little pink devotional

Cow milk is for baby cows.  Soy milk is controversial (consuming too many soy products has been linked to breast cancer) and hard to digest.  Almond milk is good, but sometimes a girl needs a change. 

Why not cashew milk? Cashew milk is used in many raw food recipes, and inspired by my newly cleansed super-friend Snack, I decided to make a batch of fresh, homemade cashew milk. I discovered that it’s super easy and super delish!

Little Pink Devotional’s Cashew Milk

Ingredients:

• 2 cups of organic, raw cashews
• 1 vanilla bean pod
• Fresh or ground nutmeg
• Cinnamon
• Agave nectar
• Water

Variations: pure maple syrup, a pinch of Celtic Sea Salt, honey.

Step One: Soak the cashews in a bowl of water, leave overnight in the fridge.

Step Two: Strain and rinse the cashews very well.

Step Three: Plop the ‘shews in a blender. Add cinnamon and nutmeg (start with a little, you can always add more), a drizzle of agave nectar and fresh vanilla. If using a fresh vanilla pod, simply slice it open with a knife and scrape out the black, sticky vanilla guts and add them in. I used a whole pod. You can also use vanilla extract, but I like how fresh vanilla leaves those pretty black bean specks. Add water. If you want to make cashew cream, which is awesome in coffee or as a dessert topping, only add 1/2 cup of water. If you want cashew milk for smoothies, cereal or drinking, add 2 or more cups depending on how thick you like your milk. Experiment! You really can’t go wrong!

Step Four: Blend it all together until uniform, smooth and creamy. Taste it. Adjust spices and water to your liking.

Step Five: Place your cashew milk in a sealed container (a glass milk or mason jar is perfect)and refrigerate. Cashew milk will delicately seperate and leave a nice cream on the top overnight. Shake before serving. Fresh cashew milk keeps refrigerated for up 7 days. Freeze for longer keeping.

That’s it! So easy. If you want to get fancy, you can strain the cashew milk over a cheesecloth, squeezing out the milk, which leaves you with both cashew milk and cashew flour, which is great for gluten free, naturally low-carbohydrate baked goodies!

Cashew milk ideas:

Smoothies. I had one this morning and it was to die for. Half a ripe nanner, some frozen berries and powdered super greens blended with cashew milk? So delish and held me over all morning.

As a cereal topping. Imagine fresh cashew milk over homemade granola. Who’s the queen of brunch now?

French toast batter. Num!

Used in baked goods. Banana muffins, zucchini bread, cookies, cakes…experiment!

Creamer for coffee or tea.

A topping for berries or desserts.

Thai iced tea!

Cashew milk hot cocoa.

Woah.

I just discovered something so awesome. Hemp Milk ice cream. It’s so creamy, so delicious, so chocolately awesome, I couldn’t believe my mouth! Being the ice cream fanatic that I am, this is a big deal. I would even say that, if Tempt can come up with some more flavors (they currently have vanilla bean, chocolate fudge and mint chip), I may never even think about Molly Moon’s again.

Go vegan treats, go!

Zoe has befriended Claire, this amazing nine-year-old with a boy haircut who lives two doors down.

Enjoying a nice fire out back one night, I offered Claire a perfectly white, firm marshmallow and a stick, so she could enjoy a S’more with the rest of us. She politely declined and said “I don’t eat anything that’s dead, and marshmallows are made with gelatin, which is crushed animal bones.”

We smiled with those grown-up smiles that say “Isn’t she darling?”

Claire didn’t bat a lash. The girls skipped away into the dusk to continue playing in their magical vegan child world.

On my way to the kitchen sink, I noticed the paraphenelia Claire left behind: a list of vegetarian and vegan restaurants in Seattle, and a comprehensive pamphlet on animal cruelty.

Influenced by her older friend, Zoe is now a vegan. She was pescetarian a few weeks ago, but she informed me of her full conversion over sushi tonight.

For the record, I fully support this decision, even if it is just a temporary experiment in culinary maturity. I totally get it, and have struggled with eating meat a few times. There are some meaty things I enjoy (like, everything meaty), but when I think about that meat too long, I realize what I’m eating…FLESH. I am eating the flesh of an animal. And I think about skin. And I look down at my arm, and… shudder. I could probably kill a rabbit in the wild if I was starving to death, but that fact is, I’m not. I live in middle class America. I’m definitely not starving.

So I’m really excited about having a vegan seven year old. Hopefully this isn’t the beginning of a series of crazy lifestyle choices. Tofu pups I can handle, but facial tattoos and a carnival-working boyfriend named “Skabs” I cannot.

I have learned of a new cupcake joint in Seattle, and my first reaction is SERIOUSLY? C’mon, Emerald City. Can’t you think of something else already? I mean hey, I’m not one to turn down cake, but this whole cupcake trend is over, isn’t it? Haven’t cupcakes gone the way of the Mongolian Grill? What about a bialy shop? Or an edible underwear café? Something.

And yet, the more I scoff at the idea of yet ANOTHER DARLING CUPCAKE SHOP, the more I think about cupcakes. And I think about how small and good they are. And I think about going there right now and ordering a dozen freshly baked little cupcakes and buying a big carton of ice cold milk and going home, getting in my comfies, hopping on the couch, watching an old movie and slowly nodding off into a deliciously regretful sugar coma.

Damn you, cupcake.

When I was ten years old, my father and I took a trip to Paris, leaving my younger brother and mother in London where she was filming a movie. My dad believed in one-on-one time with us, and sometimes that extended to a weekend away. We stayed at a great hotel and he said I could order whatever I wanted for breakfast (French fries). We went to the Pompidou museum, the Eiffel Tower and the Louvre - the usual spots. It was pretty great. On the plane back to London he asked me if I knew why we had gone, just he and I, to Paris for the weekend. I said no, but I felt so lucky for the trip. He said, “I wanted you to see Paris for the first time with a man who would always love you, no matter what.”

I read this today on (my completely guilty pleasure) GOOP.  Makes me tear up a bit.  I’m such a sucker for wonderful dads.

I’ve had a file in my life for seven years.

This file has moved with me five times, stuffed in drawers and cabinets along with important papers and documents.  When inspired to roll up my sleeves and get to it, the file has been opened, only to be closed again when the inevitable roadblock stood in my way.

A constant item on my to do list, the file has been an object of stress, sadness, regret.  The file represents a time in my life when I was at my weakest.  A time in my life when my stupidity was not only evident to me, but to everyone else.  The file was my biggest mistake, and I carried it with me everywhere I went.

Finally, after seven years of living with the file, dealing with the confusion of court orders, fees, lawyers, emotions…I have completed the final task.  I wrote the final check.  I licked my very last stamp on my very last letter and spoke to the very last clerk I will ever speak to.

What I feel right now is indescribable.  The mistakes I made, the regret I’ve carried, the shame, the fear, the dwelling on these things, is over.  It has left a shadow, a memory, but I feel now that I can move forward with honesty, with transparency.  My past no longer stays on me like a scarlet letter.

My daughter finally has my last name, and a new birth certificate to prove it.  The man who signed his name on the dotted line is no longer listed.  He no longer exists.  I am no longer waiting for the aftershock that follows an earthquake, wondering, worrying, living with the file of papers and amended court orders that involve three states and lawyers whose phone numbers have changed.

I am her mother, and she is my little girl.

I raised her right, alone.  It was hard.  Sometimes I called my mom and said I couldn’t do it anymore, her spastic two year old body throwing itself against the bedroom door in a full blown toddler tantrum in the heat of a Montana July.  I missed out on my Roaring Twenties, a time that should have been spent living in New York, following my dreams, going to art school, falling in love, having my heart broken, riding trains across Europe.  Instead, I was pumping milk for a two pound preemie, changing diapers, breastfeeding, potty training, determining the effectiveness of Time Out.  I was up to my deflated boobs in poop, pee, Cheerios and Guess How Much I Love You.

But I did it.  And I did it alone.  This document is the last nail in the coffin, and the validation that I didn’t know I needed.  My daughter is proof that I did an alright job, but this piece of paper is proof that I did it alone, and that makes me feel like a big girl.

The file is going away now.  In the paper shredder.

And I, my friends, am getting drunk.