Lactose Intolerant? Try Homemade Oat Milk

For those of you out there that can't tolerate cow or goat milk because of a lactose intolerance, you often end up seeking out alternatives and come across things like overpriced oat or rice milk. Well here's a cheap and easy way to get a better quality, better tasting, version of what's in stores, without all those pesky preservatives.

It really is the easiest thing to make. All of the ingredients are most likely already in your kitchen.

All you need is:

1 cup Porridge Oats (not instant oats)
1 tbsp Demerara Sugar, Honey or Agave Nectar (sweeten to taste)
1 tsp Olive or Sunflower Oil
6 cups warm water



Once you've got all the ingredients just add them in any order and blend for about 10 seconds. The mixture should turn white (like in the picture). If it's still clear your water isn't warm enough. Then strain into a pitcher and you're done. Use in hot and cold cereals or drink it straight.

For a stronger flavor and thicker oat milk let it set for about 30 minutes. You can also make your own rice or almond milk too. Just follow the same instructions as above only add 2 cups cooked brown rice or 500g ground almonds instead. Let the almonds set longer than the rice or oats to get the full flavor.

Oh No!!

This is what I woke up to this morning, snow. I marveled at the sight for about 2 seconds until I remembered I just transplanted everything yesterday. I jumped out of bed and rushed outside to drag all of my pots in.



I just told someone the other day that we rarely get snow too. Should have kept my mouth shut. Luckily it was only a dusting. Then an hour later this happened.



I was tempted to bring the pots back outside but decided to wait a while. With such unpredictable weather I didn't want to risk it. I was right to wait too because a few hours later we got even more snow.

And to top it all off, my cat decided to dance in the pots and crush my beet root seedlings, break a few broccoli stems, and even snap a borlotto bean plant in half. Oh and he even managed to dump an entire tray of seedlings killing most of them. He's still alive but I came very close to giving him the boot out into the cold. Bad kitty!!

It's Time

The beer box seed tray held up long enough for me to transplant my seedlings and boy were they huge. Now to chuck the box into the compost bin. The bottom is already well rotted. And my beans are so big I've already had to stake them in the pots.



Top right to left: beets then broccoli
Middle: Corn
Front 3: Climbing beans

The beets and broccoli will be staying in their pots. Oh and I have to mention I got those large pots today at the discount store for 4 euro each!! Such a deal. The corn will be transplanted into the garden when the weather warms up. I put some in there already, as an experiment, so we'll see what happens. And the pots are where the beans are going to stay. I'm just going to put them up against the fence and string them up.



As you can see from this pic my back garden is going to be mostly containers. I wish I could dig up those slabs and redo the whole area but the landlord would frown upon that. Oh well, containers are just as good.

So that should do it for a while. Not going to be able to transplant or sow any more seeds for a while. I've run out of pots and room in the house so we'll give it a break and concentrate on what I've got.

What I did...

...to get my seedlings to look this amazing.



Here are a couple cheap ways to get the heat going in your seed trays.



Under the beer box is a hot water bottle and you can see the milk jug. I crushed it so it would be flat and cover a large space. Strangely enough the milk jug stays warm longer than the hot water bottle. And I know the jug works because as soon as I put a covered seed tray on it condensation instantly appeared.

Another thing I did, and I'm thinking it helped, was to sprinkle kelp powder on the plants as soon as they popped up. Seaweed is an excellent fertilizer. You can buy a small packet of it from the health food store for 1.99. And a little goes a long way.

Next step is to find a way to get my beans out of there without disturbing anything else. The box is just about ready to decompose, which is just what I was hoping for, but I still need it to hold out for a few more days. Just until I can get more pots and the weather to warm a bit.