You win some; You lose some!
When you live like we do one of the challenges or problems is to adjust existing habits.
A few weeks back I decided to stop using milk. I had a theory it might help reduce the congestion problems I’ve been having.
So how did I go about it ?
What were the obstacles?
Well to start with I usually drink hot chocolate at work. It’s a habit physically. I don’t even look at the buttons anymore. When we got a new machine and they were slightly different it threw me.
Yes, I drink hot chocolate with my eyes closed.
So I needed to break the habit.
Black tea it would be. But the habit needed to be broken easily.
Ah, I had two weeks break from work and two weeks break from the coffee machine!
So that was great.
It has worked!
I’d already switched to soya milk in my porridge which was the other big milk input I had.
So then I needed to fix another ‘problem’. For three years I’d been making yogurt. The yoghurt was a great way to use the home made jam from the plot.
No milk; no yoghurt; three tonnes of jam needing to be eaten!
So I decided to make soya yoghurt instead….
More about that later…
Speaking of jam. There’s been a catastrophe!
It looks like this
That (for the uninitiated) is unset jam!
Hurumph!
Remember that dead easy recipe I posted?
I picked a load of lilac flowers and steeped them the other day. Then on Sunday I added pectin sugar and cooked it up. After it cooked it was
Da da da….
runny.
On Sunday night I reboiled it. Still no joy!
Meanwhile back at the yoghurt, I decided to figure out the soya yoghurt without much research just by adapting the method I used for regular milk yogurt.
It’s simple. (What like the jam?)
500ml UHT milk heated for 1min and 40 sec in the microwave.
Add a couple spoons of live yoghurt.
Put it in a yoghurt maker.
Wait five hours.
Then chill.
So I did the same thing with soya milk and soya yoghurt instead.
Five hours later….
Well technically five hours plus an overnight cooling later. Nothing had happened.
Now I should’ve been a bit more scientific but I just cranked the timer round again for a further five hours!
Still no joy!
Five more hours……
Drumroll
Success!
Add jam and….
I’ll need to pay more attention next time so I’ve got a better indication of time!
Ah but the jam, what about the jam?
Well, it makes a good cordial instead!
Take it with you:
18 comments on “You win some; You lose some!”
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Green Lizard's Blog 
Reblogged this on Linda's wildlife garden and commented:
Lovely post Liz thanks for sharing
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Ha ha, if life gives you lemons, make lemonade! 🙂
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If life gives you lemons make gin and tonic!!!!!!!
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Now that’s a much better idea 🙂
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Marvellous! Happy Friday!
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We like runny jam on pancakes like fruity syrup,
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Good suggestion. This is a bit runnier than that but I’ll try it.
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Maybe not enough pectin?
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Don’t think so Helen. It just wasn’t meant to be.
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I am impressed…I haven’t made jam in years and never yogurt. I hope this helps your congestion….
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The great thing is the congestion is much improved. And weirdly my normally torturous hay fever hasn’t happened….yet! It’s very odd.
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I suffer with sinus problems and find almond milk on my porridge. is good. Since reading this post I wonder how almond yoghurt would taste. Have a lovely weekend – its raining in London
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I think it could be good. Not sure how you would start it if making your own. We also have almond milk
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We eliminated milk and cheese from our diet many years ago. Sinus problems. It got so bad, it affected my balance. When I was running my printing press, I’d bend down to offload envelopes, it felt like I was falling into the press as it’s running. At the time I was drinking coffee with half and half. I switched to Coffee Mate. It took some time before I realized that Coffee Mate used Casein as an ingredient. Casein is a milk derivative…I had to give that up too. It has helped though so much that if I take a chance and try eating pizza with cheese on it, I suffer the loads of sinus production. (hope I didn’t gross you out)
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That’s really good to hear. It’s going well without milk. We still have some cheese but not much. That could take longer. The weird thing is the normally crippling hay fever I get hasn’t materialised yet. Thanks for the comment. I’m glad it works.
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What does it taste like? Is it comparable to bought soya yoghurt? I am seriously going to investigate a yoghurt making set for soya yoghurt – they are always out of stock when I go shopping.
On a slightly different subject, do you make your own bread?
Sarah x
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I think it tastes better. It’s more subtle that the flavour of the original soya yogurt that I started if off with and I think it needs seven hours. Though I’ve not really nailed it down. That way I use our jam, don’t have plastic pots and it costs about 15p a pot.
We have made bread but are almost gluten free so that’s usually trickier to make than regular bread. I use a bread maker when I do. A friend gave me one second hand.
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