Apple Cider Vinegar - The Doctor Within

I get asked all the time at my fermentation workshops, in my clinic and on the market stall – if I could only do one thing to change my life/diet/habits etc., what would it be? For years I would always say it would be to cut out all NightShades from your diet (white potato, aubergine, peppers, chillies, tomato, gogi berries) because of their toxicity for spiritually awakening bodies. 

Of course, this still holds true and this is the one food family that is not included in my diet. 

When it comes to fermentation and overall gut health, it is vitally important to add in living foods; this is the missing food group we’ve all been hungering for. I would have to say the easiest, best and most effective addition a person can make to their diet is to take Apple Cider Vinegars every single day.

Of course, I am quite biased on several fronts here….I make my own ACVinegars and I happen to think they are the best tasting, most alive and perhaps far more ‘healing’ than anything else out there. One of the reasons I say this is because they are hand made with water from the most natural sources as well as quite a few other factors I have found to be important.

I only ferment in glass, ceramic and natural materials. No plastic here! As well, I am very fussy about the storage and fermentation process – my ferments are interacted with. Well, they are living beings after all and I wouldn’t leave them out of my daily activities – so they are scattered around the place, talked to, moved about and generally included in our lives. 

We also insist on using Co Cork grown apples and local West Cork apples when we can get them. There is nothing like the healing energy here in West Cork! 

Because of my interest in the spiritual connection we have with our food, I have learned to consider every aspect of food creation and fermentation is one of the most alchemical processes I have ever found. Magic happens when we take water, fruit and allow nature to power, direct and enhance the results.   

What we have in the end is a living food with a consciousness. I wouldn’t leave that task to just anyone, so I make them myself. Besides, I wanted my own ancient healing Irish Mother – not someone else’s! 

For Apple cider vinegar to be effective and really work for you it should be taken every single day. Something like the old folk saying – ‘an apple a day, keeps the doctor away’. Perhaps, it’s the apple a day in your apple cider vinegar that is the doctor within. Over the years I have heard lots of stories of how symptoms just went away after taking it for 3 days, 10 days or 60 days. Everyone is quite different and our bodies respond differently to the living ferment. 

And, we all take it for many different reasons. Some people swear by it for arthritis, tummy troubles, indigestion, IBS, hair, skin and nail health while others just ‘feel’ better when they take it. 

I like to take it first thing every morning with my left over herbal tea, a remedy and some clay. However, on days when I am feeling stressed, tired, with a cold or flu or just ‘off’ – I take it several times with my remedies or in fermented drinks and water. It’s one of natures’ magical elixirs….

Apple Cider Vinegars ready for market

Breakfast Muffins

Not something quite new....but very tasty! With the early spring glut of eggs from all our feathered friends we are having fun creating new twists on good food....here is another favourite.

Rebel Breakfast Muffins

Ingredients:

Spring onion, mushrooms & red nnion chopped fine (or anything you have)

Cheese 1 cup grated (smoked or strong goat cheese is lovely)

Fresh coriander, parsley, basil etc. diced

Finely chopped sea weed flakes

Bonita Tuna or other fish – 1 cup flaked (optional) 

Eggs 6 to 12 beaten with 2 tbsp milk, black pepper & sea salt to taste

Instructions:

Preheat oven to 200C

Grease your muffin tin – best to not use papers, they stick!

Sauté the veg lightly in olive oil for 5 to 7 minutes, then add the vegetables along with cheese, tuna etc. into a large mixing bowl, pour beaten egg mixture over top – then lightly stir by hand to blend. Place muffin pan on the center rack of preheated oven - bake for 22-27 minutes or until muffins are golden to light brown (they will puff up). 

Let muffins cool for a few minutes before removing from the muffin pan – then turn out onto a board or plate to cool down a bit before eating. Can be stored in the fridge for a couple days – seem to freeze ok, but nicest when fresh with a piece sourdough toast......

Rebel Breakfast Muffins 

April's Energy Balls....Healthy Coconut Treats

These days it really is all about energy - we seem to be running on empty, even when we are full or feeling drained, although we do so much to stop the leaks. Of course a huge amount of our energy (all of it?) must come from our food, and when we are eating things made from machines - well, let's just say that warm and fuzzy feeling is missing.

If you would like to try a dairy free, sugar free, wheat free - yummy treat, try these little energy balls. I have a more involved recipe listed below, but really, it you have a food processor, just use a handful of almonds, a few dates and figs and make a paste. Then roll into balls and sprinkle on some coconut.

It couldn't be easier to treat yourself....and lets face it - you deserve the best (say it often and believe it).

April’s Energy Balls

2-3 cups of chopped dates, figs or apricots and other dried fruit
¾ cup of crushed almonds, cashew or walnuts
2-3 tablespoons of sugar free strawberry jam
Maple Syrup (about 1-2 tablespoons)
Dessicated Coconut (1 cup)
½ to ¾ cup Tahini or Almond Butter

This recipe can be made differently each time you make it according to the ingredients that you have on hand. Also, the measurements can not be exact as sometimes the dates, figs and apricots may be a little drier and will therefore need more of the ‘wet’ ingredients to hold them together.

I chop all dates, figs and apricots by hand as fine as possible and combine in a large bowl (if you have a food processor, use this). Next I put in the nuts, jam and maple syrup. Mix all of these together loosely by mixing lightly, then add the tahini or almond butter slowly- seeing how much you will need to make the dry ingredients stick together.

Tahini works best for this recipe because it is not sweet and does not make Coconut balls overly sweet, and also because it is less thick then the almond butter. However, I have made it with both and it has worked out well. Even try a combination to give a nice nutty taste too.

Once all those ingredients are mixed in, see if you can squeeze a small teaspoon full into a ball- if this is done easily then do not add any thing else. If it is too wet, add more dates and if too dry add more jam and/or tahini.

Now that you can make little balls with this, roll them onto a plate covered with the coconut until each one is coated entirely. Then place onto a separate pan or serving dish.

These look very nice, are a balanced, healthy snack and are quite tasty with a cup of dandelion coffee. I serve them with seasonal fruit such as fresh strawberries or orange sections on a platter for nibbles at the end of a meal or at any party. Enjoy!

Or drop by my market stall in Bantry or Skibbereen to have a treat....can't wait to see you,

April

A bowl of Energy Balls.....yumm! 

A Seasonal Favourite.....Cinnamon Swirl Cake

I was delighted to have my recipe for this cake featured in last weeks Southern Star newspaper in Nora Strong's column... it was also lovely to meet Nora and show her a little about our life here and all we are trying to do. 

So, for those of you who are not living locally here in West Cork here is another one of our favourite recipes for winter (and nearly anytime of the year! LOL) - we love Cinnamon Cake around here. It's a great warmer, tastes lovely and has anti-inflammatory properties that are supposed to be great for balancing blood sugar.

And, this recipe is so easy.....especially once you make it a couple of times and memorize it. Then, you can adapt it to nearly anything such as carrot cake (omit the cinnamon and brown sugar) add in 1/2 cup grated carrot and some spices such as cloves and allspice....Hmmm...that sounds nice too!

Nothing like a little piece of cake on a rainy afternoon along with a cup of dandelion coffee.....and to make it extra special, I make my own Bourbon vanilla extract which adds a lovely element to any baking. As well as my own eggs, our goat's milk and fresh yogurt. With all of this goodness, this cake can't be beat. 

Make your own at home and drop by my market stall for a slice.....

April Danann's Cinnamon Swirl Cake

Cake
3 1/2 cups flour
1 1/4 cup sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder (or a little more)
pinch salt
1 cup milk plus 3 tablespoons if needed
2 – 3 tablespoons yogurt
3 eggs
½ cup melted butter
1 tsp homemade vanilla extract if you have it

Swirl
1 cup butter (soft, not melted)
1 cup dark brown sugar
1 tablespoon cinnamon
2 tablespoons flour

Topping
½ cup powdered sugar
1 - 2 teaspoons goat's milk

To make the cake sift the dry ingredients together in a deep mixing bowl. In a separate bowl, whisk the eggs together with milk, vanilla and yogurt. Add the wet ingredients to the dry flour mixture, mix well. Add the extra 3 tablespoons milk if batter too thick.

In the meantime, melt the butter over low heat – cool a little, then slowly add to the cake batter folding over until well blended. Scrape into a square, greased or lined baking tin (deep is better) until evenly spread over the bottom.

To make the cinnamon swirl place all ingredients into a bowl or small pot and mix well until it is thick and creamy looking. Spoon this carefully over top of the cake batter starting from each corner, working your way in – then using a knife, pull the cinnamon mixture throughout the batter.

Bake at 180C for about 30 to 35 minutes until a toothpick comes out clean at the centre of the cake. Let cool in tin. Before serving, mix together powdered sugar and milk into a thin icing and spoon overtop.

Cut into squares….enjoy with a herbal coffee!

April

Cinnamon Swirl Cake - available in my market stall Bantry & Skibbereen 

A Heavenly Treat....Homemade Apple & Cinnamon Goats Yogurt

I tried my hand at making my own yogurt this past week and it turned out fairly well….of course it’s goats yogurt, which I think is superior in both taste and nutrition – and it’s so easy to work with.

To be honest with you, we spent so many years as vegans and vegetarians, that even now with our own goats I often forget about milk and we almost never eat yogurt…

I make a little cheese each week with our milk and the rest is used for dandelion coffee at the weekends. That’s about it for the milk – of course the children have about a tablespoon in their porridge in the morning.

However, whenever I read up on the fine art of cheese making I always came across advice and recipes for yogurt….

So, I thought I might as well learn how to do this as well! What I did though to make the first batch easier and to try to learn how our milk would respond to a yogurt culture – is buy a goats yogurt and use this to ‘seed’ another batch using our own milk.

First of all, I am using raw milk which has it’s own bacteria and life process taking place. I have found I am learning more about how our milk responds to being processed into cheese every time I make it….(the cultures and rennet).

And I only have small amounts of milk to play with each day, so I have to pay careful attention to what I am doing if I want to learn anything here. LOL

I used about a litre of milk, which I warmed to room temperature. Then taking 1 generous tablespoon of the purchased yogurt, I stirred a little into some of my milk. This was then poured into entire jar and shaken very well.

I didn’t want to sit around and stir, heat or otherwise stand over a pot ‘cooking’ something that, to me, should be a natural process. Yet, I knew the milk now needed heat in order to curdle into yogurt (grow the mesophilic bacteria).

So, to provide a relatively steady supply of gentle heat, I placed the jar into a small bowl and filled the bowl with hot water. This was replaced every few hours and the jar contents were swirled around or gently agitated.

It was starting to thicken after a few hours…then it was left overnight (in the oven to act as an insulator) while the next morning another bowl of hot water was filled.

Pretty soon I had yogurt. No real fuss. Nothing fancy and virtually no equipment was needed. When I think about it….this is gentle food at it’s finest. Homemade yogurt is a little thinner then the shop bought stuff….but the taste is very nice!

For our yogurt treat, I stewed apples and cinnamon and mixed this into the yogurt….heavenly!

April

Apple & Cinnamon Goats Yogurt

Homemade Shampoo – Lavender & Nettle

For years I have made my own shampoo – however I haven’t really thought to talk about it on this blog because, well, it’s a foodie focus and I didn't really put shampoo into the same category. Then this week as I was making up a fresh batch for us to use, it occurred to me as I poured nettle into the mix, shampoo IS also a foodie thing.

Sort of.

By now I hope you can see (I have certainly changed my mind about a few points when it comes to food!) how pretty well everything can be made at home, it’s generally better then something bought in a shop and for far less money.

Of course, my first comment on this is to also mention – you can also make it your own way. And that to me is always the greatest satisfaction. I love it when I can put my own spin, taste or scents into something.

It’s kind of a signature thing - just like your own energy field. 

Shampoo for me is no different and such a simple item to make at home. It really is just a few ingredients – blend them together and give it a shake when ever you want to use it (no binders or preservatives to make it all neat and uniform).

Yet, that is precisely what I love about it – life is not neat and tidy nor should it be uniform. And your own shampoo should not contain toxins which sit on your head soaking into your skin (brain?) all day long.

So – I make my own. To do this I grate down castile soap into flakes while heating pure spring water in the kettle. Then I pour boiling water over top of the flakes to melt them.

Next I decide what kind of shampoo I would like and I prepare the extract from some herbs such as nettle and lavender this time around. But I also like rose, chamomile, mint and rosemary as well.

These extracts go into the mixture which is by now in a ceramic bowl and I then add a few drops of pure oil or herbal essence from a plant. To make this shampoo today, I put in a few drops of lavender oil along with the nettle infusion.

I let the mixture cool down, pour it into a bottle and then give it a good shake. It makes a low suds lather and leaves your hair feeling refreshed and nice. But you know what is even better?

You feel great because there is not one thing going into your skin or energy field that is toxic or harmful in any way.

April

Two Geese A Laying - Quiche....

After taking a little break from cooking over the weekend – due to being so busy with other things- today I was back in the kitchen with some rather large goose eggs to use up.

Right now with the spring coming on into full swing (you would never know it today however with the snow flurries) our geese are laying an egg each day. And we love it!

They are such wonderful large specimens of life and especially great for baking, cooking or eating as they are. Because the rest of us are doing our parasite cleanse, I wanted to make something with the eggs that could be kept and frozen.

Funnily enough – unless we have our own eggs, we don’t often eat that many of them, so quiche or egg pie is not something I would make very much of. But today I decided to give it a go.

Of course then I had to carefully consider how to go about it and whether I would make one in layers of mix everything together. I also wanted a pie with a crust, but not something heavy or doughy.

In the end I made an oatmeal based butter and coconut crust – baked it on it’s own for a few minutes and then poured in the filling. For the filling – I used up a few things I had on hand...

To start with I had a huge bag of pok choy, some kale and spinach – this was gently steamed down to greens and then blended while I stir fried some onion, leek, garlic and celery in a little olive oil.

Next I chopped some Welsh onion stems, garlic chives and other green shoots from the garden and placed these fresh into the steamed greens along with fresh coriander.

By now it was starting to smell very fragrant! Then I just added these together – the greens, the stir-fry, some feta cheese and left over olives were sliced and stirred into the mixture with salt, pepper and thyme.

I placed this mixture into each tin with the cooked pie crusts – and then poured well beaten goose eggs over top of each pie. After nearly 30 minutes in the oven, they were done – and got a thumbs up from my taste testers!

Can't wait to taste these myself....

April

Quiche with goose eggs

Chickpea Flat Bread - Oven Fried

This is a recipe you have got to try! 

If you are anything like me, you have things in your cupboards you use seldom - or go through little phases of using them and then forgetting about them for awhile. For me there are several items, some of which I have mentioned on here.

Well, another one is gram flour or chickpea flour. Not so long ago I did use this far more often but it fell out in favour of spelt flour for breads and baking. This week I decided to bring it back and redo some of my favourite recipes with it.

I ended up making a gram flour bread type of pancake - often called Socca - of course my recipe is a little different (what else is new!) but we think it's even better with a few tweaks...

Here it is:

Oven Fried Bread

2 cups of gram flour

400 ml water

finely diced onion

fresh and dried Rosemary

Olive oil or coconut oil

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

salt

cumin

pepper

Mix the gram flour and water together - blend really well to get out any lumps - then allow to sit for at least 2 hours or even over night. 

Once the flour is ready - add your spices and baking soda, except the fresh rosemary, and blend lightly again to make sure everything is evening distributed. 

In the meantime, set your oven at 190C and prepare a round tin or deep pizza pan by covering with parchment paper. Pour about 1 tablespoon of olive oil on the parchment, add the onion to the batter and then gently pour the batter on top of the oil. 

Once the batter is in the pan - carefully mix or draw the oil through the mixture (it will float to the top) and then sprinkle with a little more salt, pepper and the fresh rosemary. 

Place in a hot oven for about 30 to 35 minutes until a toothpick comes out clean. Take out and allow to cool for about 5 to 10 minutes, then serve with a meal.

This is lovely with anything or on it's own.

April

Lovely!!

Almond Citrus Cake

For another take on using oranges in our baking I decided to mix two of my favourite food together - almonds and oranges. I wanted to use up some oranges but also to bake using less flour and more of other, different ingredients.

Almonds are lovely because they grind down into a floury powder, yet retain that deep taste that goes throughout a dish. And they pair up well with citrus - especially orange. I also like the texture of cake, cookies or other foods like nut loaf when made with almonds.

Cakes are easy to make with nearly any combination of ingredients and are just as easy to freeze for those days when something a little sweet would be nice with your dandelion coffee. 

This recipe is really straight forward and easy to follow - I had my children working with me on this one too - we usually bake something on Fridays for our home school project....

Almond Citrus Cake

2 cups ground almonds

1 cup whole grain spelt flour (or white spelt)

1 large organic orange

3 eggs (I use duck eggs)

1/4 cup maple syrup

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon Apple pie spice

1/4 teaspoon cardamom

pinch salt

7 to 8 tablespoons orange water

Place the orange in a saucepan cover it with water and bring it to a gentle boil for about 1 hour. It should cook gently, otherwise it will be tough. Once boiled, take off the heat and cool. Then cut it open and remove the seeds. The orange then needs to be blended into a pulp together with one or two tablespoon of the water it was boiled in.

Turn on the oven to 180C and prepare a baking tin - I usually use a bundt pan for cakes.

In a deep mixing bowl, place the dry ingredients and sift them together (flour, almond, baking powder, baking soda, spices, salt). Break the eggs in a small bowl and whisk together with the maple syrup. Next, add the wet ingredients (including the orange pulp) to the dry almond mixture and start to mix together - you will need to add the orange water here - add enough to ensure it is wet but not sloppy. Usually around 7 or 8 tablespoons.

Spoon this batter into a prepared tin and bake for about 40 to 45 minutes. Once a toothpick comes out clean - turn off the oven and allow to cool for 10 minutes then turn out onto a rack. This is lovely served with orange sections, or drizzled with maple syrup.

Enjoy!

Almond Citrus Cake

Sage & Coconut Biscuits

Well, once again I find myself with things sitting around my cupboards and I want to be using it up....but also I like to expand my recipe base at the same time. Often we find ourselves stuck in with the way we cook, bake or go about preparing food.

When we venture out of that box and go back to the drawing board some interesting points tend to be raised. First of all you can do nearly anything - with what you've got. I am not one for special ingredients or strange stuff I will never use again or in anything else.

Secondly, we can tend to have some types of food we enjoy but only prepare it one or two ways. I was like that with cabbage, which I posted on yesterday with a lovely slow cooker recipe. But, I am also like that with coconut.

I love coconut - and use it shredded in several dishes such as muesli, cookies and cakes. I also like the coconut milk in rice dishes and a couple of soups I make. But that seemed to be it really - so yesterday I set about playing around in the kitchen with blocks of creamed coconut.

And the results were quite interesting! I ended up with a lovely biscuit that the kids loved and I can't wait to taste. It looked very much like a scone but I was told it was sweet and creamy tasting with a different texture from a floury scone.

To make these biscuits I did the following!

2 1/4 cups spelt or barley flour 

200 g creamed coconut

1 tablespoon rubbed sage

2 teaspoons baking soda

1/2 cup water (hot)

1/2 cup goat's yogurt or sour milk

sea salt

In a saucepan I poured the 1/2 cup hot water and added the coconut block - this was gently heated on the wood stove while being stirred until it was uniformly melted. In the meantime I preheated the oven to 180C and placed a piece of parchment over a baking sheet.

Next I measured out 2 of the cups of flour into a deep mixing bowl and added the other dry ingredients (soda, salt and sage). This was sifted around to mix thoroughly. In another small dish I placed the goat's yogurt - I ended up using half yogurt and half sour milk. (add 1 teaspoon cider vinegar to make the milk sour).

After mixing the milk mixture in with the coconut I added this to the flour in the deep mixing bowl. It will blend nicely into a soft ball which you can then turn out onto a floured surface. Use the extra flour to handle the dough sprinkling a little over top to keep it from sticking to your hands.

Flatten it down a little and start punching out round circles (sort of like cookies or scones) and placing them onto the cookie sheet. Once the dough is used up, sprinkle some more sage over top and put them in the oven for about 15 to 17 minutes. 

They turned out wonderfully (I made them twice with different flours) and smelled like they had butter inside - but they don't, it's just lovely coconut!

April

Sage & Coconut Biscuits 

Liquid Gold - Bees & Honey

Since today is a food day, I have been cooking and eating all day! Which is not how things usually are however,  I have been working on some more recipes and we had some tasting to do. Besides, what else would there be to do on a rainy Thursday at home?

Well, one other thing I have been doing is filtering honey through a muslin cloth into jars for storage. We just moved a hive to higher ground and in the shift had to remove quite a bit of old comb (they had lots) and ended up with some lovely honey.

Of course this is a messy job and everyone in the house wants to be in on it - so everyone and everything gets sticky! The one thing I have noticed myself doing (again) is comparing my honey from my own bees to something that would come in a jar from Tesco's for instance.

Of course, my first thought is that Tesco honey looks 'like honey' - which is what we as consumers have been trained to expect from a honey product. These thoughts brought me back to the years spent working on my honey project at CAFRE college in Northern Ireland and the things I found out about myself and others as a consumer (or a well trained monkey!)

Well, first of all, the honey we have in our hives is different from something found in a shop. We do not feed our bees and do not treat with anything. We also keep a large herb garden. But more then that, we use the comb honey, untreated, unheated - as is.

Unless I want some filtered for baking and cooking - which is what I am doing today, we eat the honey straight from the hives. I wouldn't' for the life of me want to alter anything this precious. 

However I know enough about this subject and how honey is processed before it arrives on a store shelf to understand that our perceptions of honey are shaped by what is available to us from a shop. When I was working on my study at CAFRE college, during some of the food labs, I surveyed people extensively about their tastes, preferences and expectations for honey.

What was uncovered was that none of their preferences were based in reality - people wanted medium coloured, light tasting, clear honey - the type that would indicate it was blended from multiple sources, heated to high temperatures and imported in from God knows where. 

Yet, they expected this commercially produced honey to be very good for them and have medicinal properties. 

Very few people would have known to use local honey, on the comb when you can get it, unheated, untreated - right out of the hive is best, especially if you want it for medicinal purposes. And that local honey colours and tastes vary from season to season as well as within each hive. 

Bees which have access to herbs such as thyme, sage, lavender and chamomile would produce a great tasting honey as well as perhaps be quite healthy and strong themselves. Each of these factors is important for us to know as informed consumers (taking the game to another level). 

If you like honey and have a back garden, you should consider keeping bees, you don't have much to do with them, just plant a few herbs or flowers and let them do their thing. 

They are an indicator species for the planet - if they fail to thrive, so do we. That seems pretty important to me.

Well, off to keep going with the honey!

Have a healthy day,

April

Top Bar hive in back garden

Nut Butter Cookies

I came home late tonight from a day out and of course, everyone was feeling a little peckish after our long day. No one was really overly hungry (we had taken food with us for our picnic) but you know how it often is....

You would like something to nibble on, without being a disaster or going off the rails. Of course, in my house now, there is no room for a disaster, because absolutely everything must be made from scratch or we have nothing. Once I was in the house and getting everyone settled - my mind was already turning over the possibilities of what I could make quickly enough...

I wanted to have a light snack, tasty, nice with a dandelion coffee yet filling and still a treat of some kind. My thoughts were going to some kind of cookie - and I knew just the right one to make.

Going back to my basics of baking guidelines, this time I used 2 cups of oats instead of flour, some baking soda, a little salt, and it took off from there - I put all of those things into a deep bowl and looked around the kitchen for something quick to add in.

Nut butter cookie dough

Next went in a 1/2 cup of flour, then some cinnamon, 2 mashed bananas instead of an egg (for texture) and 1 cup of nut butter. I combined half tahini and half cashew nut butter because those were both on hand and needed to be used up. 

After I started mixing this up I added more liquid as needed, in total about 6 tablespoons of milk, and 4 tablespoons of maple syrup. This mixture was stirred around just enough to make sure the flour had been well blended in and then dropped onto a baking sheet covered in parchment paper.

Nut butter cookies ready for the oven

They were in the oven for less then 20 minutes - and before anyone knew it, we had a batch of nut butter cookies to go with a hot cup of coffee. This is a tasty and fairly healthy snack too, it can be made sweeter if wanted or you can omit the maple syrup all together and just add more milk or water to get the cookie dough consistency.

All in all, to make these cookies it took less than 30 minutes, they are so easy and straight forward to make. The best part about this type of recipe is it's versatility - whatever nut butter you have on hand or want to make, can be used in the cookies. 

Right now, I am working my way through a couple of them, so good!

Have a lovely day,

April

Nut butter cookies - just out of the oven!