If You Can't Beat 'em, Join 'em

And http://ulteriorharmony.org/?p=711

Oh, I have so much to share here, and I'm dancing a long-form lesson in taking back the choice over my time and where it goes.

I spent five days last week with no refrigeration. I woke very early to an intense burning-rubber smell, which I finally tracked down to the defunct freezer. Fridge was okay but the smell was unbearable and I couldn't turn off one without the other. Anything like that happens anywhere near the weekend (Thursday--even Wednesday) and you're waiting until Monday. 

Daytime temperatures were around 105--great temperatures for bacteria to grow. So, a good opportunity to grow some bugs! It was also several days of hauling blocks of ice and sacks of ice cubes--small potatoes after the 50lb chicken feed sacks, but heavy lifting nonetheless.
I started with my kombucha cultures. Some got black tea, some got green tea. Good old culture that I brought with me from HI, to AK via Oregon, and now AZ! 

Then I grated up burdock, half a sweet potato, a bit of coconut, ginger, turmeric. I salted them and mashed them around with my hand--there's no water added to that mix, it's just the veggies' own juices. And yes, that's a kombucha bottle weighting it down! Friendly ferments... 

And of course, I'd just opened a brown coconut when the fridge failed. I could have tried sun-drying the pieces but then I'd have had an army of ants. Mold was threatening to form already. So I blended it all up in the Vitamix as fine as I could, together with Irish Moss gel. [Irish Moss is an alga with a gelling action due to the long-chain polysaccharides, just like agar but it gels without needing to be heated.]

And then I opened some high-quality probiotic capsules into the mix. Covered loosely, let sit for a day, and then added to the cooler full of ice cubes.
Honestly, I'm not certain that the bacteria I wanted are the ones I got. I'm a little afraid of the coconut cheese -- had a bit of it one evening and was sick as a dog, but it could have been something else (I'm also not sure that Irish Moss works in this body).

I'm enjoying the trial and error with the bugs in this new environment.
The fridge finally arrived at 11pm Monday night. Obnoxiously late, especially when I'd finished unloading the coolers, mopping the floor, etc. etc...

And of course, when something isn't an issue, you don't think about it anymore. I'm not constantly rotating food, draining coolers (and using the water to mop the floor or flush the toilet), going out for more ice)...and it just becomes a no brainer. But, especially not having had a decent refrigeration set-up at my former abode with the chicken folks, I am grateful grateful grateful every single day, whether I'm eating or not, that my food is being held from this weather, that I can choose whether or not I want to grow bugs! I wish the same for my own body.
I wish for everyone good, positive bugs--commensals rather than parasites.

As Promised - Coconut Kefir a Different Way - Thoughts, Please!

I've obliquely mentioned my 'different coconut kefir' a number of times and promised to blog about it: I very much want to know what folks think about it. I also mentioned that there's one product with a tiny 1% of sodium casinate (a milk derivative) that I use - they're both the same deal: it's what I use for making coconut kefir! I'm highly ambivalent both because of that ingredient and because it is such a labor-intensive process, as you will see. It took me so long to do this because of the difficulty of photographing the process. And now that I have all the photos, Blogger refused to let me upload two of the best ones! What's up with that? (It said 'server rejected' and slapped my wrist about not having the right to upload those photos. Excuse me? I took them myself with my own camera!) So, apologies for the photography!

I use my kefir grains to culture a coconut cream made up from Wilderness Family Naturals' Coconut Milk Powder -

It is mostly low-temperature spray-dried coconut milk with 8% maltodextrin and 1% sodium casinate to help prevent clumping.

But even with those additives, it's pretty clumpy, as you can see! I use about three of these spatula-loads...

...blended up with a small amount of water, that I then top off to just over a pint.

Add in the kefir grains, cover, let sit for 24 hours or more...

...and the kefir cream rises to the top and the whey is at the bottom. The cream at the top has such an incredible texture that I didn't want to stir it back together, so I got myself a turkey-baster at a thrift store(!), cleaned it well, and use it to suck the whey up from the bottom -

Here is the whey - about a cup each time. It's not totally precise - I always end up sucking up some cream too.

And here is the cream with the kefir grains mixed in, sitting at the bottom of the jar.

The labor-intensive part is getting the cream out of the jar and separating the grains from it...

Blogger wouldn't let me upload the picture with the whey, cream and grains all separated, but the one above is on the way to that. I end up with half- to three-quarters of a cup of cream, that looks like this:

The tricky thing is that I almost always miss a couple of grains and have to pick them out later when I'm eating the cream. It really only works because I'm the only person eating this - I don't know how well it would work for a crowd. I guess I could just stir everything together, strain out the kefir grains and then strain out the whey - but the floated-to-the-top texture of the kefir is just so great...

I love getting both 'whey,' fizzy and delectable, and cream, out of the kefiring process. I use the whey in my green smoothies, to start sauerkraut, just drink it straight. The kefir cream I mostly eat straight, but here it is as a delectable no-sugar treat -

- mixed with a little stevia and lime zest, on a crust of pecan/flax/coconut/xylitol/lime zest. So yes, it has great potential as a dessert ingredient, if I save up several days' worth, or make bigger batches, or strain the grains out and then strain again. It really is delectable - it is sour, rich, creamy, with just a hint of coconut flavor remaining. Wonderfully satisfying texture and flavor. And all those beneficial bacteria too!

Kefir experts: is this ok for the kefir grains? I notice that they're always clogged with the cream (and when we were in Oregon and I was buying coconut water and kefiring it, the grains ended up looking very different, expanded). They've also scarcely grown since I bought them several months ago: I understand that naturally they reproduce. This is probably a pretty low-sugar product for them to work on. Occasionally I've added some sugar to the mix and they seem to have been invigorated by it.

So, I have ambivalence about the process, because it's so time-consuming, but I also have mixed feelings about the coconut milk powder itself, or more specifically, about that little 1% sodium casinate. I'm not a strict ethical vegan, but I generally feel better (in all respects) when avoiding animal products. And I have a really horrendous reaction to cow dairy, especially when processed. It has frightening effects on my mood and mental state (as I believe I mentioned wrt ghee in Oregon).  When I eat any quantity of this kefir cream, I notice a slight mucus-y feeling in the throat and sometimes nose. I wonder if it's my imagination, or if it's an allergic response to that trace of dairy. At least it doesn't make me psycho...

I'd love to hear everybody's thoughts on this, please!