courtesy of abigrace.com.au
I can’t believe how much my palate has changed since eating according to TrimHealthyMama. THM has been a bit of an adjustment at first, but it gets easier. One thing I simply couldn’t let go of was my daily latte. I love my milk! I tried to make almond milk, but it was quite yucky to me. I bought almond milk in a carton from the supermarket. Just as yucky. I let it go and resigned myself to just doing THM but with milk consumption.
What’s wrong with milk?
Real, raw milk? Nothing per se, except that it is liquid carbs… carbs and fat combined together in liquid form. Liquid carbs are the most potent fat promoting form. Whilst raw whole milk may be a healthy superfood it is best for for growing children, pregnant women who don’t need to watch their weight, or husbands who have a high metabolism. Sadly, for the rest of us, in today’s modern world, it only fattens us up.
Which makes my morning tea latte a crossover meal. Too many crossovers inhibit weight loss. Yet I haven’t been doing THM for weight loss. I’ve been following THM for the sheer health benefits. The science behind it just makes sense! My health has improved nearly 90% and I’ve only been doing THM since early January. And, having said that I am only adhering to THM principles for 70 – 80% of the time. In the spirit of honesty I will admit to eating take-away foods more than once a week. Which means huge crossovers. Despite that, I have lost 6 kgs since the beginning of the year. But honestly, I have not been trying to lose weight but gain health. Now I am losing slowly though, I have been motivated to be a little more adherent to the weight loss part of the THM plan. And that means giving up my daily (make that twice or thrice daily) latte.
And so I made Almond Milk again.
Would you believe it? I actually can tolerate it now! How…is beyond me. But to prove it I have made my homemade almond milk and had my local barista (thanks AbiGrace) make me my afternoon latte. It is nowhere near like cows milk to work latte art with and as a barista she taught me how/why and wherefore that the milk could not be textured in such a way as to produce the same artistic pour… but for right now I am not concerned with that. Protein and carbohydrates (as opposed to dairy milk which has protein, fat & carbs) are what concerns me.
courtesy of abigrace.com.au
What do you think?
There are heaps of almond milk recipes on the Internet… I can’t lay claim to liking them all. Not at all. Some are lower in carbs than others. Some are too watery, too weak. I like my almond link to be thick and creamy but not overpowering with its nuttiness. For now, this recipe is the one that suits me just fine. I may tweak it as I go along. In fact, I already have an idea up my sleeve to increase the protein levels.
Almond Milk
- ½ cup almonds
- 3.5 cups water
- 2 medjool dates
- ½ tsp vanilla
- pinch celtic sea salt
- Stevia Extract (Nunaturals Pure Extract Powder or NOW Stevia or Nirvana Choc Flavoured Stevia Drops)
Soak almonds and dates in water overnight.
Drain and rinse almonds and dates.
Put into blender with water. Blend.
Add salt and stevia to taste.
Place tea towel or nut milk bag over bowl and drain/squeeze. Use liquid as milk!
Left over almond pulp can be used in cakes, muffins, breads or dehydrated and processed in food processor as almond flour.
Yummo!
And it tastes okay. Actually, it tastes mighty fine! I had 3 latte’s yesterday so it must be okay to keep me going back for more!
Addendum: This recipe is not THM plan approved. Not at all. It is simply that I am enjoying this whilst also following the THM eating plan between 70 -80%.
Looks like it turned out alright! 😉 however I am a bit bias. Next hurdle: using it in dads coffee 😉
Dad says he is more than happy to have it in his cappuccino… but not in instant coffee.
My dear Susan. Excuse me for butting in. It’s been on my mind all morning since reading this. Y’see, I’m on a bit of a health journey myself at the moment and I’m battling with new information against the backdrop of ingrained old information~
I am going to be a complete and utter nerd and put my two cents worth out there. Please know that I am only doing this in the hope of some feedback and perhaps more clarity from yourself. I am not trying to be ‘over’ you because, believe me, I am pretty confused about the whole thing!
I have worked out the carbs and sugar content in both full cream milk and the nut milk that you are currently making. Here is my (not so scientific) analysis.
1/2 cup almonds…………Carbs 14.11 g, sugar 3.43 g
2 medjool dates……….Carbs 35.99g, sugar 16g
so a combined Carb content of 50.1g
Combined Sugar content 19.43g
Full Cream Milk (Devondale) …..1 1/2 cups………Carbs 18g, Sugar 12g.
Now am I missing something about milk? Is there something in the ‘science’ that makes it more fattening than the simple figures I am looking at?
I’m battling with my own mind and this question right now in so many ways. I’ve always been a health nut (excuse the pun) but I’m beginning to wonder if in the process of trying to eat ‘healthy’ I have actually been consuming more carbs (and perhaps calories and sugar) than would be deemed good for me.
I adore almond milk and for the past six months have been drinking about 1.5 glasses of it a day. I use about a cup of almonds to 500ml of water and 2 medjool dates for sweetening. But looking at the above figures I am wondering if the longed for weight loss has been stalled by such habits?
Anyway my friend. I look forward to hearing back from you and hearing your thoughts. xx
Hi Jacqui,
Firstly, you are NOT butting in! Thanks for commenting with such an interesting thought. Sorry I haven’t commented earlier but I needed to get my head screwed on straight so I could answer.
Whilst medjool dates are tastier and sweeter, it is true that they are also higher in carbs. Fortunately, or unfortunately they are also more expensive which means I usually use normal dates which are lower in carbs. Quite a bit lower.
What I have been learning is that to truly get the carb content we must subtract the fibre content from a food. So whilst your analysis for 1/2 cup of almonds is correct it doesn’t take into consideration the fibre content – and the greatest majority of fibre is removed from the almond milk!
This is where THM has been helpful for me. As you know, I put on a fair bit of weight in my previous attempts at health, namely through Nourishing Traditions.Yet, so far I have lost 9 kgs on THM and am totally chuffed!
However, the way I like my almond milk is NOT on the THM weight loss plan. I like mine thick and creamy but it is still a bit carby and the weight loss version is more watered down and probably not sweetened with dates. However, the Chocolate Stevia Drops (Nirvana) are excellent or you could also use a chocolate essence from the cake/baking section in the grocery store, I think. It does sound to me like you are self sabotaging with your, no doubt, deliciously thick and creamy almond milk but making it a bit strong.
i’m not completely off dairy but my almond milk made this way (in above blog post) is helping me to cut down considerably.
According to MyFitnessPal recipe that I plugged in, my recipe above makes about 3 cups and has:
138 calories
15 carbs (13)
8 fat
4 protein
3 fibre
12 sugar
But we subtract some of the fibre content from the carb content, which puts the carb content at about 13 carbs.
However, the same recipe BUT NOT using Medjool dates and using normal dried dates yields:
105 calories
7 carbs (5)
8 fat
3 protein
2 fibre
5 sugar
Again, we subtract the fibre, which leaves us with 5 carbs.
So I have to ask myself – is it really worth it to use medjool dates? Yes they are so much nicer… but is it worth it? If it is not helping my weight loss efforts then I might as well have milk! And it isn’t just the carbs but the sugar content – high sugar combined with carbs can spike my BSL.
Thank you for taking the time to answer Susan. Congratulations on the weight loss, that is quite an achievement. I believe the almond milk that THM recommend is Breeze which apparently is zero sugar. I do wonder how they get it to taste so creamy considering it is low in calories. I think I’d rather stick to making my own (fattening) version as at least I know what I am drinking!!
I’m still on my journey, I haven’t quite found the place where I feel comfortable just yet. I do know that I love food though, real food and I find it hard to follow any regime that tries to replicate a popular food with some unusual ingredients! If I can’t eat bread on (whatever diet it might be) then I would rather just NOT eat bread at all than replace it with some weird science of ingredients. I watch my darling daughter stocking up on all the gluten free versions of her favourite foods so as not to miss out on her beloved pizzas, sausage rolls and the likes 🙂 I have learned to keep my mouth shut but its not the way that I want to live. Who knows, perhaps I will never lose weight but I will certainly enjoy the journey, after all what else is one supposed to do with their time if they are not perusing the latest health fads????!!!!!!
I just re read my comment and as usual I have completely gone off topic! I hope you didn’t think I was running THM down during my rant. To be honest I haven’t even read the entire book so am not that clued up on the format. My pet hate at the moment is ‘replacement’ foods and so my ramblings were focussed on that. My words come from the jumbled brain of a women who is seeking a way of eating that not only helps her health issues but might possibly lead to weight loss and yet at the same time satisfy her families need for tasty food. As you can tell, I’m definitely not there yet!
Hiya Jacqui,
I didn’t think you were ragging on THM… and it is okay by me if you were. I am not the THM Police. LOL I have finally found an eating style (with tweaks) that can be tailored to suit me and my family but I know that one size does not fit all.
I don’t particularly care for replacement foods either but I am happy to experiment with things like almond milk and learn about new foods for, as you say, what else can we play with? LOL
I see you managed a cauliflower pizza base. My attempt flopped. Oh, what I could scrape off the pan was very tasty but it ended up in a crumbled mess. But I know where I went wrong and how to improve it for next time.