Crying (And Cursing) Over Spilled Milk

Have you ever saved your money for what felt like forever and a day and bought something that struck you as exquisite and extraordinary? I’m not talking about gigantic purchases, either– like houses or yachts or Ferraris– I just mean basic, everyday things like a laptop, new glasses, or (in my case) a kick ass blender. Yes? No?

Vitamix Blenders: Sweet dreams are made of these!

When I still worked at the Office Job, I had an automatic savings plan set up specifically for this fantasy blender of mine. Every paycheque, a small amount of money would be skimmed off the top and squirreled away into the “Vitamix” savings account. It took a long time to accumulate enough dinero for this blender, because they definitely aren’t cheap, but I did it and the Vitamix was finally mine! Come to mommy, little blender! The problem was, by the time I finally got my blender, I was too afraid to even use it, lest I blow the motor or otherwise ruin my Expensive Purchase right away. Totally. Defeating. The purpose.

I confess: Up until very recently, I had only used my Vitamix to make what amounted to two very expensive batches of Peach Bellinis. (So much for all those healthy Green Smoothies I had originally envisioned! :)) I am a somewhat rational being, however, so I buckled down the other day and resolved to learn more about this Magical Blending Machine. I know that a Vitamix can perform virtual wizardry in the kitchen– nut butters! soups! bread dough! freshly milled flour! regular ol’ smoothies! delicious frozen cocktails!– and I figured that my reluctance to dabble in this black magic stemmed solely from my lack of practice in pushing the ‘On’ button. (Really, could it get any easier than ‘On’?) Time to break in my Vitamix, baby.

The first task I assigned for myself was to make almond milk for our tea lattés. (I know, I know– what a hippy-dippy mission for a bunch of boho punks!! Bear with me.) Marty normally takes rice milk in his morning coffee, and I drink my herbal teas straight– like the tough-as-nails badass I truly am– but both of us enjoy some vanilla almond milk in the occasional tea latté. (Speaking of which: if you have a Teopia store near you, totally get some Coco Caramel Rooibos tea and make an almond milk latté with it. Or order that tea online. It is to die for.) I figured homemade almond milk was worth a try, and I even found an encouraging recipe that said making almond milk from scratch was “easy”. What was there to lose?

It started out simply enough. I procured a cup of raw (not roasted) almonds and soaked them in a bowl of filtered water for about 8 hours.

The almonds softened and swelled up to nearly double their original size.

The almond on the top was soaked

After they had soaked for a nice, long time (8 hours or overnight– whatever works for you), I rinsed them thoroughly and plopped them into my Vitamix with 3 cups of water. (The recipe calls for 3-6 cups of water, but I decided to go with the thickest option for my first go-round.)

A quick flick of the ‘On’ switch and about 20 seconds of high-speed whirring later, I had a frothy blend of… um… almonds and water.

The next step was to strain this mixture through a cheesecloth into a new container, so I could separate the curds from the whey, so to speak.

Enter my first error. If you ever decide to make your own almond milk in the future, do not pull your cheesecloth taut over the opening of a pitcher and hold it into place with an elastic band (like I did in the very top photo). This will leave your cheesecloth flush with the brim of your container, and the almond mixture will spill over the sides of the pitcher in about .001 seconds, leaving you with a goopy mess of runny almond paste to clean up. Don’t do it!

Boo! Hiss!

Attempt #2 at straining almond milk: I rescued as much of my almond mixture as I could and cut a new piece of cheesecloth. Thinking I had outsmarted those sneaky, dripping almonds, I lined the inside of a large plastic funnel with the cheesecloth and placed the funnel at the top of my pitcher. Then I poured in my blended almonds.

You can barely see it, but my funnel is propped inside the pitcher. You CAN see the thinnest-of-thin stream of almond milk dripping down from the funnel.

Enter my second error. Trying to strain a bunch of blended almonds through a cheesecloth and a funnel requires patience. Lots of it. Filtered almond milk dripped from the bottom of my funnel at a painfully slow rate, which I guess makes sense when you think about it: Lots of almonds + Cheesecloth + A funnel with a small hole = Not a lot can get through all at once. I win basic physics! Or not.

I tried to expedite the process by giving my cheesecloth a little squeeze. This was not a fabulous idea and was actually my third error. I didn’t really secure any loose corners of the cheesecloth when I did this, so almond mixture oozed out over the sides of my cheesecloth and down into my funnel. Globs of almond grits then fell into the filtered almond milk before I could prevent it from happening, meaning that I had to start the process all over again. (Again.)

Ahem. Attempt #3 at straining my stupid almond milk: I lined the inside of a wire-mesh sieve with a new piece of cheesecloth. My sieve didn’t fit into the mouth of my pitcher (at all), so I had to play a little balancing game with it using one hand and pour my almond mixture into the sieve with my other hand.

Nice fit FAIL. The rubber handle on the sieve is relatively heavy, so it kept slipping down to the right hand side and causing general straining mayhem.

Using the sieve would have been the winning strategy if I had chosen a container with a wider mouth to rest beneath it. As it stood, straining the milk was STILL awkward because I insisted on catching the filtered milk with my cheap-ass, narrow-mouthed plastic pitcher. Heh. If you decide to make almond milk in the future, line a sieve with a cheesecloth and then just use a mixing bowl to catch your filtered milk! You can always put the milk into a pitcher afterward. (*She says, completely after the fact.*)

Things got easier after I squeezed the last few drops of almond milk out of the cheesecloth (and managed to avoid simultaneously squeezing almond meal into the precious filtered liquid). I rinsed my Vitamix container, poured the filtered almond milk into it, and added 1/4 cup of pitted dates, 1 Tbsp coconut butter, and 1 tsp of vanilla extract. (The recipe also called for 1 Tbsp of lecithin granules, but honestly: who has lecithin just lying around? Not even I do, and I believe that says something. I left the lecithin out.) Whir went my Vitamix at high speed, and voila! I had a pitcher half-filled with homemade almond milk.

This morning was the true test. I checked on my almond milk in the fridge while I was making breakfast, and I was disappointed (but not surprised) to see that it had separated out into three distinct layers. (That is where the lecithin would have come in handy.) Not to worry. I just shook it up and added it to my Honey Chai Tea anyway after breakfast. Some stray almond grits instantly floated to the top of my cup, making it look like I had added curdled cream to my tea, but the milk actually tasted really good. I enjoyed the thicker consistency of the milk and felt proud of myself for making this “easy” recipe from scratch!

The saddest/grossest looking cup of chai you'll ever see. I sprinkled some cinnamon on top, and then the mystery almond meal floating at the surface looked more deliberate. Heh. Despite its sketchy appearance, the tea and milk tasted really great. I swear!

I’ll most likely attempt this almond milk recipe again, and when I do– I’ll be sure to use a mixing bowl underneath my sieve for straining purposes. I’ll also add a tiny bit less vanilla, because (as much as I love me some bourbon vanilla extract), I practically got drunk off of it when I had a few tablespoons of almond milk in my chai latté. Even 1tsp was a lot of vanilla!

My next Vitamix task will be to tackle some sort of flour: oat, rye, or maybe buckwheat flour for pancakes. I bought both a ‘wet’ and a ‘dry’ container for my Vitamix, so I’m really curious to see what this baby can do with some ordinary rye kernels!