The Happy Homemaker

All I need is the hot guy out front polishing my car!

 After all the talk this year about cooking chickens, making broth and growing my own veggies, I am sure you are all dying to hear about my next homesteading adventure. Well, wait no more......

As I learn more about food and health I spend more (too much) time thinking about how things are effecting my body. And more (way too much) time thinking about what makes up the things I am buying/eating. But, it seems there is actually a plus side to this obsessing. It seems it is actually very easy to make things yourself AND these things might actually taste exponentially better than the crap you buy at the store.

I had some free time this weekend so, in addition to writing TWO BLOGS, I did a little food experimenting.

Mayonnaise.  Anyone who knows my family, or at least has eaten fish with my family, knows about our love affair with mayonnaise. Next to popcorn, it was my dad's favorite food. He always 'fixed' his mayonnaise. This involved lots of lemon juice and spices.  And then he ate it, lots of it on crackers, on potato chips, with cottage cheese. A reunion of his family this summer involved large vats of tartar sauce (essentially fixed mayonnaise) on fish.  And it was mighty tasty. 

But, have you ever actually read the ingredients of a mayonnaise jar?  Most of the stuff in there you just do not want to eat. Even the happy 'healthy' kinds from the expensive yuppy stores.  Well, it seems you can make olive oil mayonnaise in the blink of an eye!  Olive oil, egg, mustard power, lemon and a blender and pow (or whirr)!  Delicious!  (The only catch was waiting for the egg to reach room temperature. After my waiting patiently for 4 hours, my egg calmly rolled itself off the counter rather than be a part of my culinary adventure. And neither Otto nor I nor all the king's horses could save that poor egg. )

Yogurt. Many of the books I have been reading lately tout the benefits of fermented food. But, much like mayo, if you go looking for yogurt in the regular stores you get.... Well first of you get dairy which I don't eat, but secondly you get lots of words that I don't even understand.  And I'm tired of eating words I don't understand. But fortunately, it seems if you want to eat fermented food you can grow bacteria in the comfort of your own home.

Coconut milk yogurt was today's adventure.  And I wish I could tell you that it was delicious, but unfortunately, yogurt is a painfully slow adventure. My bacteria are currently duplicating in the back room.  I can tell you my genius for of the day. It seems to grow cultures properly you need to keep them at about 110 degrees.  With that news, I was about to give up my yogurt plans when suddenly I realized that the 'professional greenhouse' I used to grow my plants this spring might be the perfect tool for yogurt. So my coconut milk is sitting on the plant heating pad. (I think this ingenuity probably multiplies my homemaker status).  Anyhow, keep your fingers crossed!

    If it looks anything like this, I'll be in heaven (and probably ready to quit my day job)!