Cashew Milk

Milk and I have had a love hate relationship since college, so I've turned to rice milk over the years to satisfy my need for something "milk-like" for my cereal, coffee, baking, etc...  Over the last couple weeks the price of rice milk has become more expensive than my sons, organic, pasture raised, whole milk and I can no longer justify my rice milk purchase, so I began looking into alternatives.  My mom heard about my rice milk "dilemma" and made a batch of homemade almond milk for me!  Yes, my mom is that awesome!!!  Though, to my disappointment, I'm totally allergic to it.  So, I have turned my efforts to cashew milk!  To my surprise, nut milks are EXTREMELY easy to make!!!!  And, at least with cashew milk, there is no need for a fancy blender!  

Ingredients: 

1 cup raw cashews

3-4 cups water 

1 medjool date pitted (or other desired sweetener)

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

pinch of kosher salt

Tools:

Blender

nut bag or tea towel

mason jar 

Directions:

Soak 1 cup of raw cashews for a minimum of 1 hour or overnight in the refrigerator.  I soaked mine overnight.  

After soaking for desired duration of time, thoroughly rinse until water runs clear.  While rinsing the cashews, I placed my date in some hot water, to loosen it up for a couple minutes, before placing it in the blender.  

Place soaked and rinsed cashews into blender along with date and add 2 cups of water - mix - add an additional 1-2 cups of water.  If you are looking for a whole milk consistency add only 1 additional cup (3 cups water total), but if enjoy a thinner nut milk, add an additional 2 cups (4 cups water total).   Personally, I enjoy a "whole milk" consistency, so I only used 3 cups of water.  Blend until smooth.  Add vanilla and salt - blend until all ingredients are incorporated.  

While my ingredients were blending, I took a moment to secure my tea towel on my mason jar...I do not have nut bag, though after this process I will be investing in one!

Strain blended nut milk through a nut bag or tea towel into desired container.  This process was  kind of tedious, as my tea towel was too thick to allow for quick and easy milk extraction.  I was constantly removing cashew pulp which took about 5-8 minutes for the whole batch...this was the longest part of the whole process.      

NOTE: I saved my cashew pulp remnants from the tea towel and plan to use it in a cookie recipe I hope to post soon!  

This recipe yields about 2 1/2 cups cashew milk and 1 1/2 cups cashew pulp.

I added the fresh cashew milk to my morning coffee and it was AMAZING!!!  No need to add any extra sugar!  I also added it to Max's multigrain cereal (one part cashew milk to three parts water) and it turned out creamy and rich.  In the future I plan on trying it warmed with some cinnamon and fresh nutmeg.  Also, I think it would be a great replacement of whole milk in my homemade masala chai recipe - yummy!!!