It's Alive!

I'm sorry, I fell off the blogging waggon. Right after New Year, we all came down with lousy colds and I lost all my inspiration for a while. It's that time of year. Not much exciting going on. We've been getting snow just about every week, but it hasn't accumulated very much. This week has been rather warm and melted what bit was left, except for a thick layer of ice on the road from the house to the barn. So we still have to wear Yak-Trax on our boots to keep us from falling and breaking something.

Anyway, the title is also referring to that bottle of milk in the picture. It really is alive! I ordered some Kefir grains from a lady by the name of Romey, over in Washington State: http://kefirwellness.com/

 You place the grains in the decanter and add regular milk. Let it sit out on the counter top over night, and the next morning you strain out the the grains and you have Kefir, which is a cultured milk, full of probiotics that are very good for you. The grains, which don't look like grains at all, more like little florets of cauliflower, feed on the lactose in the milk and grow and multiply. So once you have the grains, you never need to buy more. The milk has a slight yeast smell ( though it's not a yeast) and is a bit sour tasting. Some people, especially in eastern Europe, drink it straight, but it's really good when mixed with banana or other fruit and honey or maple syrup, kind of like a smoothie. You can also add it to pancakes or whatever recipe calls for milk. Not only that but if you leave it out for about 48 hours it gets thick. You remove the grains off the top ( they float to the top) put the thick kefir into a cheese strainer and leave to hang over night. The whey seeps out and you're left with a kind of cream cheese. I made some and added a few herbs and a bit of onion powder. It's delicious on crackers. Some, I just left plain except for a bit of salt, and that's good on toasted English muffins with jam for breakfast. Mmm, I'm so happy with my Kefir!