Ginger and chili kick starter – without a juicer

Are you among those people that believe that you need a nice and expensive juicer to make your own juice? Well, I was once one of those people and as I knew I was moving from one end of the world to another I didn’t wanna go and spend the necessary amount of money on a juicer and was therefore not making any juices.
After a winter with a few colds, a sore throat and a bad craving for home made juice I decided to come up with an alternative. I went to my kitchen, looked in all my cabinets and quickly decided to try the blender, bowl, colander and kitchen towel method and you know what? It worked perfectly… and in that moment I realized that I had probably just saved about $200 (the average price for a good juicer in Denmark) – $200 that I could use on something else and still get a perfect juice whenever I wanted 🙂
Know that I have moved I still use this method as I find it a little stupid to spent money on something that I can do myself and get the same result. Of cause it takes a little longer (15 minutes) but I think it is worth it in the end and you will definitely fell more passionately about your juice when it is made this way 🙂

If you get hooked on the juice-without-a-juicer idea, you can check out my other my other juice recipes which includes carrot and clementine, clementine and orange, cranberry enegizer and the green vitamin bomb.

Ingredients (4 servings)

2 large or 4 medium apples

1 orange

0.5 lemon

1 chili

1 tbsp ginger root

0.5 cup water, cold

Rinse the apples in cold water, remove the core and chop into smaller pieces. Place in a regular blender together with the cold water. Blend for a few seconds to give space to remaining ingredients (this is not necessary if your blender is big enough to contain it all).
Peel the orange, lemon and ginger, cut it into smaller pieces and add it to the blended apples together with the chili. I have used a Tabasco chili, which gives it a little kick – not too much, not too little, but you can use any chili.
Blend it all well together. I use the ‘liquify’ button on my KitchenAid blender for about 30 seconds.

Ginger & chili juice 1

Find a bowl, a colander and a kitchen towel. It is important that it is a brand new kitchen towel that you only use for juicing and nothing else.
Place the colander in the bowl, cover it with the towel and pour approximately half of your juice batter into the towel.Ginger & chili juice 2

Use one hand to assemble the towel and the other hand to twist it around. Keep twisting to get all the juices out. Remove the all the dry fruit from the towel and repeat the process with the other half of the juice batter.
This portion makes about 3.5 cups (a lille less than 1 liter) and is enough for 4 servings.

Ginger & chili juice 3

Let the juice rest in the fridge for an hour or two if you want a strong ginger taste. Otherwise you can serve immediately in a glass with a few ice cubes.
If you have kids and plan on serving this juice for breakfast, you should consider leaving out the chili and only use half of the ginger.

Serve for breakfast, after a trip to the gym or use it as a natural remedy against a sore throat. This juice can be serves for anything at any time, so there is no excuse for not trying it 🙂

FOOD ON DEMANT (2 of 2)

Bon Appétit Friends!

Ingredients (4 servings)

2 large or 4 medium apples

1 orange

0.5 lemon

1 chili

1 tbsp ginger root

1.25 dl water, cold

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Spicy Elderflower Cordial and Syrup

I few days ago I was out walk with my mom and a friend of mine. We went to walk my friends moms dog, but we ended up going on an elderflower hunt instead 😀

We went to an area where there in our childhood was a playground, but unfortunately (for the kids living there now) the area is now overgrown with  nettles, ground elder, brambles and elderflowers. There had been some elderflower pickers before us, so we had to go home to get a garden cultivator so that we could get the top flowers. In a short while we had picked more than 50 elderflower heads and were ready to walk the now very impatient dog 😀

The elderflower season in Denmark is normally in May/June, but due to the cold weather we have had this spring, you might still be lucky to find some during the next few weeks 🙂

 

Ingredients

30 – 40 elderflower heads

3 organic lemons, sliced

4 inches ginger root, peeled and sliced

2 red chilies, sliced

4 cups cane sugar

2 tbsp. citric acid

6 cups water

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Heat the water until it begins to boil. Carefully remove all the small insects and other not-elderflower-objects from the elderflowers heads, but DON’T rinse! Rinsing them will remove the pollen from the flowers, and the end-result will be less tasteful!

Place all ingredients, except water, in a heat proof bowl and cover it with the boiling water. Stir to combine and dissolve the sugar.

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Cover the bowl with a lid or plastic wrap and fridge for 3-4 days, stirring occasionally (at least once a day).

Filter the juice through some tightly woven fabric and into cleaned bottles or ice cube bags if you want some for the freezer. If bottled, keep cool for up to 4 weeks.

This portion makes 6 cups of elderflower cordial, but I have chosen only to bottle 4 cups, and make syrup from the remaining 2 cups.

Use for lemonade (1 cup elderflower cordial to 4 cups cold water, 10 ice cubes and 1 sliced organic lemon) or do as me – make elderflower cupcakes  (recipe will follow) 🙂

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Elderflower Syrup (1 cup)

2 cups elderflower cordial

 

Heat up the elderflower cordial at low-medium heat in a saucepan. Stir occasionally and let cook until reduced properly. It is up to you, what you think is ‘properly’, but i have reduced it down to 1 cup. You can easily reduce i more, but be careful that it doesn’t burn.

Use for Elderflower Latte, as a syrup for aged cheese, as a cocktail syrup or as an ingredient to you summer cupcakes.

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Bon Appétit!

Ingredients (elderflower cordial)

30 – 40 elderflower heads

3 organic lemons, sliced

10 cm ginger root, peeled and sliced

2 red chilies, sliced

10 dl cane sugar

2 tbsp. citric acid

1.5 liter water

 

Elderflower Syrup (1 cup)

5 dl elderflower cordial