even the colours are strikingly different. Today we are eating peach jam which tastes and looks like peaches, with a hint of apple, and the smell is exactly like ripe peach.

Another point to be made here is that making these jams (and any of the other condiments) has not taken much extra time. I usually wait until the house is quiet and the children are in bed, so that I can handle the boiling water bath and sterilize jars without kids underfoot. It has become a time for myself, perhaps in the same way that others spend time on their creative pursuits, cooking is my outlet and my way to be innovative in my life. 

I went to the cupboards and counted the finished jars to see what I was up to, as of right now I have a total  34 jars of jams, apple sauce, apple butter and apricot/fig preserves. My goal is to have about 50 or so with a few being made every month for special occasions. At first that number seemed huge, but not anymore, it's totally doable.

Something else that stands out here is that the children prefer the apple butter and apple sauce that I have made while they have not really ever shown much interest in it before. Further to this, is that I am finding more ways to use these sauces - not only at breakfast on toast or in porridge, apple butter tastes lovely on the side with lamb dinner or on a goat's cheese sandwich as well. 

Finding new ways to make and use these homemade foods goes hand in hand so it is important to trust your instincts and play with it. If at first you don't succeed, try again - this is really important, because when it comes to cooking many people give up easily when something doesn't turn out right. Although I never gave up on cooking, I did think that there were certain things that I could not make or that were on the 'difficult to make' scale. 

In the past I have made my own mustards and mayonnaise with different results, some good and some disasters. This time around, I didn't really follow any recipes, I actually looked at the ingredients on the back of a natural organic mustard jar and then put them together the way that I thought they should go, plus or minus a few things. My mustard turned out great and is now 'aging' in the fridge after being mixed with honey. 

Perhaps the best thing of all is that once you have had and made your own foods (I cook each and everyday all of our meals) nothing else compares. It is no longer a 'treat' to eat out or spend excess money on food items that can be easily made at home with much better results. I remember those days of spending a fortune on a meal only to feel bloated and heartburn afterwards. 

Finally, one of the best things to come out of making more of my own foods is that I know exactly what is in each jar. There is no label to be read or company to be trusted (did they only put in what they said they put in?) nor is there unnecessary contamination from chlorinated, fluoridated or medicated water supplies that I try so hard to avoid.  

All in all, this has been a great learning curve for me, one that I hope will take me much further than I first imagined, now I think I am ready to branch out into other types of foods such as pickles, chutneys and my own tomato free pasta sauce. 

Today I am baking savory muffins (goat's cheese and rosemary) while last night I made another batch of apple butter, this weekend I want to do something different with a fish dish...

Back to the kitchen! 

April

All that's left of my muffins!

Love Summer Fruits

Yesterday was another interesting day with still being on this fast, and wanting to create and cook - I ended up making ice cream and apple sauce in small batches to just keep myself occupied really. I find that I relax, am happy in myself and can think or process through things when I am busy working with food. 

First of all ice cream is something that I have been making for awhile and we have a small ice cream maker. The main reason we got this was because we had been all going without any ice cream for several years due to the fact that we don't eat cows milk, sugar or want the added chemicals of commercial ice cream.

There are companies out there who make ice cream from goat's milk however, it would have other ingredients that we did not like or need. Therefore, being resourceful, I started to make my own for our special occasions (such as summer!) and feast days. There is a feast day coming up soon at the beginning of August, and now the ice cream is ready for this celebration. 

When I first started out making ice cream I just researched what other people were doing and then improvised to fit our own needs - and it turns out very well. I make goat's milk ice cream using bananas, milk, jam and little else.

Yesterday I used 4 bananas, about 2.5 cups of goat's milk, 1//2 cup fresh peach jam and a tiny bit of raw agave syrup - mostly because I could not taste it to see how sweet it was. Otherwise I would not use the agave, but the jams I am making are mainly only fruit, some lemon juice and 1/2 cup of apple concentrate per batch of jam. They will not be overly sweet.

Then I decided to try my hand at making my applesauce recipe and canning it into the last remaining jars because I had apples that were not being eaten. I never liked applesauce as a child or at any other time - until I started making it myself. I think for me it has to do with the texture - if it's too much like baby food, I don't want it.

I also like applesauce that is warm and spicy with lots of cinnamon, nutmeg and ginger or allspices in it. So this is what I did - 8 cups of chopped apples, teaspoons of spices, tiny bit of lemon juice and cooked the apples into a sauce. They bottled up perfectly as well, in the jars that would not seal the day before, go figure! 

Now, when I open the cupboard there are a dozen jars lined up filled with jams and sauces - ready for the coming winter and changing seasons. It is a warm and fuzzy feeling for me and I truly feel right now these few remaining items that have been creeping into our diets will be eliminated once and for all.

Soon, I want to try my hand at making some chutneys and perhaps pickles as I get more adventurous  with my canning abilities. Last night Max came home with over 30 more jars, so I guess that was my green light to keep going with this. 

Keeping it real here in West Cork,

April

This is my ice cream maker - very simple little thing!

Here is a deep mixing bowl filled with the 4 ingredients of my ice cream

Cooking while fasting....

To be honest with you, I get asked this all the time - don't you find it hard to cook and be around food when you are fasting? All I can say right now is that perhaps I am so used to it that it no longer bothers me, however I am not sure that it ever did.

Of course I can smell the food, I can see it and I would love to have some. However, once I start a cleanse, I am single minded enough to follow it through no matter what is happening on the outside. It's as if my body goes into the 'detox mode' that I talk about in my book The Pagan Diet© and until this is finished, nothing deters me from my goal. I find that I am especially creative and want to cook and research recipes during my cleanses.

Yesterday was a productive day in many ways, I made lots of muesli for our post cleanse meals - I have been making my own muesli for years (my recipe is in The Way to Heal Body Mind & Soul) and if you have not tried making this yet, please do. You will not ever go back to buying anything from a shop - I like the fact that I can put anything into it that I want and I am the only one who handles it.

When I make it, I try to make enough to last about a month - it is not something that we would eat every day, but usually on the weekends or when my son comes home for sailing absolutely famished, it is an easy ready snack.

Muesli is packed with concentrated energy, which is a fantastic way to start a food day or even to end it as a final meal. I like toasted muesli that is not too sweet, with a variety of dried fruits, nuts, seeds and anything else in the cupboard!

Then late last night, because I had more fruit to be used up (local organic strawberries) I made some more jam, but not with the same results that I had the night before. My strawberry/apple jam turned out wonderfully and the jars sealed. Then I made some ginger/peach jam in a bigger batch - and 2 of the jars did not seal.

I was doing some trouble shooting when looking at the lids, they had been used previously for storing fruit, so this might be the problem with the lids, or it was just too late at night and I was tired. However, the other jars did seal and they were poured later... I did find that I preferred to make smaller batches at one time as this was easier to handle, at least right now when I don't have all of the equipment that I would like to have. 

But, all is not lost because I simply put the jam from the unsealed jars into the freezer to be used as freezer jam. Fruit is fruit and nothing need be wasted here - it will all be eaten. I am figuring that for  a family of 4 who loves jam ( and use it in everything) we would most likely go through about 1 big jar each week. That means I have to make at least 50 jars to last until next summer.

I still have work to do here! (smile) Now, I want to find more creative and tasty combinations for these fruits and will do some apple sauce as well. So, back to my research on fruit, jam and canning.

Have a homemade day everyone!

April

Muesli - raw in first bowl, then finished in middle bowl and ready to be toasted in oven tray. Finally in the jars once cool.

Love In The Making...

If I were to be completely honest about the true way that I want to live - the way that I have always dreamed of living, it would be to create, source, grow, make, cook and provide all of my own food. And of course, through doing this as a family we would be even healthier, stronger in body and spirit without much energy coming in from outside sources. 

Most people would look at us and think that already we are pretty well free from food and lifestyle of the majority - and we are. I do not eat the same foods as others, I always cook our own meals, which are mainly vegetarian unless it is a feast day or festival. However, we got to a point that we were feeling stuck in our souls - unable to move forward any further towards our goals, and I feel that this remaining 'food' that was coming into our diets from outside sources, was the sticking point. 

Even though I have been doing this for a little while now, there are still areas for improvement and you would probably not be surprised how easily processed foods creep back in to our food chain when we get busy. There is a lot I want to say about eating this food - the first thing is that it is devoid of love. Machines, people just doing a job, government regulations, corporate rules, bottom lines and business plans - do not place a lot of 'love energy' into the final product. 

Why is this a real problem for those of us wanting to walk the talk and follow a spiritual path you might be asking? It is because, when food is empty of love, it fills up with something else - and this is fear. When an energy is removed (during processing) something else comes in to fill the void, like a vacuum.  So, we have been consuming fear, it doesn't feel good and I am doing something about it. 

I started with jams because this is something that we would eat a lot of - sugar free jam is also relatively easy to make as well. Over the years I would have considered we were buying some of the best quality jams and I have enjoyed them. They are tasty and full of fruit - however, they are still made in a factory which is processed food and contains the negative qualities that I no longer want in my body.

Last night, I decided to start out on the right foot, I researched how to use my glass jars for the jams and followed all the instructions to the letter - at the end of the evening I was sitting down, listening as each jar lid popped and sealed. Exactly as it was supposed to do.

So, I was pleased with the good start. We now have 8 jars of peach and nectarine ginger jam! And I am delighted with it. Of course, it is fruit season right now, so I want to carry on with making quite a few more jams for the winter - you might be hearing a lot about jam making in the coming days. (smile)

I also realized how much more equipment I need to get, as well as to source more jars. I can see that I am going to be busy with this - and of course, there is nothing I would love more.

Have a great day,

April

Some remaining jars waiting for labels - the half filled one, will be enjoyed as soon as we are finished our Master Cleanse!