Recipe: Almond Milk

Creamy and delicious, this version of almond milk blows the store-bought stuff out of the water. Let’s get started.

If you told me last year that I would be making my own almond milk, I would have laughed. I probably would have laughed if you told me that last month.

Because, really. Why?

And yet, here we are.

With a homemade recipe for almond milk.

Because it’s like making your own mayo. And chocolate syrup.

Once you find out how easy it is, WHY WOULDN’T YOU MAKE IT?

And…It’s cheaper and way better for you.  

And that is that. I use almond milk in smoothies pretty regularly, and lately I’ve been hearing about people making their own, which is what got me intrigued. A lot of store-bought versions have carrageenan, which is stuff you want to stay away from. Namely because it’s not good for your digestive system and can cause inflammation, ulcerations, and bleeding. None of which we need.

So by making it yourself, you know exactly what’s going into it, and you save money to boot.

Win. Win.

You need a few inexpensive supplies, which you can reuse over and over again.

Namely, a nut milk bag.

And a glass jar.

Both of which I purchased from Amazon. Easy peasy.

Then just your ingredients (almonds, dates, water, cinnamon), and you’re all set.

I’ve got to say … even though it is SUPER SIMPLE to make, I was feeling mighty proud of myself when I was done and had 30 oz of homemade almond milk and it cost about six bucks for the ingredients.

Like … WHO DOES THAT?

WHO MAKES THEIR OWN ALMOND MILK?

Now we do. Yes, we do.

Almond Milk
Recipe courtesy of Cate O’Malley

Ingredients
1 pound almonds
4-5 pitted dates
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
dash of cinnamon
1-1/2 to 2 cups water

Directions
Put the almonds in a bowl and cover with water to soak overnight (or 6-8 hours). Drain the water and rinse the almonds. Put the almonds, dates, vanilla extract, cinnamon, and water into a heavy duty blender and blitz the heck out of it. You will see the almonds break down and turn into a pulp-like substance. Add a little more water as necessary to help move the pulverizing along. Put a large bowl on your counter. Put the nut milk bag in the bowl and dump the blender contents (pulp) into the nut milk bag. You will see the liquid start coming out into your bowl.

Keep squeezing the bag to get ALL the liquid out. Once done, use a funnel and pour the almond milk into a glass jar (I used this one) and store in your refrigerator. You can save the pulp and add a little bit to smoothies for extra bulk/nutrition, or discard.