New Traditional Foods (NT) Thread - Page 6

[yitlan]

Originally Posted by Brookesmom

I'm kind of scared to make the switch from organic unhomogenized milk to raw.

I made the jump from homogenized organic to raw and have had no problems. Neither have dh and dd. I think it tastes soooo yummy!

[OceanMomma]

I hadn't drunk milk for years when I started on the raw milk. I didn't deliberately seek out raw milk either. Just, it was the most animal friendly alternative to soy I could find - leave Mums & babies together, don't truck animals to the meat works, they even get a 2 month rest every year. Neither me or dh or dd has been sick ever. I did get some milk for a guy I know to try who says he may have felt a bit sick, but then we had some form of gastric flu around at the time as I knew 5 ppl who'd been feeling sick & vomiting & not one of them had been to my house for a cuppa. So I think it was a case of him putting 2 & 2 together to make 400.

ITA vegmom. The lady I get my milk from had hers tested for bacteria & the levels were lower than store milk. She says that by nature, milk is an anti-bacterial product. So what happens when you pasteurise is you get a sterile, dead environment for all the bacteria to move on in.

The only problem I have found with raw dairy is that you are then unable to drink the pasteurised stuff without it tasting horrid. Butter is the same. dd will not eat store butter - even organic - as she doesn't like it. I had big dd, who used to complain bitterly about me not getting store milk actually acuse me of putting baby pee in her tea when I put some store milk in there once.

[yitlan]

Originally Posted by OceanMomma

She says that by nature, milk is an anti-bacterial product. So what happens when you pasteurise is you get a sterile, dead environment for all the bacteria to move on in.

This makes so much sense!
That's why we're told to put our own breast milk on cracked nipples or even other skin conditions!

[Brookesmom]

vegmom, yitlan, Oceanmamma, thanks for the replies! I'm going to try some raw milk next time the half gallon is out.

I too think milk tastes nasty- maybe I will like the taste of the raw- that would be a first! I hope my HFS sells the raw butter. It sounds great.

It does make a lot of sense about the raw milk being antibacterial, just like momma milk.

[brandywine]

OK, I'm back now, having read several online articles, all of this thread and an old thread in the food forum. I'm hooked! Mostly because I'm looking for an excuse to eat butter and bone soup, two of my favorite things on earth. Baby steps though, right? Ok, so I started some sourdough starter this morning, andI'm a pretty accomplished baker (apple polisher too!) and I've made bread with a chef before, so I figured I'd start there. Also, we live on a horse and cattle ranch (we rent) and I talked to the owner about buying one of him grassfed organic cows for meat. Spendy but good. Where did you all start? What were your first 'baby steps'?

[Elzabet]

I started with changing my grocery shopping from typical to organic and making bone broths each week--chicken one week, beef the next (has anyone made fish broth?)--so I could keep soup in the house. Then I kept renewing a copy of Nourishing Traditions from the library until I could by my own copy. $25 was kind of steep to me so I took a while to look around for a copy under $15 (plus shipping). NT has a good chapter in it about what to do if you are cost conscious but it works as well for those of us just getting started.

I love it because it just verified what I was seeing IRL. My grandfather is 88 this year and he eats 2 eggs and bacon every morning and uses real butter and milk. His wife of 10 years is barely 10 years older than me (and very happy ) and he still runs his own catering service out of his home with all the labor--physical and mental-- that entails. He also doesn't look like he's nearly 90 either. My dad (70) however is a bit of a mess physically as he loves to tell me about and his wife keeps feeding him all this low carb low calorie processed crap and he wonders why he feels poorly.

[yitlan]

My baby steps:
raw dairy and yogurt
the crispy nuts
cereal grains (haven't been able to abandon boxed cereals totally yet)
the fermented catsup and apricot butter
soaked beans (I usually soaked them overnight anyway to cut down on cooking time. Now I just add whey)
more meat in our diet

I think you're right: baby steps are the way to go. It would take a major life overhaul to adopt EVERYTHING in the book at once!

[xenomama]

Originally Posted by toraji

I seem to have gotten the award for "most annoying ex-veg"

As a former scared vegan in denial a couple years ago, I totally ignored the stories that people like elainie told about problems with the vegan diet. After all, I was one of the "good" ones, right? Ha ha, I'll show them! But in the end, I had to swallow my pride and change my diet. I will not make my child suffer because of dogma.

Oh, how I hear you. I'm an "ex" as well after 10 years no meat. I started craving it when we were TTC, and "coincedentally" my thyroid levels had tripled! I ate a ton of soy products, and I'm so glad I no longer do. I'm new to WAP, and am trying to go organic as much as possible. DH isn't as keen on it as I am, but he's enjoying the fresh food!

[Elzabet]

Does anyone else graze? I like NT because it has the recipies for good grazing material like the crispy nuts yitlan mentioned. I have to eat almost constantly it seems like due to a high metabolism. Extra protein and fats help but when I forget to add them properly, I need to munch constantly.

[OceanMomma]

I started with raw dairy instead of soy milk. Then I did things like got raw butter, raw clotted cream & raw yoghurt as I had access to them & they were all organic, locally produced etc. I also borrowed a copy of NT by the lady I get my milk from.

I soak our oatmeal in whey every night. No big drama, I make kefir & always let some separate into whey so I use that. Just bung it on to soak when I wash the dishes after dinner.

I buy dh & dd a organic free range chook once a week which I roast. I make chicken stock from the carcass.

When the farm I get my milk off home kills one of th cows, I get about 25lb of mixed meat - everything from steak to mince. I look up recipes for it in NT or convert back my vege recipes ie sub beef for beans in stews etc.

We don't eat bakers yeast so I make a loaf of spelt sourdough once a week & a sourdough pizza half way thru the week to keep my sourdough going.

I have found since I have effectively upped my animal fat consumption, I have lost weight. Well 5kgs in fact. Granted most was pregnancy weight but you would expect it not to come off if all that fat made you fat! I also do not feel the cold as much.

[TigerTail]

lol ocean, at the baby pee!
i have to be honest; the raw milk i got locally did not taste good to me, like the old 'certified' alta dena milk i got. i don't think it's just being hung up on the 'cerified', thing, it just tasted cleaner or something (and i've yet to get raw butter or cream, they're always out!) i'm all for local production, i'm just wishing the joint had a passel of amish kids there boiling the place; i really like the (non-raw, unfortunately) amish and mennonite dairy i've gotten at my local veggie mkt from a bit up north... is it that it was frozen? (i didn't specifically request that it not be, but i wish i'd known it was before i had bought 3 gallons. i got a little burned out on the stuff and tried to use it all in cheese.) is it just me?

god, i miss alta-dena dairy. i wish my state would not be so neanderthal we had to buy 'pet food' milk to make it even legal to sell.

suse

[TigerTail]

bumpers

not much action here, lately (i am spending more time in the garden, too.) but had a blast bottling beer; it was fun!

do y'all feel like we lost steam when we had to start a new thread because of length? i saw a lot of other tribal threads that looked like they just didn't bother- now i feel picked on :P did veggies and pagans get told to start over too, or was it just us? i feel a victim of political correctness.

i'm waiting for peggy's recipe o' the month to be a big ol' slab of pasture-raised meat.

my local farm finally has caught up with dairy orders so i may have a chance to get some raw butter! (and they've got lamb & goat innards too.) gotta work my way out there soon.

i saw kishk in a jar (and a dried version) at the arabic mkt! i am inspired to make some; i have bulghar & some goat kefir whey. wish me luck (and i really need to bottle my mead, but dh is working 7 days this week & it is really a two person job.)

suse

[Queen Gwen]

Originally Posted by suseyblue

bumpers


do y'all feel like we lost steam when we had to start a new thread because of length? i saw a lot of other tribal threads that looked like they just didn't bother- now i feel picked on :P did veggies and pagans get told to start over too, or was it just us? i feel a victim of political correctness.

Naw, I'm in another tribe that started over too, so it isn't just this one. I know I'm spending a lot of time in the garden lately, so a lot less time on the computer. As a matter of fact, 4yo dd just asked me to go outside with her and hang upsidedown on the trapeze. Gotta go.

[xenomama]

Well, I'm guilty of ignoring the post, too. There's just so much to do as a mommy! I'm going to try to get NT soon & start making goodies. My DH was really excited about the possiblity of homemade ginger beer. Is it alcoholic or non, like the store brands? We're both nondrinkers, so that's kinda important. :LOL Btw, we got some fresh, sustainably grown beef yesterday, and oh man was it good!

[MaryCeleste]

Hi! I'm new to MDC, but I've been eating "new traditional" style, more or less, for the last two years or so.

My DD is 5 months old. She's kind of a WAP poster child: happy, strong, tall, and bright-eyed. BF has been going wonderfully. (I did stock up on the obscure formula ingredients, just in case I got hit by a bus or something. Anyone want 2 lb. of lactose powder? ) Now I'm wondering what to do about introducing solids.

In the last few weeks, Moobles has started showing "signs of readiness." When I hold her on my lap during meals, she grabs at my fork, while gaping her mouth open like a baby bird. I've tried offering her tiny dabs of some of the things on my plate: mashed egg yolk, beef, and fruit. She didn't want the egg at all, which surprised me, since NT recommends it as a first food. She mouthed the beef and fruit with great interest...then spat them out. Well, more like drooled them out, actually.

I get the feeling that she's enjoying the whole experience. She just hasn't figured out the concept of swallowing. Do I take this as a sign that she's not ready yet, and back off for a few weeks? Or do I keep on offering things to her?

[xenomama]

Sounds like my daughter. She's probably having fun just learning the textures and tastes right now. I would continue to give stuff, as long as you're not introducing more than 1 food every few days. Breastmilk will be her primary food for some time yet, but they love to play with food! Oh, and have you tried avocado or sweet potato? Those tend to go over well.

[OceanMomma]

This quite interesting. I was about to sneak on in & see if we could discuss the baby food section of NT.

I personally find it very scarey but then that might be from my years & years of veganism & their literature. I've always gone the teeth route with solids. ie top & bottom teeth = fruit & veg, eye teeth = proteins & molars = grains. So we are still on only veg & fruit.

I looked at the WAP web site & their kids section was a bit - I dunno - from memory one baby there was so healthy it apparently slept thru the night from day 1. Another was trying to crawl at 2 weeks. Boy must I have been malnutrited when pg then as neither of my little ones sleep thru the night yet!! But do have to say littlest dd is definitely a poster child for something. Very plump & glowing & bright. I get constantly accosted by old dears telling me how bonnie she is.

I tried the ginger beer recipe in NT & I ended up somehow with something that was like ginger flavoured runny jelly. dd was very disappointed. I have a very old family recipe for ginger beer that is awesome but uses dried yeast so we can't make it anymore I know a lady with some water kefir grains she makes soda from. She also told me she puts ginger in kombucha for "ginger beer"

[TopazBlueMama]

Suse, let me know how your kishk turns out. Has anyone else made it? I've actually tried it twice, but haven't been happy with it. Well, actually it makes delicious soup when it's cooked in broth, but I couldn't see how she said it could be eaten as cold cereal. It turned out way to hard and crunchy for eating like cereal! Maybe my oven was to warm or something? I don't know, but I wish I could find something to work for cold cereal!
For baby food I like doing avacado, bananas and egg yolks, they all just seem like natural baby foods to me!

[spyiispy]

Hi Annie! (and others ) Hmmmm....baby foods.....I really don't think there's an exact science to this; I mean, in different regions, people/babes ate different things and still were extraordinarily healthy. My kids never had commercial baby food...vile vile stuff! Come to think of it, I don't remember what Esme's first foods were.......but Indy's was applesauce (not given by me...not my first choice). Both my kiddo's loved sweet potatoes and got lots of good butter fat in them. My babies really wanted to participate in mealtimes by eating off of our plate and we just gave them teeny tastes of what was on our plate (provided it wasn't terribly hard to digest). Even while exclusively breastfed, they seemed to enjoy being held in the sling during mealtime and just studying the food intently. I don't know how many times I dropped food on their heads while eating! LOL

It irks me how complicated some people make this stuff!! Mainly, drs./baby food manufacturers/WIC staff (don't get me started....!!!)

(Annie....we're "tentatively" going to be back in Tri-Cities for awhile at the end of the month!)

Lisa

[TigerTail]

i'm using the 'wild fermentation' book for my kishk (& hopefully ginger beer; only mildly fermented, btw, daniele... fine imho if you are just not drinkers, but maybe up there with mouthwash & vanilla extract if you NEED to avoid alcohol- muslim, recovering alkies etc.)

i'm finding i like nt for the research & info & sandor katz's book for the huge pile of experience making actual recipes; i've had too many inedibles from nt to make the recipes without a grain of salt (instead of two tablespoons, lol.)

btw, can't you make cream stout with the lactose? or is it just lactic acid? (you could just use it in recipes, i suppose, as a sugar replacement... btw, why is it not affected by oxidation, like the dry milk, eggs, whey, etc?)

suse