Day 5

I am trying to cram so much information into my brain, it hurts a little bit.


As if it isn't overwhelming enough to switch from boxed foods to made-from-scratch foods, trying to get my kid to stop eating fruit snacks and eat real fruit instead, and to wrap my brain around the fact that almost every food I'm used to eating has a negative (or 10) ingredient(s) in it.  Now I have to start soaking grains?  Crap.

But truthfully, I eat a lot of whole grains and I'm used to baking from scratch already, so why not take this nutrition thing up a notch.  Eating whole grains is so much better for you than processed grains, but eating soaked grains is even better.  It's just one more thing I can rub in your face.  And I think I could definitley win an argument with it.  "Oh yeah?  Well, I soak my grains!" Boom. Final word is mine.

Okay, but this requires me to take a different step, one that I've been sheepishly avoiding.  Grains have to be soaked in whey, cultured yogurt, kefir, cultured buttermilk, or in lemon juice or vinegar.  If I want to use any of the dairy methods, I need raw milk.  Thankfully I found a farm to buy it from, and hopefully I can get some tomorrow (I'm impatient and impulsive, it's a great combo, let me tell you).  But I'm terrified of buying it and having it go bad on me, so I want to have a set plan in mind to make sure I use it and it doesn't go to waste.  I want to know what I'm doing with it, what it will become, how I will use it, etc., otherwise I'll never "get around to it" and I'll kick myself in the pants for wasting $6 on a gallon of milk.

So, I suppose this should be my next step in this journey.  Taking the "cultured dairy product" dive.

~ * ~

I made whole-wheat pumpkin bread and it was a hit!  The recipe contained honey as the sweetener, but I added a splash of maple syrup.  Maple + pumpkin just sounded right to me.  Unfortunatley I didn't have real vanilla, only imitation (something else I need to pick up tomorrow!), but other than that, all of the ingredients were real & healthy.  And my son ate THREE SLICES.  He wouldn't stop asking for more!

For oil, I had my husband pick up Sesame oil at Sprouts (after having to put vegetable oil in my tortillas yesterday, boo)... and it definitely added a sort of nutty flavor to the pumpkin bread, but that wasn't a bad thing. Next time I think I'll use coconut oil.

I also baked sweet potatoes.  I was craving them for some reason.

My 2-year-old daughter has some swallowing issues and cannot eat anything that isn't pureed.  For her dinner this evening, I mixed the left over pumpkin puree with one of the baked sweet potatoes and added a generous slap of butter.   Both the pumpkin and the sweet potato are rich in betacarotene, which protects against cancer, colds and infection...  but our bodies can only convert carotene to Vitamin A when bile salts are also present, hence the butter being an important addition!  The fat stimulates the secretion of bile and helps the body convert carotene to vitamin A. :)