Rest

Not the word that comes to mind this time of year, right?  I am learning the benefits of rest and being forced to do so right now as I recover from my miscarriage.  So, I thought I would do a little post about rest, to encourage myself and everyone else that rest is needed and a GOOD thing!

There is a short article you can read HERE that reviews the benefits of rest.  A few of these benefits include:

*increased immunity
*reduced blood pressure
*more energy
*better sleep
*smoother emotions

Our society does little to encourage good old-fashioned rest.  May I encourage you to take some time in the next week to make sure you rest?  The holiday season will be a lot more fun with more energy, better sleep, smoother emotions, and less sickness!

Fermenting Part 3

 This post we will discuss making homemade yogurt.  It's a simple process and a great way to have unique fermented cultures, as each different kind of yogurt you make at home will have different healthy bacteria.  I am currently using Bulgarian Yogurt, the cultured being purchased from Cultures for Health. You can click on my link on the right side bar to explore all the various yogurt cultures they sell.  The nice thing about this culture is that it is an heirloom variety and perpetuates from one batch to the next, making it very economical.  I have been using this one for almost 2 years.

The first step is heating your milk to 170 degrees.  I like making big batches, so I heat enough milk to fill a six cup canning jar.

 I like to use organic non-homogenized milk, as I avoid homogenized products due to their health risks (you can read more HERE).  Once the milk has been heated to 170 degrees, I then let it cool to about 100 degrees and add about 1 tsp (or a little more) of my previous yogurt for each cup of milk I use.  You have to wait until your milk cools before you add the yogurt or you will kill the ability of the yogurt to set.

 I then transfer my covered jar to my Excalibur Food Dehydrator, as it is large enough to hold my canning jar and I set it to 105 degrees for 4-5 hours.  If you do purchase a dehydrator, I recommend buying the one with a timer.  Side note: not only is this dehydrator great for making dried foods, but it makes yogurt making a breeze and is great for bread rising or keeping sourdough cultures going in this cool weather.

Here is my milk getting ready to go into the dehydrator.  Homemade yogurt will not be as thick as store bought (though you can thicken it by substituting cream for some of the milk), but it is delicious!  I often eat it plain, with a bit of fruit, or with maple syrup or one of my herbal simple syrups that I posted about earlier this month.

Homemade yogurt is delicious, easy to make, and full of unique cultures that will boost your immunity!  Have fun trying this recipe and be sure to check out all the yummy yogurt cultures at Cultures for Health.

Featured on Simply Sugar and Gluten Free

Lovely Giveaway!

Just a quick interruption to post about this lovely giveaway from Mountain Rose Herbs!

The prize this week is a treat just waiting to happen!

The winner will be able to create either version of the recipe using this collection of organic ingredients. Plus, we’re throwing in a copy of Kami McBride’s book The Herbal Kitchen which is a wonderful resource with over 250 recipes for using herbs to enhance the health benefits and digestibility of your food!

Here’s this week’s big prize…

32oz Organic Virgin Coconut Oil1lb Organic Maca Powder1lb Organic Arrowroot Powder8oz Organic Hemp Seeds2oz Organic Vanilla Flavor Extract1lb Himalayan Pink Salt
The Herbal Kitchen by Kami McBride

There are several ways to enter and you can submit up to 5 entries for a chance to win this amazing collection of ingredients!

1. Leave a comment here telling us about your favorite herbal treat for the holidays!

2. Post a link to our Amazing Maca Bar giveaway on your Facebook page and leave a comment here to let us know you’ve posted. Follow us on Facebook here!

3. Tweet about our Amazing Maca Bar giveaway on Twitter using the tag #herbalgiveaway and leave a comment here to let us know that you’ve tweeted. Be sure to follow us on Twitter!

4. Blog about our giveaway with a link back to this post. Then leave a comment here with a link back to your blog post so we can check it out.

5. Sign up for our recipe packed Newsletter and leave a comment to let us know you’re a reader.

You have until Monday, December 26th at 11:59pm PST to enter. We will pick one winner at random on Tuesday, December 27th! We can ship blog prizes to US addresses only.

T

Fermenting Part 2

 For this post, I thought I would share a very easy recipe for sauerkraut, which is an excellent fermented food, once called the poor man's doctor.  For this recipe, you don't need any kind of starter.  Some people do add whey, but because my son is sensitive to whey, I make mine using only salt.

Sauerkraut:

*2 large, heavy heads of organic cabbage
*5 T sea or pink salt (it has to be non-iodized and sea or pink salt work best)
*1 T nori seaweed flakes (optional)
*2 six cup canning jars

Wash off the cabbage.  On a clean surface (you want to keep everything as clean as possible, avoiding touching other things during this process to keep as little as possible other bacteria entering your fermenting jars), roughly chop your cabbage, then place it in a shredder or cuisinart using your shredder blade.  Evenly fill your two jars with the shredded cabbage.  Add 2 1/2 T salt to each jar, or if you are using seaweed, only add 2 T salt to each jar.  Next take a meat pounder or similar kitchen tool and pound the cabbage down until you see juices starting to form.  Once the juices reach the top of the cabbage, you can stop pounding.  You will be surprised how compact it gets!  Make sure the salt and seaweed are well blended.  Cover the jars loosely and  place the jars in a dark cabinent in your kitchen for 3 days.  In this cooler weather, you make have to leave it out a 4th day.  The finished product may fizz a little and should expand in your jar.  It will have a sharp tang, but discard if you taste anything that tastes bad or smells foul.  Enjoy!

For those interested in the added nutritional benefits of seaweed, I highly recommend Seaweed, by Valerie Cooksley.  She discusses all the amazing health benefits of seaweed.  I understand the book is no longer being printed, but you can buy it on amazon.  Just click on my amazon link to the right.  I love this book because of all it's information and she also tells you how much to take, which is quite helpful.

Mountain Rose Herbs carries a number of kinds of seaweed and they are all from Canada or Iceland, which I recommend as you do not want to be buying seaweed from Japan or China since Japan's nuclear accident.  Some of my favorites are nori and dulse flakes and sea lettuce.  You can click on my Mountain Rose Herb link to the right to see more varieties of seaweed.

(Shared at Real Food Wednesdays, The Nourishing Gourmet, A Glimpse Inside , Ani's Favorite Things, A Little Nosh, Gnowfgins , Ms. Helen's Country Cottage, Momnivores Delimma, Somewhat Simple, Delightful Order, Food Renegade, Real Food Whole Health, Jo's Health Corner,  Bacon time with the hunger hypo, Diet Dessert Dogs, KB and White Snake Home, 

Fermented Foods...Why Ferment?

I am going to do a series of posts over the next few days about the benefits of fermented foods and share some easy ways that you incorporate these beneficial foods into your life and diet.

Why ferment?

What did people do before the modern resources we have today to preserve our foods?  Most cultures preserved their foods through the fermentation process, which not only preserved their foods, but also provided them with the amazing benefits that I have listed below.  Sadly, our modern culture, for the most part,  consumes very few fermented foods, and is suffering from the lack of these beneficial foods in their diet.

Here is a brief summary on the benefits of fermenting along with some great resources for further reading:

*increases the levels of B vitamins in your foods
*aides digestion
*boosts the immune system
*increases omega-3 fatty acids
*increases digestive enzymes
*alters vegetable proteins to resemble meat proteins
*increases the nutritional value of the food by synthesizing vitamins and amino acids
*helps the growth of healthy bacteria in the colon

For further reading:
*Article by Dr. Mercola
*Enroll in Vintage Remedies Holistic Wellness Course - to read more about this, click the link on my website for Vintage Remedies
*Article by Robert Lawrence
*Article by the Herb Companion


I will next be discussing how to make fermented foods.  If this is something that you are interested in, click on the link to the right for Cultures for Health and take a few minutes to start looking around their website and find some fermented foods that appeal to you that you would be interested in trying.  Almost all fermented foods are easy to make and will easily become part of your daily routine.

Fun Recipe!

I am going to try this recipe from Cultures for Health for a delicious dip for my family this Christmas Eve.  The recipe is a sun-dried tomato, basil, hazelnut, kefir dip.  I can't wait to use the sundried tomatoes that I made this summer in this dip.
Since I have not been making kefir, I will simply substitute some of my homemade yogurt.  I will be doing a series of posts shortly on the importance of incorporating fermented foods into your diet.  If you are looking to improve or maintain your health, eating fermented foods is key!
I buy all my starters from Cultures for Health.  I have used their kefir, two kinds of yogurts, sourdough bread, and water kefir starters with great success.  I am getting ready to start up their buttermilk culture as well! Take a few minutes to read through their website.  You can do so by clicking on the link to the right.
If you are looking for an easy culture to start with, try their buttermilk.  It is very easy and quick to make.

Two Herbal Books for Children

There are two books that I would like to recommend for treating children with herbs, homeopathy, and essential oils.  I have both of these books and they are my first "go to" for my son.  Between the two of them, they cover just about every childhood problem/illness you could imagine.

I believe that the first treatments we should turn to should be natural remedies and if these don't work, then use medicines that the medical community would recommend.  I have 10 years of  nursing experience to see that we live in the age of antibiotic and medication overuse that are starting to show some very devastating results.  So, try some gentle healing first and these books will be able to help you get started.  You can buy both these books through my amazon store link...just click on the Amazon store link just to the right and it will take you right to amazon - thank you!

Gentle Healing for Baby and Child by Andrea Candee
This book covers both herbal and a few homeopathic treatments in the form of cell salts and Bach Flower Remedies.  I appreciate that she has a guide for dosing children so that you are able to figure out what dose of herb your child needs very easily.  It's hard to find dosing instructions in most herbal books.

Aromatherapy for the Healthy Child by Valerie Ann Worwood
This book covers aromatherapy treatments for children starting as young as infants.  What I found particularly helpful in this book is a chart telling just what oils can be used and what age the child needs to be, a list of oils she recommends having on hand, and very specific dosing instructions.

Mountain Rose Herb Giveaway

Mountain Rose Herbs is doing a fantastic giveaway!  You can register here.  There is no purchase necessary.  But, if you do have some shopping to do, please click the link just to the right for Mountain Rose Herbs and order through that link, as I am now an affiliate.

Crying It Out

I have an excellent article regarding the harm and danger in letting your baby "cry it out".  You can read the article here, from Psychology Today.

I would encourage all new parents and those considering children to read this article.  Having your baby "cry it out" is a modern practice and we are now starting to see it's unfortunate effects.  Here are a few choice paragraphs:

"With neuroscience, we can confirm what our ancestors took for granted---that letting babies cry is a practice that damages children and their relational capacities in many ways for the long term. We know now that letting babies cry is a good way to make a less intelligent, less healthy but more anxious, uncooperative and alienated person who can pass the same or worse traits on to the next generation. 

The discredited behaviorist view sees the baby as an interloper into the life of the parents, an intrusion who must be controlled by various means so the adults can live their lives without too much bother. Perhaps we can excuse this attitude and ignorance because at the time, extended families were being broken up and new parents had to figure out how to deal with babies on their own, an unnatural condition for humanity--we have heretofore raised children in extended families. The parents always shared care with multiple adult relatives...

The fact is that caregivers who habitually respond to the needs of the baby before the baby gets distressed, preventing crying, are more likely to have children who are independent than the opposite(Stein & Newcomb, 1994). Soothing care is best from the outset. Once patterns get established, it's much harder to change them.
We should understand the mother and child as a mutually responsive dyad. They are a symbiotic unit that make each other healthier and happier in mutual responsiveness. This expands to other caregivers too."

A Recipe for Relaxation

With my hormones a little haywire yesterday, I needed some PMS relief.  I tried this lovely essential oil recipe about 2 hours before going to bed and felt like a new woman!  This eased my tension, relaxed my body, and soothed the soul!  If you try this, make sure you are using only pure organic oils (I have a few recommended sights on my sidebar) so you obtain their healing benefits and avoid any adverse reactions. If you click on each oil, I have linked them to sites that discuss all their healing benefits...it's quite amazing!

5 drops lavender
2 drops lemon
2 drops grapefruit
2 drops geranium
1 drop clary sage
3/4 cup dead sea salt (can use epsom salts or honey instead)

Put the essential oils into the salt and stir well.  Start your bath (make sure it's nice and warm) and pour the salt mixture into the running water.  After the salt is poured into the bath, swish the water to make sure the salt is distributed well.  You will be amazed at the beautiful aroma!  Keep your bathroom door shut to enjoy the full benefits of the oils.  Soak for 20-30 minutes.  Some relaxing music and candle light will only enhance your relaxing experience!

Side note - I slept with a drop of lavender and neroli oils on a cotton ball near my bed and had an excellent night's sleep.

Lemon Lime Simple Syrup

I posted a few days ago about making herbal simple syrups.  I have tried a few and love them!  This morning I am using my lemon lime simple syrup to make a hot ginger lemon tea for my family.  Here are the proportions I used to make my syrup.  This is a loose recipe and can be easily adapted to meet your particular taste.  If you like a deep lemon/lime flavor, simmer for more than 20 minutes, but keep tasting every 5 minutes as the flavor will deepen quickly.  For a lighter flavor, simmer for 15-20 minutes.

1 cup water
1 1/2 cups sucanat
9 limes
1 large lemon

Cut each lemon and lime in half.  Given each one a good squeeze into your double broiler before placing the fruit in it.  After all the fruit is in the double broiler, add the sucanat and water.  Mix well, pressing the fruit if needed.  The water should just about cover the fruit.  Simmer on medium heat until desired taste produced.

Enjoy!  Hot tea is a wonderful way to use this syrup.  Add your herbs of choice and then flavor with your syrup.  This morning we are enjoying lemon balm, lemon grass, and a pinch of echinacea, along with some powdered ginger in our tea blend.

FREE Program through Vintage Remedies! 8 Weeks to Real Foods...

Do you want to eat healthier?  Here is a FREE program to help you make that change to real/whole foods! Simply click on the Vintage Remedies icon on the right of my page and this will take you straight to Vintage Remedies.  The program is called 8 Weeks to Real Foods and can be found under the EVENTS tab.  This is great for beginners as well as those who already eat whole foods.

Again, this is FREE!!  So, sign up today and help you and your family make the switch to real and whole foods!