Tutorial: Make Your Own Delicious Walnut Milk!

Hi, everybody! The Fresh Pioneer is back and I've got a tasty treat for those of you who are looking for a way to boost their nutrition, cut fat, and lower cholesterol. Or, if you're like us, make something tasty for people who are lactose intolerant!
                                               
First, an odd fact: did you know that while approximately 15% of Caucasians are lactose intolerant, up to 50%-80% of Hispanic/Latinos are? (East Asians have the highest at reported nearly 90%... which made me think of all the Asian food dishes I know and realize almost none of them have dairy. Interesting.)

Hazelnut milk, about $8 a quart.

When our pediatrician first suggested testing our oldest daughter for a milk allergy, I thought that was something he always did with babies who were colicky. But then he told me that studies have shown Hispanics to be much more lactose intolerant than Caucasians. Luckily, none of my children have inherited any milk allergies, but my husband can only handle dairy in small amounts.

Almond milk, about $6 a quart

  That wouldn't be a problem except that he LOVES dairy. Ice cream, cheese, milk, yogurt. Everything that is made from cow milk, he craves. The good news: he also loves goat milk (which is easier for l.i. folks.) And the better news is that he thinks nut milks are delicious.

Walnut milk $14.99 a quart

The bad news (again)? It's SUPER expensive. Walnut milk is 14.99 a quart in some places (like Amazon). We have six kids and I cook on a budget. I just can't imagine spending $14.99 for something you can drink in a day or two!
So, I was thinking of all the walnuts we have and decided to try and make my own.

I know these are hazelnuts. But I also had a whole bunch of hazelnuts around and decided to try two different varieties.

 So, rinse the nuts you have, if they're whole. No need to peel. Put them in a heat-proof dish and cover with boiling water. Add a few squeezes of lemon juice and a few shakes of salt. This is important. Every tutorial I had mentioned this and I decided to believe the people who wrote, "Don't skip this. It helps soften the nuts AND it brightens the flavor. Otherwise it tastes like mushroom water." Yuck. Mushroom water does not sound appealing!

 We had several canning jars full of shelled walnuts. (We also have a whole garbage can full of last year's nuts in the shed, curing for this year!)

 Let the nuts sit in the boiling water for several hours. I added a few more cups of boiling water to the bowls every now and then. Some people soak the nuts overnight, but most tutorials said a few hours, so that's what I tried first.
Strain the soaking water and put the nuts into a blender. Then for every one cup of nuts, add four cups of water. Some people use filtered water. I didn't think it really mattered since our water is pretty good.

 Blend for several minutes or until the water is light and frothy.

 If you have cheese cloth, great, but we'd just ruined our last one by letting it sit in red cabbage (don't ask) overnight. So, a pillow case also works. (Clean, naturally.) Place the pillow case over a large bowl.

 Dump everything into the pillow case. Doesn't look too appetizing!

 Carefully lift the case and let the walnut milk run out. You can squeeze the bottom to get the very last drops.

 This was pretty thick and I added a few more cups of water to the milk after I took this picture. It really was rich and creamy. I put some in fresh brewed espresso right away and it was INCREDIBLE. So good!
Anyway, at this point, some people put in a drop of vanilla and some honey, or other sweetener. I put in 1/2 tsp of raw sugar (cow's milk has sugar so although we knew it wasn't going to taste like cow's milk, I still wanted it to taste like MILK).

 You can see how creamy it is.

 The flavor reminded me of agua de orchata, a rice drink my husband makes sometimes, so I decided to put on a dash or two of cinnamon.

 OH MY WORD. Delicious! My husband drank the whole thing and had NO issues at all. His stomach wasn't cramping and there was no nausea. Plus, it has great nutrition, low fat, and helps lower cholesterol? YAY! He's a pretty active guy but he's pushing 50 and we've got to keep that heart healthy!

 So, the hazelnuts were waiting patiently.

 I could tell this batch would be different.

 It looks very rich and frothy.

 This was before I diluted it a little further with some water but you can see the darker color. It smelled heavenly even before the vanilla. It reminded me of the best hazelnut coffee creamers, but without any chemical taste.

The kids said this one was their favorite, maybe because it was so flavorful, but I think I like the walnut milk. My husband had a second glass of this one and said he really couldn't choose between them. 

So, there you go! It's super quick and easy to make your own nut milks if you have the curiosity, or the need, for a non-dairy alternative in your house. It can last up to a week in the fridge and a lot of people use these milks for their smoothies... but outs disappeared in hours. YUM. Now I'm wondering about granitas and other frozen deserts. Maybe I'll try that next!

Until next time! Be sure to stop by my author page at Mary Jane Hathaway, my other author page Virginia Carmichael, or my blog at The Things That Last. We've been super busy with state testing, college stuff, baseball, a woolen mills tour, and an alpaca farm visit, but I hope to finish my newest historical in the next few weeks. (Wouldn't it be great to have an alpaca on the cover?? No?? Ok, fine...)