It's strawberry season!

After such a long, snowy winter, it's wonderful to taste fresh, ripe, red strawberries! We typically get our strawberries from local Amish farmers, but today we ended up getting a flat from Fifer Orchards in Delaware. Now strawberries are #2 on the dirty dozen list for pesticides, so I would love to always get them organic. However, I learned a few things about Fifer's strawberries to make me feel better about their conventional produce. First, they till the soil in their strawberry fields every year, so they aren't trying to use pesticides for weed management like they do in no-till farming. They also use black covering between the plants to reduce weeds. I figured I was going to use a produce wash on the strawberries as well, so we would enjoy local and seasonal food, even if it wasn't certified organic. My mother-in-law just paid $4.50 for a quart of strawberries from one farm, but we got the flat of 8 quarts for only $30. Always ask about wholesale prices!

Produce Wash

I found a pin on Pinterest for produce wash, and I wanted to give it a try. The recipe said,

"Just a few drops of Essential Oils will wash off germs and parasites. Let your produce soak in this Fruit & Vegetable Wash or spray it and let sit for 5 minutes: FRUIT & VEGETABLE WASH RECIPE In a BPA-free Spray Bottle Add: 1 cup Water 1/4 cup distilled white Vinegar 2 TB Sea Salt or 1 TB Baking Soda 5 drops of Young Living Essential Oil (Lemon, Lime, Purification or Thieves)." 

Since I had so many strawberries, I decided to use my kitchen sink. I washed the sink first, and then added 1 gallon of purified water, 4 cups of white vinegar, 16 TBL of baking soda, and about 10 drops of Young Living Lemon essential oil. After soaking, I hulled the strawberries, placed them on parchment lined cookie sheets, and I popped them in the freezer. Did you notice I may have missed a step? The directions didn't mention rinsing, but they should have! After finishing 2 quarts, I popped a strawberry in my mouth and it was gross. :-( A good rinse with water was all they needed. I pulled the cookie sheets out of the freezer, rinsed, and put them back. 

This produce wash works. Here's the amount of dirt that came off of just 2 quarts of strawberries! By soaking in vinegar, it kills mold spores on the fruit, so the fruit will last longer. 

Since I realized I needed to rinse after soaking, I changed my routine for the rest of the strawberries. Here's my recipe. 

Produce Wash Recipe for 1 quart of fruit

Ingredients: 

4 cups purified water

1 cup white vinegar

4 Tablespoons baking soda

5-10 drops of Young Living Lemon essential oil

Fill large glass bowl with ingredients and stir to combine. Add enough fruit to fill top of bowl, and soak for 5 minutes. Rinse fruit well in colander.  Repeat with rest of fruit. 

What's your favorite strawberry recipe? Here are some I want to try: 

1. Berry Fruit Snacks

2. Homemade Jello Jigglers

3. Kombucha Fruit Snacks

4. Kefir Fruit Leather

5. Fruit Roll-ups

6. Grain-free Strawberry Streusel Muffins

7. Strawberry-rhubarb Omelette

8. Fabulous Fruit-filled Crepes

Pumpkin Chip Muffins: A recipe in progress

 Pumpkin Chip Muffins get a healthier make-over.

Pumpkin and chocolate are such a great combination, and I was thrilled when I found a delicious recipe for pumpkin chip muffins from www.tasteofhome.com. My boys devoured these sweet muffins. As I progressed in our real food journey, I loved the flavor of these muffins, but I hated the 2 cups of refined sugar and 3 cups of white flour. I started substituting better ingredients as I learned more and acquired the healthier ingredients. I started with fifty percent white flour and fifty percent whole wheat flour. I recently tried a new grain-freee pumpkin chip recipe with coconut flour, but my dear hubby was not a fan. Now I use a mixture of whole wheat flour and sprouted wheat flour. Some day I hope to be only using sprouted wheat, but I haven't experimented with that yet. I tried a few different brands of stevia for a portion of the sugar, but I thought they had a strange aftertaste. Then I moved to maple syrup and maple sugar. I've cut the amount of sugar in half, and now I use sucanat. Coconut oil is substituted for the canola oil. The muffins aren't quite as sweet with the current recipe, but they are still delicious, and all my guys gave them the seal of approval. They are an easy, portable breakfast for my husband who grabs breakfast to go. 

My Ingredients 

Expeller-pressed coconut oil

Pastured eggs, organic pumpkin, and sucanat

Homemade Baking Power- I found the simple recipe here. 

Prep: 10 min. Bake: 15 min. + cooling Yield: 27 servings

Ingredients

• 4 pastured eggs 
• 1 cup sucanat (rapadura, maple syrup, or other healthy sweetener)
• 1 can (15 oz.) solid-pack pumpkin 
• 1 - 1/2 cups expeller-pressed coconut oil 
• 1 - 1/2 cups white whole wheat flour
• 1 - 1/2 cups sprouted whole wheat flour
• 2 teaspoons baking soda
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon sea salt 
• 2 cups or 10 oz. of semisweet chocolate chips (I used Enjoy Life brand.) 

The cookie scoop makes filling the muffins neat and easy. 

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees. 

2. Pull eggs out of refrigerator. Melt coconut oil in small pan on low heat. In a large bowl, beat the eggs, sucanat, pumpkin, and oil until smooth. 

3. In a medium bowl, combine the flours, baking soda, baking powder, cinnamon, and salt. 

4. Gradually add dry ingredients to pumpkin mixture and mix well. 

5. Fold in chocolate chips. 

6. Fill greased or paper-lined muffin cups three-fourths full. 

7. Bake at 400 degrees for 15-18 minutes or until a toothpick inserted near the center comes out clean. 

8. Cool in pan for 10 minutes before removing to a wire rack. 

Yield: About 27 muffins 

Mmm, now I want to make some more.

This post is linked back to Sunday School at Butter Believer and Monday Mania at the Healthy Home Economist. 

The breakfast dilemma

When I started reading articles about traditional foods, one of the first things I started changing was our breakfast foods. We typically ate whole grain cereals, breakfast bars, non-fat yogurts, oatmeal, or bagels for breakfast. I thought that as long as the food had "whole grains" then we were eating healthy food. During my brief foray into low-carb dieting, I started eating more eggs, breakfast meats, and yogurt.
I was really discouraged to read an article about the dangers of breakfast cereal. I would still love to see more studies about extrusion and puffed grains, but until I see more evidence that they are safe, we've fazed out cereal in our house. It was not easy to give up because Curious George, my three year old, loved cereal, and I loved having an easy breakfast option. As he finished eating each box, I didn't replace it, and when he asked for cereal, I could just say that we ran out. He only asked me to buy more cereal a few times before he stopped asking for it.
So what's for breakfast now? I usually make scrambled eggs from pastured hens with raw milk cheese. My boys are starting to get tired of them, so they only eat them a few days each week. Then we have homemade waffles, toast, or oatmeal. We use sprouted wheat in our waffles and pancakes, and I've found sprouted wheat bread and sour dough bread from Trader Joe's. I know that I need to soak my oatmeal, but I just haven't gotten there yet. I recently found a family favorite in a recipe from Kelly the Kitchen Kop. I've made it twice now, and Curious George asked me for it again. I just started soaking the oatmeal tonight, and we'll enjoy the Baked Soaked Oatmeal all week.

I started soaking my oatmeal in buttermilk tonight, and I'll bake it tomorrow night. 

Here is the recipe for Kelly's Baked Soaked Oatmeal

• 2-1/2 c. oats (steel cut or regular, but I like regular best)
• 1 T. whole wheat flour (provides phytase to help break down the phytic acid in the oats)
• 1-3/4 c. buttermilk (In place of buttermilk or yogurt or kefir for soaking, you can use 1 tablespoon of whey, lemon juice or vinegar to 1 cup of liquid – usually water for those who can’t have dairy, but milk would be fine, too.)
• ½ c. coconut oil
• 4 eggs (preferably from pastured hens!)
• ½ c. sugar, maple syrup or honey
• 1 tsp. Baking powder (many have said they leave this out and it’s still really good)
• ½ tsp. sea salt 
• 2 tsp. Cinnamon
• 2 tsp. Vanilla
• 2 c. raisins
• 2 c. chopped apples or pears or other fruit of choice
• Optional: 2 c. chopped nuts (or sprinkle on each individual serving after baking

• Soak oats, flour and buttermilk covered on kitchen counter overnight, but 24 hours is better in order to break down more phytic acid. Before serving, beat oil, sugar, and eggs until glossy. Add baking powder, salt, cinnamon, and vanilla; beat. Stir in oats, raisins, and chopped apples (or pears). Sue said that she’ll sometimes add a little more milk at this point if the oats seem a little too dry.  Pour into 9×13 baking dish and bake at 350 for 20-40 minutes, depending on your desired consistency. 
• Note:  You can also mix all the ingredients together ahead of time (wet ingredients first, add dry ingredients, then add the last 3 ingredients) and freeze until you’re ready to set on the counter for up to 24 hours and then bake.  Or set it right into the oven with the automatic turn-on feature set so you can wake up to the smell of cinnamon in the morning and breakfast all ready to eat.
• One more thing:  In case you’re wondering why the oats don’t need to be drained after soaking overnight, Jenny from Nourished Kitchen has this to say:  “You don’t have to because phytic acid is degraded.  It doesn’t leach into the water like oxalates.” 

I couldn't get a picture before my husband cut some for breakfast. This is definitely a favorite in our house right now.