A-Z Simple Living: H = Homemade

It is not a secret that I like to experiment with making things myself. It is something I let go for so many years whilst I was raising small children, but now that they have grown up, I am finding that it is a wonderful and fascinating hobby. I have only ventured as far as foods and cleaning products because my sewing and craft skills leave a lot to be desired...and I have to get my kids to thread the needle these days :) However, you never know where this road will take me and I may just start sewing and knitting one day.

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Sewing and knitting remind me of when I was a young girl and my mother used to make some of our clothes, whilst my grandma knitted us cardigans and jumpers. Back then it was the sign of a not-so-prosperous household, because it was cheaper than buying them. Now the opposite is true - to have handcrafted clothes or hand knitted jumpers is something to be treasured as the cost ( in time and money), far outweighs the ready-made stuff you can buy. Funny how times change :)

Here are just some of the things I have made at home (some successful and some not), and a glimpse into what I have planned to make during my holidays. There is nothing like that feeling when something turns out better than the original, and saves you money in the process:

I picked up a dehydrator last week for $5 from a garage sale. When the guy I bought it from said that it makes the best beef jerky I couldn't resist trying it out....and he was right. Not only does it taste better, but it is relatively inexpensive to make compared to what you buy in the stores. My boys go on Army camps and jerky is a great staple for them to take as it is nutritious and does not need refrigeration. We still have to tweak a little to perfect the recipe but our first batch was a great start!

I have already told you the story of my soap-making. Not a huge success...but something to cross off my list of things to try.

This was my last experiment with bread rolls. I have yet to perfect them and have added them to my holiday experimentation list. My kids love them, and with living out of town, it would be really handy to whip up a couple of batches every week.

Homemade bircher muesli. This is an amazing breakfast cereal and just takes a little bit of preparation. I put all of my ingredients into a coffee jar, add skim milk or juice and let it soak overnight in the fridge. Easy.

This was my first batch of cream cheese made with full cream milk. I have just finished another batch using skim milk and am very pleased with the results...I'm sure my waist will be too :)

My kids love homemade sausage rolls in their lunchboxes. I do tend to rely on the frozen sheets of pastry so there is another thing to add to my (ever growing) homemade list.

I made my first Christmas cake last year...and will now make one every year. I have hot-cross buns planned for Easter, which is another first.

This is the homemade hamper I made for Xmas last year for each family. It was really well received and the preserves were all made with ingredients from the garden.

I cannot wait to get stuck into some cheese making these holidays. I have all the stuff, I just needed the time and the temperature (my cheese fridge ran too warm in summer). I have never made hard cheeses like cheddar before, and if they turn out I plan to make camembert (my favourite) also :)

I can also see the Vacola getting a bit of use during my holidays as well. Although I don't have a lot of my own produce to preserve, I have planned a few trips to the markets. Nothing like getting everything stored before winter :)

I also really enjoy making jams and chutneys (which we use all the time now) so I can see I will have to research some new recipes...maybe some pumpkin preserves :)

Other things I have planned are....homemade chicken stock, homemade mayonnaise, homemade soups, and some traditional baking. Phew, its a long list but these are the things I love to do. The moral of the story is....homemade is the way to go...for me anyway.

Do you make many things yourself? This list only scratches the surface, I would love to hear any other suggestions :)

A-Z Simple Living: C = Cleaning

If you are wanting to start your own simple living journey then the best place to start is by making your own cleaning products. I started with laundry liquid first, and once I was sure it would be just as effective as the store bought ones, I then experimented further. Basically any product that you buy from the supermarket to clean with, you can make at home yourself for a fraction of the price. My last batch of ten litres of laundry liquid cost just $3 to make and has lasted me for six months. It has no nasty chemicals and does an amazing job of cleaning the kids clothes....it also does not irritate my sensitive skin like some laundry liquids have done in the past, and my daughter's dermatitis is now non-existent.

I use the recipe from Down to Earth and thought I would include it in this post so you can see how easy it is to make!

Ingredients

1 cup of Lux soap flakes

1/2 cup washing soda

1/2 cup borax

1 1/2 litres of water

Add the above ingredients to a medium sized saucepan and heat, stirring, until all ingredients are dissolved.

Add 8 litres of water to a 10 litre bucket, pour in the hot soapy mixture and stir. The mixture will thicken into a gel as it cools, and you then place it into plastic containers for storage.

How easy is that? I bought the ingredients and it was a while before I got around to making it, so I kept my laundry liquid bottles to re-use, and for the rest I stored it in empty water bottles. You do need to give the liquid a shake before using as the mixture does separate, so leave some room in the top of the bottle to allow for this. 

Once you have made this laundry liquid you can use it as a base for so many other cleaners. I use a watered down version with a few drops of eucalyptus oil as a spray for my benchtops. There are also home-made cleaners you can make using vinegar or bicarb soda as a base ingredient to clean anything from showers, toilets, floors, dishwashers etc. I made a few and did a road test of the cleaners on this post Homemade Cleaners Road Test.

I have also experimented with making homemade soap. It turned out okay, and is totally natural, but I found the oils quite expensive to buy...and we don't use alot of soap. My family prefer the shower gels, so I buy organic homemade soap from the markets and turn it into Home-made Shower Gel instead. I am still avoiding the chemicals, saving money (cost about 20% of store-bought product), and am adding to that reduction in my carbon footprint. 

So, there are no hard and fast rules. You do what works for you...and experiment as you go along. Do you make any of your own cleaning products?

How to make 'Bickford's' Style Lime Cordial

On the weekend I decided to make some lime juice cordial with the excess of limes from my tree. I followed Matt Preston's Lime Cordial recipe (with half the amount of sugar) and was pleasantly surprised at the result. I have been having a dash with soda water and it tastes so much like Bickford's lime cordial that I'm sure it would make a great lemon, lime and bitters. The best thing...1.5 litres cost me less than $1!

This is a recent shot of my lime tree which is fully laden with limes at all different stages, so it will be productive for the next few months. That's a lot of cordial!

INGREDIENTS

10 limes

4 cups water

3 cups sugar

2 tsp citric acid

1 tbsp tartaric acid

METHOD

Using a potato peeler, peel long strips of the zest off five limes.

Juice all of the limes.

Add the lime zest to the water in a saucepan, and bring to boil. 

Pour in sugar and powders and boil for 3 minutes.

Remove from heat and pour in the lime juice,  ideally through a sieve so your cordial does not become cloudy.

Bring the cordial back to the boil and gently simmer for two minutes.

Remove from heat, and when cool, funnel into sterilised bottles. Matt suggested Johnnie Walker bottles to keep with tradition, but I had a couple of Grants scotch bottles I kept for the shape, and they do the job just perfectly (I boiled them in a pan of water to sterilise).

So, there you have it. A really easy recipe that can be used with any type of citrus. So, if you don't have a lime tree, or oranges are on special, now you know what you can make.

Any more suggestions for lime recipes? I can see I am going to need a few more ideas :)

Cherry Tomato and Chilli Jam

A couple of weeks ago I decided to make a cherry tomato jam instead of my usual relish. My sister gave us a jar of chilli jam for Christmas which we polished off within a few weeks (it goes great with eggs in the morning!) so it inspired me to investigate making my own...plus the fact that I have chillies growing. I found a few recipes and adapted my own from the ingredients in my cupboard (and with far less sugar).

Ingredients:

750g cherry tomatoes

2 tsp ground cumin

2 tsp ground coriander

2 onions finely chopped

2 garlic cloves, crushed

Red Chillies, chopped (3-4, depending how hot you like it)

5cm piece of fresh ginger, grated

250ml white wine vinegar

150g brown sugar

2 tsp soy sauce

2 tsp pectin

Halve the cherry tomatoes.

Place all ingredients, except the soy sauce, into a saucepan. Bring to the boil, then simmer until reduced to a jam like consistency. This takes about 45 minutes. 

Add the fish sauce and cook for two more minutes before spooning into sterilised jars. I used pectin so that the jam would set without having to use too much sugar.

There you have it, two salsa jars full of cherry tomato and chilli jam. It is spicy and sweet and goes well with all meat. We put it on platters when we serve cheese and dip, and add it to the top of our Sunday Eggs Benny...yummo.

Have you every tried chilli or tomato jam?

Green Mango Chutney

Mangoes are plentiful in Gympie at the moment (so many people have a tree) and I was given some large green ones. My immediate thought was to make a green mango chutney but I did not realise that even though these mangoes had green skins and were very firm, they were almost ripe. Oh well, I went ahead with the recipe anyway...with great results.

Ingredients

4 cups green (underripe) mangoes - peeled, seeded and diced
1/2 cup sultanas (I used raisins)
1/4 cup red chillies, finely diced
6 cloves garlic, crushed
1 1/2 tbs grated fresh ginger root
1 1/2 tbs lemon zest
1 tbs black pepper
2 tbs golden syrup (I used treacle I had left over from my Xmas cake)
1 small cinnamon stick
4 whole cloves
1 cup water
1 cup cider vinegar

Place the mango, sultanas, chillies, garlic, ginger, lemon zest, black pepper, golden syrup, cinnamon and cloves into a large saucepan.

Pour in the water and vinegar. Bring to a boil then reduce heat to medium low. 

Simmer uncovered until a jam like consistency, probably about 30 minutes.

Once thickened, pour into hot sterilised jars and seal. I turned these jars upside down as per the instructions and the seal popped inwards, creating the perfect vacuum. These will store for 2-3 months on the shelf, and once opened in the fridge for a couple of weeks.

The chutney is sweet, aromatic and has a distinct mango flavour. It goes perfect with curries, or as a garnish with fish, chicken or steak. Now I will hunt down some green mangoes to see what difference they make :)

How to make Ricotta Cheese from Whey

This was an easy cheese to make and needs to be made while the whey is less than three hours old to get the best results. This recipe is from the booklet included in my Cheese Making Kit that I got from Green Living Australia. For those who missed my post last week, the whey is leftover from the Cottage Cheese I made. So you actually get to make two cheeses from one source of milk. Pretty clever science that I reckon.

Ingredients

3 Litres of Whey

400ml full cream milk

1/8 cup cider vinegar

1/4 teaspoon cheese salt

Equipment

Large Pot

Cheese thermometer

Stainless Steel slotted spoon

Stainless steel ladle

Stainless steel colander

Tight Weave cheese making cloth

Step 1:
Combine your whey and milk in the pot and heat (directly on stove) to 93 degrees C.

Step 2:
Remove from heat, add vinegar and stir. The curds will rise to the top.

Step 3:
Gently ladle the curds into the cheesecloth lined colander and drain.

Step 4:
Use the corners of the cloth to make a bag and hang the curd to drain for several hours. I used a rolling pin and suspended the cloth over the saucepan.

Step 5:
Turn the cheese out into a bowl and add salt to taste. You can also add herbs at this point too, which I would do next time. This is the finished result. Looks a funny colour in this photo and is drier than I am used to but tastes like Ricotta. I would not drain it for a few hours next time, maybe half an hour so it is still creamy. This weighs just under 300 grams, so a great result from the leftover whey.

And now I still have the whey left over from this process, just under the three litres I started with. As vinegar was added to make the ricotta, it is now acidic whey which apparently limits its use in sweet dishes. I will follow up this post with some other ideas of what to use the whey for. It is a fascinating process and one thing certainly leads to another in cheese making.

My next cheese making endeavour will be a Feta cheese, and now that I have my cheese cave I can start preparing to make cheddars and colby cheeses. I also found a great tutorial for haloumi cheese...now that would be awesome. I can see that I will need to learn to make low fat cheese soon...I can already feel the calories coming :)

Simple Living Sunday 13

Every week when I sit down to put this post together, I love the fact that I am recording my journey for posterity and for my future reference. When I want to know what I was doing in the house and garden in September 2013 I know there will be a permanent record of where it all started. Hence, this weekly round up is always my favourite post. I still managed to harvest a few things this week. The green tomatoes I will experiment with later today.

I did a little shop at the Asian grocers earlier this week. Panko breadcrumbs (1/3 of the price you pay at Coles), Cinnamon sticks, palm sugar, indian spice kit and two interesting vegetables...bitter melon and water spinach. $12 for the lot - bargain.

The bitter melon is a funny looking thing and you need to salt it for a while before cooking. It adds a tangy zing to a stir fry and is particularly good with pork apparently.

I sliced it lengthways, scooped the centre out and sliced it for our prawn stir fry. It certainly added to the flavour of the dish and I have saved the seeds to see if I can grow it.

The lady at the grocers said to put some water spinach in a glass of water to shoot. I particularly love this vegetable. It was lovely in the stir fry, just a nice light spinach.

It has started to sprout nicely. Now I am not sure whether to plant it or grow it in water. Will need to research this one :)

Another baby Lebanese melon is on its way. I have been pollinating but it is hit and miss whether something grows or not.

And my favourite Patty Pan squash is still producing.

But sadly the rockmelons did not recover. Will need to learn more about growing them before next years season.

I am very happy with the pumpkins...I counted over a dozen of these today. This one is about the size of an orange.

The female flowers that seemed to take forever to bloom are now everywhere. And I have seen a few bees.

This poor tomato plant has given up the ghost so I have picked the green tomatoes to make a jam or pickle.

A nice grosse lisse, actually two stuck together. Only small though.

Plenty of hibiscus to make tea.

More compost lasagne from the bokashi bin.

And the compost will come in handy for replanting in March.

Found this guy when we took the bins up. Thankfully he is dead. Red-belly blacks are venomous.

I cleared out the other half of the preserving drawer...

...so I can sit my clean, lidded jars in it. Everything I need to do my preserving in one spot.

I checked and labelled all of the jars...26 in total, and adding to it every week :)

Yesterday I made mango chutney and today I made Spiced beetroot and Orange Chutney.

I also started a yoghurt culture which should be ready tomorrow morning. If its a success I will do a post on yoghurt making.

The whey lemonade turned out beautifully. very tangy and with its own fizz. Full of probiotics...and no colours or preservatives. Perfect!

I cleared out a cupboard for all of my cheese making equipment. I am keen to get started on the harder cheeses but need to wait for the weather to cool a little. But I found a cheese making bargain...

My very own cheese cave!! It is a wine fridge I picked up for $50. These are great because you can regulate the temperature and keep it constant, plus the glass door means you can read the temp and humidity without opening the door...once I get my thermal hygrometer that is! It is basically a digital temperature gauge that also measures humidity. So, I am on my way with the cheese making enterprise.

I hope you have all had a lovely weekend. It is just over a week now until we go on our cruise. How exciting!

Do you have any exciting this coming up this year?