DIY Almond Milk (and Almond Meal Flour)

I have had a horrible rash on my arms for about 2 months. I went to a doctor for a female check-up and when I mentioned it to her, she suggested to eliminating gluten and dairy completely from my diet to see if that might help. So for the last 2 weeks I have been doing gluten and dairy free...and my rash is nearly gone!

To replace cow's milk I have been using almond milk, which can be expensive, but after trying all the other dairy alternative I decided that almond milk is the best tasting. I decided to make my own to see if it would be more economical. The conclusion? Yes. IF you use almond meal/flour as well, which I do in a lot of my recipes. A natural by-product of making almond milk is almond flour. It is also worth it to be able to control exactly what goes into your almond milk and if you get the almonds wholesale you'll save even more. For every one quart of almond milk you also get one cup of almond flour, which can be pricey, so you save there as well.

Here is the break down on the cost comparisons:

Retail Pricing (32 ounces of almond milk)

	Store-bought	Homemade	Minus the Cost of Buying Almond Flour
Conventional Almonds	$2.29	($6.99/lb) $3.96	- $.80/1 cup = $3.16
Organic Almonds	$3.00	($9.99/lb) $5.58	- $1.13/1 cup = $4.45

Wholesale Pricing (32 ounces of almond milk)

(For more information on how to buy wholesale, click HERE)

	Store-bought	Homemade	Minus the Cost of Buying Almond Flour
Conventional Almonds	$1.95	($5.20/lb) $2.97	- $.71/1 cup = $2.26
Organic Almonds	$2.15	($5.83/lb) $3.24	- $1.00/1 cup = $2.24

The end price shows the cost of homemade almond milk if you deduct the amount 1 cup of almond flour would cost you to buy. In other words, buying store bought organic almond milk would cost me $2.15. To make my own costs $1.09 more, but then I also get $1.00 worth of almond flour, so in the end it only costs me $.09 more for the same amount of milk and a cup of almond flour.

If you don't use almond flour and aren't too picky about what is in your almond milk (all store-bought almond milks have additives), it is not worth it to make your own almond milk. For me, it is for cost effective to make the milk myself, to control exactly what goes into it and have the added benefit of the left over almond flour.

Anywho, for those of you still interested in making your own almond milk and almond flour, here is the recipe:

Almond Milk

Yields 32 oz.

1.5 C raw almonds (to minimize the cost, you can cut it down to 1 cup)

4 C filtered water

pinch of sea salt

1. Soak the almond in the filtered water for 8-12 hours. Rinse and replace the water once in the process, if possible.

2. Drain and rinse the almonds. Place in a blender with 4 cups of fresh water and the salt. Blend on high for 2 minutes. If using a regular blender (not heavy duty, like a VitaMix) you may need to do two batches, blending 1/2 at a time.

3. Strain the milk from the pulp using a nut milk bag (I did not have one so I just used a tightly woven cotton kitchen hand towel) or several layers of cheesecloth. Squeeze as much of the milk out as possible. Reserve the pulp to make almond flour, recipe to follow.

4. Place the milk in a clean air-tight container and store in the fridge for 3-4 days.

Variations:

Chocolate Milk

32 oz of Almond Milk

1 TB unsweetened cocoa powder

1/4 C raw, dark agave

1 tsp pure vanilla extract

Chai Milk

32 oz of Almond Milk

1/4 C raw, dark agave

1 tsp pure vanilla extract

1 tsp cinnamon

1/2 tsp garam masala

1/4 tsp nutmeg

Almond Flour

Yields 1 cup

Pulp left over from almond milk

1. Spread the pulp on a baking sheet. Let dry for 8-12 hours. Store in an airtight container.

*Note: I have also started running it in my VitaMix one more time after it dries. It seems to make it a finer texture.

Thanks to Kim at Nourishing Gourmet for hosting Penny Wise Platter Thursdays. I linked this post there for others to see. Check out her blog. She has beautiful recipes and amazing photographs.