Sauerkraut, Lacto-Fermentation and the Pickl-It

I just finished putting up two 2-liter Pickl-It jars of Sauerkraut. This will be the best sauerkraut you will ever eat. I promise.

The main reason for this short post is to quickly go through the process and a couple of quick notes.

First the process:

Core and chop a 2.5 to 3 lb. head of cabbage (after chop) for each jar. It's just a normal head of cabbage, and place in large mixing bowl.

Add salt and mix, mash, or punish the cabbage until the juice is coming out. Place in jar and put on airlock. Keep an eye on the water in the airlocks.

Store in a cool, dark place for 28 days.

Now the Note: For the brine, you should use 4.4 grams good quality sea salt per pound of chopped cabbage. I use Himalayan Pink sea salt.

More Tomatoes and Tomato Basil Sauce.

This is such a great recipe!

I can't keep up with the tomatoes coming out of the garden this year! This is only a small portion I got picked today before the rain came.

I am lacto-fermenting as much as I can to keep our food as healthy as possible. You've got to keep those critters in your belly happy and lacto-fermenting is the way to do it.

I made some tomato gravy using the Tomato Basil sauce last night to go with our oven baked portabello fries, roasted potatoes and brussel sprouts and my family loved it. Of course I did too.

It's really more of a salsa (which means sauce in spanish!) but I know most Americans think of the Mexican kind so I'm going with sauce.


I'm assuming that you are familiar with and know how to lacto-ferment so I'm just going straight to the ingredients list. I'm pretty loosey goosey with measurements but I'll do my best to give you an idea of how much to go with.

Tomato Basil Sauce (Salsa) in a 2 litre Pickl-it

Enough tomatoes to fill about 3/4 of your jar (about 4 cups)
A bunch of basil (to taste but I put a lot since I grow it and need to preserve it)
4 cloves of garlic
5 grams of quality sea salt ( I use Himalayan Pink sea salt but I'm trying others)

This is about 1 1/2 Tbls. Weighing is the most accurate way to measure salt since there are different densities of salt. The accuracy of the amount of salt in lacto-fermenting is important but I'm kind of loosey goosey with that too.

Process the tomatoes and garlic and empty into a large bowl. Chop the basil and add to bowl then add the salt. Mix thoroughly and ladel it into your fermenter.

If you need more tomatoes, hand chop enough and add to the jar. This gives a great texture.

NOTE: Fill to just below the shoulder of the jar because this stuff goes crazy! It's really dense so the co2 pushes the solids up and through the air lock.

Dried Tomatoes packed in Olive Oil

My original plan was to make tomato powder out of all the dehydrated tomatoes today but I remembered how I like to use sun dried tomatoes on pizzas and in most Italian recipes. I decided to try my hand at packing some of them in oil.

There has been a lot written about botulism in oil packed tomatoes but I have yet to find a story about someone really getting sick from them so I'm trying it. I'll let my in-laws test them first!

After the tomatoes got dry enough to bend but not crumble I went through these steps:


1) Sterilize pint jars and lids in boiling water.
2) Peel 4 to 6 cloves of garlic (hint: put the cloves in a container with a top and lots of extra room and shake the snot out of it for about 30 seconds. This will get most of the paper off.) and pick 4 to 6 basil leaves.
3) After the jars cool to room temperature drop in a clove of garlic and a basil leaf.
4) Pack jar half full with dried tomatoes and pack down with a wooden spoon handle or something along those lines.
5) Add garlic and basil then fill to within about an inch and a half to the top of the jar with tomatoes.
6) Pack down really well the a wooden spoon handle and add last garlic and basil to top.
7) Fill the jar with good olive oil to within an inch of the top of the jar and pack again to release all the air bubbles.
8) Store in the fridge for up to a month. (This is what I've read but I'm still checking to see why the shelf life isn't longer.

It's that easy. Aside from the dehydrating for close to 36 hours the process probably took 10 minutes. 

                                  



Now I'm ready for some vegan Mexican Stew and Margherita Pizza! Yum!

 

 

Our Hummies are so Happy

I filled the hummingbird feeder yesterday after a week of being out of town and the hummies are so happy. I just use a 4:1 water sugar mix. Picking feeders now I get the easiest ones to clean, that really makes a difference.

The one I am using now is from tractor supply with a big wide opening to fill the jar and the bottom comes apart for easier cleaning.

I am learning so much!!

Hey guys.

I have been using essential oils on and off for about 20 years I think. Y'all know I'm a science nerd, so using medicine in its natural form is really cool to me. Everything we have, everything we make, everything we see comes from nature. I mean, think about it. If you get aspirin for a headache, it is made from willow bark. Plastics are a petroleum based product.

I try to make, or learn how to make, as much stuff as I can around the house. Soap, lotion, wine, beer, alcohol for fuel, furniture, you get the idea, so the essential oils play a big part in our lives. I am just trying to keep us in touch with Mother Earth.

So, I stop by a chiropractors office who has a big sign out front saying "Clinical Herbalist". I'm thinking maybe I can make some oil things for them or learn something about herbs. She turns out to be a very smart young woman. She has a degree in biology and studied with 2 different clinical herbalist before opening her practice. We talked for a long while. One thing she said which I thought was interesting was "Using essential oil for prevention is like cracking a pecan with a sledge hammer." She's right too.

People are overusing essential oils today, what with all the MLM companies sending people out with the goal to sell as much oil as they can, and buy as much as they can. It can cause liver damage and more, it's that plain and simple. Essential oils are incredibly concentrated. An example is peppermint oil. There is as much peppermint essential oil in 1 drop as you would get out of 28 cups of peppermint tea.

The other thing she said was she needed someone that used energy healing. I never have gotten into that kind of thing so I was clueless as to what she was talking about. She mentioned tuning forks, crystals and a few other things but said Reiki would be the easiest to use here in the south. Basically because of the bible belt and people thinking the other things were devil worship or something. With Reiki a person can include Christianity because of the laying on of hands and something Paul said about "learn to heal thyself" or something to that effect.

So I get on the internet and start the google. Yeah, I do the google. I spent days on end learning about different forms of energy healing, modalities they call them. Who is "they"? All the experts on Youtube is "they". Some are not so expert.

Well now I am currently a level 1 practitioner of Reiki and an ordained minister. The minster thing is basically due to my belief in the freedom of religion and believing what I believe and not what someone tells me to believe. There are so many people that think the only right religion is theirs, only because that is what they have been told since they were born.

NOTE TO SELF - go into the science behind energy medicine and the frequency of essential oils and so on.


UPDATE TO POST - I am now a certified USUI SHIKI RYOHO Master/Teacher. I hope I can show more people how to use Reiki on a daily basis to help make their life better. It has definitely changed mine for the better! Thank you Jacqueline J Garner for the training and guidance.

Preserving Tomatoes

Wow! What a load of tomatoes I grew this year! I have been trying to lacto-ferment most of them because I love the taste but too many came in at once. I decided to dehydrate them and make tomato powder. That will be more useful and take up a lot less space, right?

I have an Excelsior Dehydrator and love the thing. I cut the tomatoes into wedges and used every other rack because the tomatoes are skin side down. They are going as I write this.

I still had a load of tomatoes so I filled up one of my 2 liter Pickl-It lacto fermenter jars with salsa and a smaller one with just tomato wedges. Lacto fermenting food is the easiest way to keep your probiotics in line. Well, maybe a pill is easier but it doesn't taste great.

The salsa is super easy to make. I use a food processor for most of the tomatoes and such.

Here's the recipe:

Lacto-Fermented Salsa

• Tomatoes (about 1.5 liters)

I wing the amount. I process what I think will be a little than I need then after it is in the fermenter I add wedges to fill to the shoulder of the jar. You may want to keep it about a half inch under the shoulder because the first day is really active!

• 1 Purple Onion
• 1 Yellow Bell Pepper
• 1 or 2 Jalapeno peppers
• 4 cloves of Garlic
• 1 bunch Cilantro
• zest and juice of 1/2 lemon or lime (I prefer lime).
• Optional ingredients are 1/2 tsp cumin and1/2 tsp oregano. I don't use these.
• 5 grams (1 tbls) good quality sea salt. I have been using pink himalayan salt but am currently trying plain old sea salt from the grocery.

Chop and mix the ingredients in a bowl then transfer to your fermenter. Place in a dark corner or cover with a towel and allow to sit at room temperature for 2 to 3 days. Shorter if it is warm, a little longer in colder climes. Stir it daily and taste it to see when it is ready. When you like the taste transfer the fermenter to the fridge for a few days to slow the ferment. Transfer salsa to clean jars and keep the in the fridge.

This is the best salsa I have ever eaten and I have eaten tons of it. I'm pretty sure this is how the original salsa was made.

I hope you enjoy and feel free to ask any questions. I'm pretty loosey goosey with recipes.

My Reiki Attunement Experience

Reiki Attunement (I want to do it again!!)

 

                                           This is my Reiki Lineage

I started meditating and seeing darkness. It stayed dark for a while but the colors changed some. The main ones I remember are purple, green and orange, all dark and mixed in with black. This is what I usually see when I meditate.

At first as I was meditating, I saw people. Only one at a time except once when there was a mother and child walking a way up a grassy hill. The first person was hard to see but it looked like a Japanese man on a mountain. The mountain was just a black hump with a dip in the middle and the man was small, standing or kneeling I think but not sure.

I saw a Japanese man from a long time ago, ancient maybe. I think I saw Dr. Usui, it was an older man in a suit from a long time ago. Then there were a lot more, one at a time. They were all in traditional Japanese robes. In some of the backgrounds I could see old pagodas and wispy trees.

Then everything started going across in front of me in waves. It was startling how prominent this was. It went on for what seemed like a long time. They went from left to right and some came from the bottom up.

I think this is about the time I felt this feeling of love or being loved, something. Unmistakable though. All of this is unmistakable. I've been meditating, or trying to, for years and this is the first time for any of this.

Things lightened up a bit and I kept meditating, just looking around. At some point I felt a strong pressure on my hands, mostly at the fingers. It was like a weight, pushing at me or pushing them down. It changed and took more of my hand and it felt like it was being held. More in the left hand than the right. This lasted for a pretty long time.

The next thing I felt was a chilling cold on my forearms. It was cold in the house but this was noticeably colder and “chilly”. Things lightened up a lot inside and there were a lot more colors, blowing by faster then the black colors.

I could see the life force flowing in front of my eyes like blood through veins, some left to right and some right to left. It was a little darker now but there were more areas of light.

Throughout the meditation when I was seeing colors and darkness there were tunnels, they started out as rolling waves, then a hole would start to emerge then over time it would change to a tunnel. I could see into it and through a couple of them to the end. Black darkness, but there were stars. This happened when I wasn't seeing things like people and such.

I feel lighter, even a little lightheaded.

There is a ton more and I'll try to put it down as I remember it.

I love the smell of frankincense essential oil now. I wasn't real fond of it before the attunement but right after the attunement I looked online for good oils for Reiki and found citrus and frank. I went upstairs and got my frank and smelled it from the bottle. It smelled great! It totally changed the way I smell frank. Crazy! They say a person is drawn to frankincense, it's either "you like it or you don't".

These are just my notes from todays attunement. I will follow up soon with more.

Beginners Need to Know How to Dilute and Store Their Essential Oils

Diluting your essential oils is crucial. I don't understand why the companies don't emphasize this more. You need to dilute your oils mainly for health and safety reasons, so you can control the amount of oil you apply topically but also because you waste so much oil just dripping one drop at a time. You get the drop that you want plus the one that rolls down the side of the bottle you just poured the oil from.

It would be cynical of me to think or say that the essential oil companies don't say much about diluting it so they can sale more oil, and I don't think that is the case. There are too many other ways than just topically to use the oils where they don't need to be diluted, but for topical use the oil should always be diluted. ALWAYS!

I had been using my new oils for about two weeks, just diluting a little as I needed and then, one day, I looked at a couple of my bottles and they were more than half gone! Where did it go? I used some of the oil neat (straight from the bottle) and I wasted a lot each time I diluted a small amount for the immediate need, spilling some and not using all I diluted.

Here is what everyone should be yelling from the rooftops. Get some bottles, some tops and some carrier oil and go ahead and dilute the ones you use all the time. I use organic grape seed oil as my carrier oil because I can find it locally but most vegetable oils are fine to use. The carrier oils also have components that can make a difference.

For me it was a eucalyptus, peppermint and tea tree blend for my sinuses, lavender just because it is lavender!, tea tree for bites and rashes, and a couple of other blends for mood management.

I use 15 ml bottles. 15 ml = 1/2 oz = 1 Tablespoon. For a 2% solution you need to put in 9 drops of essential oil. I like a 2.5% solution so I drop in 11 drops.

All of the oil companies offer different beginner sets to help get the newbie introduced to the most common oils and their uses. I know I was hesitant at first, not wanting to waste that liquid gold and definitely not wanting to hurt myself somehow. They should always add a small bottle of carrier oil and a few small brown bottles with drippers and tops with each set! Also a short instruction sheet with dilution ratios and just the most rudimentary information would be a huge help.

You guys just remember to dilute according to the person that will be using the oil, children should use a 1% solution as long as they are over 6 months old

Check out the new Essential Oil Forum.

Making Beeswax Lotion

Today was the day to try to make a full batch of lotion. I've made a small batch before. I just got some coconut oil, poured a smaller amount of grapeseed oil on top and heated it in the microwave. No measurements, just thinking about making coconut oil the consistency of lotion. It worked out great!! I added some lavender essential oil I had and voila! Lotion! Wifey loved it. It was just in a little espresso cup. She used it all in about a week.

Today I decided to make enough lotion for 2 half pint mason jars. Even though I know a pint equals16 ounces, I decided to use a measuring cup to get the exact volume of the 2 jars. I poured 1 and a half cups of water into the jars. My recipe, to follow, is for a cup of lotion, so it was pretty easy to add 50% more ingredients at the correct ratio and have the amount I needed.

As you get to know me, you will understand me when I say "It is never 'pretty easy' for me."! I put the beeswax and coconut oil in the jars and dropped them in a water bath to melt. I couldn't help but notice that the jars were almost full and I hadn't added the soft oils yet. Hmmmm, maybe the beeswax will melt down more. Somehow I had adjusted my recipe by 150% instead of 50% so I had twice as much beeswax and coconut oil as I needed for this batch. No problem! I found 2 more half pint jars and split the melted wax and oil between the four jars. Not too big a deal! My problem now was to figure out who to give the extra to!

When I poured the melted ingredients into the cold jars the beeswax solidified on the sides but I fixed that by putting the jars in the microwave and re-melting that part.

Next I added the soft oils, Aloe Vera gel and Grape Seed oil. They were both at room temperature and made a bit of a glob in the jars but with a good bit of stirring it all mixed well.

After the jars of lotion cooled a bit I added the essential oils. I get my essential oil from Native American Nutritionals and have always been satisfied with the products and customer service. If you are ever looking for a place to get some essential oils, call Paul or just send him an email if you have any questions. I made the 4 jars all a little different. I made one jar with Aligning essential oil blend. It helps keep a person grounded and focused on the task at hand. It's the one I will use the most. The next one was for Wifey, a combination of Lavender, Lemon and Skin Care blend. The two extra jars were scented with Love essential oil blend and Citrus Passion blend. You can read all about the different therapeutic benefits of these oils on Native American Nutritionals website.

 

Two of the jars separated a little, with a little of the liquid collected at the bottom of the jar. All I had to do was put them in the microwave and warm them up so I could stir them better.

This recipe should last at room temperature for about four months and in the fridge for about six months, maybe more. I put the extras in the fridge. Wifey and I both like this lotion recipe better than just adding enough grape seed oil to the coconut oil and stirring it all up! Remember "Put the lime in the Coconut"? Here's the recipe


John's Simple Beeswax Lotion
For one cup of lotion

1/4 cup Beeswax
1/4 cup Coconut Oil
1/4 cup Aloe Vera Gel
1/4 cup Grape Seed Oil
10 drops good essential oil (adjust to your liking)

I used the jars to melt and mix in.

Put the beeswax and coconut oil in the jar and place in a pot of water up to about 2/3 up the jar. Turn the heat on low to medium low and warm till all the solids have dissolved, stirring occasionally. Lower the heat to low or just turn it off. Add the soft oils to the jars while still in the warm water and stir well. At this point I add my essential oils and mix well. Remember to use the amount that you like. I like a little milder than most people. Some people say to wait until the lotion is room temperature but I've tried stirring lotion at room temperature and it didn't work for me.

Remember, you can adjust these amounts to suit your needs. You might like a little less beeswax, so add the amount in coconut oil to make up the difference. Replace a hard oil with a hard oil (or besswax) and a soft oil with a soft oil.

I hope you all enjoy making this lotion. It is always better to make things at home.

Check out this new Forum for essential oils.

Where Do I Go to Get Started in Essential Oils?

Whenever I make a purchase, I look long and hard for quality, value and price. I read everything I could find on the four companies below and hope this will make your purchase easier.

I am not in a position to do a review of any of these companies but I do have an educated opinion that might help you get started in the right direction. 

First, the 2 most popular essential oil companies currently are DoTerra and Young Living. They offer distributorships to those of the entrepreneurial ilk or have distributors where you can buy their products. They offer classes and have a good support network to help people new to essential oils get started. The oils are top quality, but they are at the top when it comes to prices. The prices are better if you are a distributor and there may be a chance to make some extra money for that real go-getter salesperson.



Another company to look at is Native American Nutritionals. Native American and Rocky Mountain Oils have joined forces and are working together now. I believe that their quality is as high as any other company out there and their prices are a little better. 



I ordered my first oils from Native American (NAN). I bought the basic one kit and have been using all of the single oils and blends. The Basic One kit contains Lavender, Lemon, Peppermint, Eucalyptus and Tea Tree in single oils and the blends are Flu Time, Arthritis Plus, Tranquility, Aligning and Skin Care.


For information on the use of EOs, they refer you to the e-zine Essential Health, which has a lot of articles to get you started and thinking of different ways to use your new oils.


Now, here's the kicker. Just last week I was trying to find a source of EOs that was high quality AND reasonably priced and ran across Plant Therapy. I use the internet to research just about everything I buy and this was no different.

This is a great source of information - https://www.facebook.com/groups/717267978298069/  It is a great place to learn how to safely use essential oils.

 I liked Plant Therapy’s Q & A series on their blog, for getting started with the basics.  You can read Part 1, Part 2. and Part 3.   Be sure to check out their blog, too.  It’s loaded with recipes and DIY tips that use essential oils.

Even though I haven't had a chance to use or review any of their oils I think I will make my next purchase from them, because they have been tested the same as the other companies and the quality seems to be the same if not higher. They have a line of organic oils also. Through all of the checking and research I did I couldn't find anything negative about them. Maybe I will get a chance to review their oils in the near future.

Now the price. The EOs available from Plant Therapy are almost all half the price of the other companies! That is a huge savings. They have blends (synergies) that are comparable to the other companies and a good selection of single oils.

I hope this helps you in making your decision of where to purchase your Essential Oils. They will make a huge difference in your families life, from healthcare to cleaning you home and it is the only way I have found to guarantee that the products I use are safe.

New Direction

I am reworking this blog with the weight of the info toward holistic living and the therapeutic use of essential oils. I plan to get a forum started soon. This blog will in no way be connected to any essential oil companies but will be open to all.


Wifey and I also loosely follow the Forks Over Knives way of eating. It has changed our lives in ways we never imagined. Lower weight, lower cholesterol, lower blood pressure, more energy, better sleep at night... the list goes on and on.

http://essential-oils-and-other-home-remedies.56497.x6.nabble.com