Home Made Almond Milk

A few months ago, I posted a recipe for home made rice milk.  Now we’ve decided to try almond milk, since Ace has had some nuts and has not shown any allergy to them.  We felt that the nutritional value of almond milk would be more beneficial to him than the rice milk.  Also, I am the designated photographer for an upcoming culinary tour hosted by my work, so I figured I best hone in on my food-photog skills.

I went with a really simple recipe from Vegan Reader for my first go at it.  It’s just almonds and water…  doesn’t get much easier than that!

The recipe is simple.  You need 1/3 c. of raw (preferably organic) almonds and 3 c. of water.  It makes just 16 oz. of almond milk, so increase as needed.

To start, you pour 1 c. of water into a pan and bring it to a boil.  Boil 1/3 c. almonds for about 3 minutes to blanch them.

Once they are blanched, strain them and let them sit on a plate to cool off.

Once they are cool enough to handle (it just takes a few minutes), slip the skins off of the almonds and discard them.  You just want the meat of the nut, as the skins will make the milk a little bitter.

Once they are all peeled, put them in the blender with 2 c. water.  Preferably distilled or filtered water (we keep a Brita pitcher in our fridge, so I used that).  Blend the heck out of those suckers until they are finely ground.  I set my blender on the highest setting and let it go for about 3 minutes.

Once it’s blended, you need to strain out the nut pulp.  I originally strained mine through a strainer 3 times, and then once more through a cheesecloth for good measure.  It was still a little to gritty to make it through a sippy cup, and it had settled more overnight, so next time, I’ll probably let it sit and let all the sediment settle and strain it once more.  I had quite a bit of pulp left over, and read you can use it in cooking or other goodies if you like almonds (I don’t!).

That’s it!  It turned out well, and I read you can add vanilla or honey to sweeten it, but I thought it was plenty sweet.  Ace liked it for about 3 sips then wanted nothing to do with it, and later had what appeared to be a contact rash around his mouth, so it may have been all for naught, but at least I got to practice those food-photog skills, right?

Enjoy!  :)