Traditional Cooking

Are you talking about cooking similarly to the book, Nourishing Traditions? Or something entirely different? 🙂

We currently grind all our own wheat,spelt,kamut and cornmeal. We are raw milk,kefir, and koumbocha drinkers. We try to use only natural sugars, honey, pure maple syrup, succanat, rapadura, and stevia. We love to consume about 85-90%% of our diet whole foods from our own garden, and farm. There are some great sites and blogs that are whole foods as well, let me know if you want some links.

One important thing though, this is just how we choose to eat, we aren’t always perfect we still have occasional greasy burger, or junk. We never want these things to become and idol in our life, which is VERY easy to do when trying to convert to this way of eating because there is so much preparation involved with cooking everything from scratch. This way of eating doesn’t make us better than the next person who eats processed foods all day, and its God who is in control of our health whether we eat 100% natural or not.  I would take one step at a time, small steps as this is a learning process everyday and we are still learning! Good luck on starting your journey!

HI Lindsey,

  It is so great that you are learning all these things. You’re right that it is definitely a lifestyle. I’ve been on this food path for many years, between 5-8 years. It is definitely a transition that takes time and I wasn’t raised to do any kind of cooking in the first place. Slow food rules! I also believe in eating seasonally, according to G-d’s provisional design, eating as much fresh when in season while preserving for later the extras. Waste is my enemy! Our ancesters used so much of the food they were using. For example, from watermelon, using even the rind, prepared properly into pickles and jam.

 I make as much from scratch as possible, grind and flake my grains, using coconut oils, palm oil shortening, olive oil and sunflower oil (but only to halve with the olive for mayo). Make meat and vegetable stocks. Am making more lacto-fermented veges and dips, starting w/the fermented pickles, fermented salsa, bean paste, mayo, and am planning on doing more this year than last. I just made ketchup from my leftover tomato juice-yum! It tastes like a cross between ketchup and b-que sauce.

I also soak nuts (and dehydrate), beans, flours, and cereals (including granola), soak my corn flour in limewater, started sprouting grain last year. I also make kefir, have made kombucha before and have plans to do it again-my children and I adore the taste of it and how it makes us feel.

Also yogurt (which I am experimenting with and will post the results because I am searching for the better consistancy without using dry milk powder or gelatin). I like making butter and the resulting buttermilk, sour cream, farmer cheese and raw yogurt cheese and using the whey in ferments, for soaking, and drinking.

Use ACV with the “mother” in it. I keep considering saving our chicken livers, but I haven’t mustered up the courage yet. Last year, I started making salad dressings (except for bleu cheese).

We buy grass-fed meat from a farm in TN yearly, raise and butcher our own chickens and have our own eggs (all soy-free and free from GM ingredients). If I’m not making it currently, I buy the best I can, like sauerkraut preserved in salt only, not vinegar. I won’t buy seafood unless it’s wild.

I avoid soy, hydrogenated oils, all corn syrups, artificial dyes, sulfured dried fruits, vegetable oils (except for the aforementioned sunflower), powdered milks, vital gluten, fat-free and low-fat cheeses; nitrites, nitrates and erythrobates. I avoid GM products, which means anything corn related must be organic. We already don’t eat pork products for religious reasons. I also do not cook using a pressure-cooker or microwave; beans and meats were meant to be cooked s-l-o-w-l-y. No non-stick cookware (love my cast iron passed down to me!), avoid cooking tomato products in stainless steel (but otherwise use stainless steel). For storing food, I only use glass, no plastic (unless it’s a non-food item or non-heated and being put in the freezer). Also, I’ve been trying very hard to completely avoid canned items.

I like keeping recipes as simple as possible, not reliant upon so many out of season or out of the ordinary ingredients that are expensive and not native to my area. The farthest I like to buy from are my surrounding states; though I have to buy some things-pineapple, bananas and kiwi-from S. America (we should be able to get them from out tropical areas like S. Cal, Florida and S. Texas!)

My immediate goals are to begin a sourdough starter, be consistant about making baked beans, pasta and pizza and continue to strive to have one fermented food per meal or at least at lunch and supper, as well as snacks. Also, to turn thins I already make into a more nutrient rich, probiotic rich food. I’m sure I’ve left a few things out on both the “doing” list and “avoidance” list.

What recipes are you interested in? I’ve definitely had failures, but one of the great things about using real food is that usually it can be transformed into another edible food item. It’s a never ending learning experince and exciting, too! G-d, Homeschooling and food-those are my favorite topics!

Rachel

Rachel….amazing!  I have started several of these processes of change over the past couple of years, but am nowhere near as far along as you are.  You are very impressive.  Thanks for the comprehensive description of your food-lifestyle…I love reading about other people’s experiences and dedication to help keep myself motivated.  🙂

Lindsey, we started this food journey about a year ago.  Then we lived in the suburbs with an extra fridge and freezer. But we were in Alabama where access to things like raw milk and pastured chickens are harder to come by.   Since moving to Seattle, access to these foods is so easy but I don’t have a freezer here (though I have about decided to get one even if it has to go in my bedroom :)).  We haven’t tried drinks of any sort yet though I want to.  I have been a bit overwhelmed at how not having freezer space has made cooking this way more difficult.  I guess because I am cooking EVERY meal, EVERY day.  Some days I miss being able to feed the kids a bowl of cereal and a piece of fruit.  Just this morning I begin to load the kids up to go through Mc Donald’s – which we haven’t eaten at in months.  All because I didn’t feel like cooking and I didn’t have anything prepared to serve them.  So this may not be the failures you were asking.  But today I am feeling like a failure because I don’t have it in me to cook another meal this week 🙂  Thankfully it is friday and the hubby loves to cook.  Oh and I stopped halfway  out the door and came in and baked the boys some muffins.  I just couldn’t bring myself to go to mcdees.  Sorry for the sob story but today eating whole foods is a burden to me.  Hopefully just for today 🙂