How To Make the Creamy, Toasted Coconut Milk of Your Dreams

Let me start by saying, if you already make your own nut milks at home, you have to try this. I mean - walk to your kitchen, turn the oven dial, and get some coconut in there. You have to trust me here. I started making homemade toasted coconut milk a few months ago, and it has become one of my favorite things. It's creamy, rich, nutty, and intense. I enjoy it immensely on its own, and as an ingredient in other preparations as well. It's a real flavor punch. Imagine all the ways you can use it to make some of your favorite preparations even better. It's great in chai tea, in morning oatmeal, baked oatmeal(!). You can use it in a wild range of sweet preparations, but it's also good as a way to add a little je ne sais quoi, to broths, soups, and weeknight curries.

You can see how it comes together in a video of the process here, and you can find the recipe down below, as well as a few notes. Let me know if you make it, and if you do, please let me know how you're using it!

A couple notes. If you want to totally geek out on this, play around with the toastiness of your coconut. If you toast coconut deeply, you're going to have a different profile than a more lightly toasted coconut. I tend to ride the dark side of the spectrum, but it's wild the difference between a milk made with lightly toasted versus dark. Both delicious, just different.

Also, like all pure coconut milk, it will separate. And it solidifies in the refrigerator. Use it as you would canned coconut milk, and expect it to behave similarly (i.e. you might need to warm it up a bit, and give it a good stir before using)...

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A Glow-promoting, Luminizing Breakfast Beauty Bowl

One of the very best ways to work toward beautiful, luminous, glowing skin is through eating well and mindful hydration. Your skin is often a direct reflection of the internal eco-system of your body, and, being nice to your inside is one of the best ways to positively impact your outside. It's the foundation you need to support good skin, bright eyes, strong hair, thick eyelashes, healthy nails, and on and on. Eating a seasonal, plant-centric, whole foods diet is a great place to start, but I thought I'd take today to highlight a few skin-friendly superstars in this Luminizing Breakfast Beauty Bowl - they're extra beneficial and skin-supportive, and quite easy to work into your day to day.

The base of this beauty bowl is a simple mixed berry smoothie boosted with some chia. The berries are compact, anti-oxidant, anti-inflammatory powerhouses, rich in cleansing fiber and collagen-boosting Vitamin C. I use mixed berries (blackberry, blueberry, strawberry) for a bit of diversity (and because they're quite easy to come by in most freezer sections) but if you really want to step up your Vitamin C game, you might trade in acai for the berries now and then. Switch it up - diversity in your is also important.

Use whatever plain, unsweetened, yogurt you prefer - coconut yogurt, Greek yogurt, nut milk yogurt, or sheep or goat milk yogurt - the probiotics here are a big help in balancing out your inner digestion and overall internal ecosystem. Use whatever yogurt works for you. Chia helps with tissue repair and skin regeneration. That's the foundation here.

Beyond that, you can boost your beauty bowl with as few or many other ingredients as you have on hand. Pick at least a handful. Here (pictured) you see digestion-friendly pineapple wedges, pomegranate seeds (thought to help reduce UV photo damage), Vitamin C-rich citrus (blood oranges and mandarin segments), a sprinkling of nuts and granola, some crushed dehydrated raspberries, and a sprinkling of bee pollen.

I love serving this sort of thing as a DIY breakfast option. You can make a big batch of smoothie (pourable straight from the pitcher), and then offer up a "buffet" of toppings. Everyone can customize their own bowl to their liking ;)!

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Vibrant Vegan Double Broccoli Buddha Bowl

A Buddha bowl is all sorts of healthful goodness piled in abundance in a single bowl. They tend to be very beautiful, and have an ability to make people more appreciative of a meal than usual. Perhaps it's because of the care that is often taken in their preparation and presentation? I'm not sure, but there is something about a bowl like this that re-frames the food at hand, and reminds us just how beneficial, miraculous, and powerful each ingredient we use can be.

I've highlighted a favorite Buddha Bowl here. It's strong on a number of points. Green, filing, and fast to pull together, particularly if you have cooked quinoa on hand already. It's a bowl on green overdrive - doubling up on broccoli by using it in a coconut curry pesto and using the florets on their own as well. You toss it all with a quinoa base, and top with whatever else you have around - avocado, micro greens. The base ingredient list is, literally, seven ingredients long, and there is a lot of room for flexibility - part of the charm of a bowl like this. :)

I'm posting a video of the process here, you can see me pull it together, and you can find the recipe down below as well.

You can certainly do a version of this bowl any number of different ways. I can imagine a yellow curry version with cauliflower and brown rice (or millet) in place of the broccoli. Or a non-curried version with a more traditional pesto. Enjoy!

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Pickled Turmeric Eggs

A number of you spotted these pickled turmeric eggs in my refrigerator when I posted this shot to Instagram recently. They're great! They're also incredibly easy and quick to make, and convenient to have on hand. Pickled eggs, like these, will keep in your refrigerator for a week or two, and I love to use them in all sorts of ways. As a component in a quick lunch you can't go wrong, or to top off a Buddha bowl, or just as a stand-alone snack. You can eat them halved and topped with whatever you have on hand (pictured here with scallions, chopped walnuts, and a dab of turmeric lemongrass curry paste, and a bit of watermelon radish), but I also like to grate them on a box grater for a vibrant shredded egg salad. You can also use the shredded version as a protein-boost on top of a green salad, or as the main event on an open-faced sandwich. The turmeric swings some nutritional weight, and brings an electric yellow hue to the outside of each egg. The apple cider vinegar delivers a nice bite and tang to the situation, and also tightens up the texture of the egg. You have to give these a try! I'm posting a video of the process here, and you can find the recipe down below as well.

One last thing I'll mention is this - Be sure to use the shallots (or onions) as well. They're great in salads, on tacos, or served as a condiment at the table. A little pickle accent is welcome at just about every meal.

Enjoy! --Heidi

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A Lesson in Juicing

So, I quite like my juicer(!), and I love the possibilities it lends to expanding my overall ingredient/culinary palette. Fresh juice is invigorating - straight up, blended, or as part of whatever I'm making. The most important thing is to use vibrant, healthy produce. Use the best quality produce you can get. It's important to seek out organic or sustainably grown fruits and vegetables, but if that's not happening, wash it gently, but thoroughly.

A few observations: A blender and a juicer are entirely different beasts. I know this seems obvious, but the blender does chop-chop, and the juicer separates all the fibers and solids from the juices. The juicer produces essences that are incredibly intense, alive, and bright. The flavor is main-lined. Beyond fruits and vegetables, I experiment with grains and nuts (see below).

Everyone seems to think using a juicer is a royal pain. Primarily the clean-up part. And that is partially true. It seems most convenient to juice in batches, set aside what you might use in the immediate future as well as the forthcoming day or two, and then freeze any juice beyond that immediately. Not as perfect as freshly juiced, but still ok.

One thing I'll add here, read you juicer's instructions before diving in. What works in mine might not work in your model. There are a range of different types of juicers, and a range of ways they extract juice.

Almond Milk: Soak 1 cup / 5 oz almonds overnight, covered, in filtered water. Drain. Add three cups water, and ladle into juicer. This produces a full-bodied almond milk. If you like it a bit thinner, go with 4 cups water. The flavor really sings when you season it with a touch of salt and sugar. Just go with your taste buds, until it tastes good to you. Makes about 3 1/2 cups. Also, be sure to keep the meaty by-product of making the almond milk, just scrape it out of the juicer. Salt it a bit, and it's a great homemade almond butter.

Oat Milk: Soak 1 cup / 3 oz rolled oats (not instant) overnight, covered, in filtered water. Drain, add 3 cups water, and ladle into juicer. Makes about 4 cups. Note to self to try a version with toasted oats. I could imagine experimenting with it as and ingredient in custards, puddings, french toast, and the like.

Pistachio Milk: Soak 1 cup pistachios / 5 oz overnight, covered, in filtered water. Drain, combine with 3 cups water, and ladle into juicer. This was my favorite non-fruit juice by a stretch. Really nice. I kept trying to combine it with little accents like orange blossom water, or citrus zest, but in the end I liked it best straight. Makes about 3 1/2 - 4 cups. And like the almond milk be sure to keep the meaty by-product of making the pistachio milk, just scrape it out of the juicer. Salt it a bit, and it's a great pistachio butter.

Sesame Milk: Had high hopes for this one but it really didn't work. The unhulled seeds never broke down in the juicer.

Fennel Juice: Trim the root end, but use all the rest of it. 1 large bulb = ~1 cup juice.

Celery: Lob off the root end and use the rest. And I didn't bother restringing. 1 medium bunch = 1 1/2 - 2 cups juice. I'm enjoying using the celery juice as a component in all things brothy. The fennel juice as well, but to a lesser extent.

Cucumber: Juice it all. And leave the skin on, it lends a nice color. 1 large (8 oz) cucumber yields about 1 cup of juice. Not really the season for cucumber juice at the moment, but I juiced it anyway. Super cooling.

Cilantro:1 big bunch, leaves and stems = 1/3 cup juice. I threw a couple serranos (deveined and deseeded) into the juicer here as well for a spicy version. You just know it's going to be good swirled into yogurt or creme fraiche and spooned into a bowl of roasted tomato soup!

Dill: 1 large bunch (stems and fronds) yields about 3 tablespoons juice. Equal parts dill juice + olive oil and a pinch of salt has been great over greens, savory pancakes, and eggs this week. I imagine like the other intense herb juices, it would be welcome as a vinaigrette component, drizzled over gratins, and tarts as well.

Ginger: 8 ounces unreeled yields about 3/4 cup ginger juice. Freezes quite well. I've been using in teas, broths, citrus juice (grapefruit-ginger is my favorite), dipping sauces, etc.

Grapefruit: 1 large = 1 cup juice. I could live on this during the winter.

Pomegranate: I'm not sure I'd recommend using a juicer here. Mine definitely wasn't happy. That said, the resulting juice is electric - straight-up incredible. Juice the seeds only, but review your juicer's guidelines before an attempt. 1 large pomegranate = ~ 1 cup of seeds = 1/3 cup fresh juice.

Carrots: 1 lb = 1 cup juice. You know, it's just occurring to me as I'm typing this to try a carrot soup with pure juiced carrot. Use it to make the silkiest carrot soup ever.

If you're a juicer, here's my plea to let me know what you use yours most for. Or is it the sort of thing that just collects dust in everyone's pantry for most of the year?

Juice Combinations

A few combinations I tried:

Pistachio Milk: 1/2 cup pistachio milk, 3/4 teaspoon honey or sugar, 1/8 teaspoon sea salt, tiny pinch of ground clove. But like I said up above, this is really good straight.

Spicy Carrot: 1/4 cup carrot juice + 1/4 cup almond milk + 1/16 teaspoon cayenne + 1/2 teaspoon ginger juice + 1/8 teaspoon fine grain sea salt + 2 tablespoons celery juice.

Pomegranate Almond: 1/4 cup pomegranate juice + 1/4 cup almond juice + 2 drop rose water + pinch of salt, 1 teaspoon lemon juice + sweeten to taste.

Cucumber Celery: 1/4 cup cucumber + 1/4 cup celery + 1/16 cayenne + pinch of salt.

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