Have you got any tips for making Almond milk? I've tried a few times and it's just ended up really watery and bitter
Yep...I'm making almond milk today in fact...just put the almonds to soak. I make my own cos it's so freaking expensive to buy and it's all sweetened with other rubbish added. This is much better.
Main tip: buy good fresh almonds. The bitterness you are tasting might be due to the quality of almonds you are buying. Even if you splurge on really good fresh almonds, it will still be so so much cheaper than paying $11 - $12 for a 1 litre carton of crappy almond milk in a tetra pack!
Almond Milk
Makes: 1 litre (scale up or down as you please)
Ingredients:
250g raw almonds (FRESH & GOOD QUALITY)
1 litre filtered/spring water
You will also need some fine muslin or very fine cotton and a strainer/sieve.
Directions:
Place almonds in a container and cover with tap water so that the water comes a little over the top of the almonds. Cover and leave to soak for 8 to 12 hours. In hot weather, place the container in the fridge. I usually do this overnight but today, I put them to soak early this morning so I can make it tonight.
Drain the almonds well. Place in a blender with the filtered water and process until the almonds are fine meal. At this point you can strain it, but i like to leave it for 10 minutes or so to really let the almond flavours get into the milk.
I don't have a sturdy blender so I use a food processor. If using a processor, make sure it's a large capacity one (at least 6 cups). Process the almonds first and then add the water gradually as you process. If you add all the water at once in a food processor, it will just spill out the sides. That would be BAD.
To strain, line the strainer with the muslin. You want a piece of cloth that will come well over the sides. Place the strainer over a bowl or container. Pour in the almond mixture. Make sure you press and extract as much of the milk as possible. At the end, gather up the cloth around the almond meal left in the strainer and really squeeze out all the excess.
That's it. You can now pour the milk into a glass bottle or jug. It will keep, airtight, in the fridge for a few days.
Variations: Add some sweetener or vanilla, cinnamon, cacao, whatever to flavour it. I prefer to make it plain and flavour it, as needed, if I want to.
It's really good chilled on a hot day
)
Tip: Don't waste the leftover almond meal. Use it in almond bread (like above) or in cookies, cakes etc.
Hope that helps. :-D
