In the kitchen; Ginger sweets and fresh nut milk.

Ahh, look at these late summer beauties. This weekend we have had absolutely gorgeous weather and have spent lots of time outside, we did however also make some very yummy ginger candy that I wanted to share.

At the Saturdays farmers market I came across these fresh tender ginger, that needed no peeling, and have the added bonus of haveing many health benefits as well. The children having tried ginger chews before asked if we could please make our own, so we did, and we also made candied ginger and some ginger syrup.

First we made candied ginger, we used this recipe. we started by slicing the ginger into very thin slices.

I put about 8 slices in a pot with two cups of heavy cream and 2 sticks of cinnamon over very low heat in preparation for the chews which we made after.

The rest I put into a non reactive stainless steel pot, covered with water and simmered for ten minutes. drained the water off into a separate container, and repeated.

After the second draining I added the remaining ingredients into the pot, using the water from the first two boilings, and substituting half the sugar with honey. Stuck in a candy thermometer and let it boil till it reached 225 F, at which point I strained out the ginger pieces and shook them in a bag of sugar.

The syrup I saved in glass jars for use in teas and whatever else I can think of, if you like soda I think this syrup with some added club soda might come close to a ginger ale.

I also added a little to my cream for the caramels.

Lots of sugar in these recipes, clearly not something we will be making often:)

The children loved them, they certainly have a bite from the ginger, but they love them

At this point the cream had been infusing for a couple of hours, and I was ready to proceed with the chewy gingers. We used this recipe, we did substitute half the sugar with honey and I think probably all the sugar could be substituted with honey. Instead of corn syrup I used organic brown rice syrup.

I added all the ingredients to the pot, boiled them until they turned a darker brown, took it off the heat and added the cream carefully while stirring vigorously.

Once again popped in the thermometer and let it boil till it reached 250 F

After which I poured it into a foil lined stainless steel pan, well buttered.

I let it cool for a couple of hours before covering the tray and leaving it overnight in the fridge.

Today I cut it into pieces, and individually wrapped them in parchment paper.

Kaleena enjoyed this task, and was a great help as this was a sticky long job.

They came out amazing, I must say. If you like the ginger chews that you get at the health food store, you will love these, they are a little more subtle in the ginger flavor, just strong enough. Again the children loved them! I highly recommend them for that special treat, and besides the cutting and wrapping it was really pretty simple to make them.

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We also made fresh nut milk for our Spirulina shakes. I have often  soaked nuts over night to add to our shakes, but would still use store bought nut milks. Besides the constant waste of the containers which don't recycle, these milks are expensive and have ingredients in them that seem unnecessary.

So I decided that from now on I will make my own. It turned out delicious and is so easy to make.

I soaked a mixture of organic almonds, cashews and a few macadamias overnight (12-24 hours)

After which they were all puffed up

I put them into the blender, added water and blended. (about 1 cup of nuts for 3 cups of water, you could add more water depending on how creamy you like it, we like it rich)

I strained it through a mesh strainer, it could have used a double straining, but since we mostly use it in shakes we don't mind a little nut meal.
I added a drop of vanilla extract and a drop of agave in it as well.

(All the nut meal is great added in breads or can be dried and used later)

And here it is all fresh and yummy!

Of course we had to make a shake immediately , and the freshness really did make a difference.

So very yummy. Looking forward to avoid all the throw away carton use, as well as save money, at least we will be able to have organic for the same price as we usually pay for none organic.

~Happy cooking~