Make Your Own | One Sweet Heat

Need a little spice in your life? Or maybe just on your sandwiches? Yes?

This mayo will do just the trick.

Recently, I started making our own homemade mayo thanks to a recipe I pinned on Pinterest. I made it exactly as is the first time, then made my own adjustment (we like it better without any olive oil). After successfully making plain mayo a few times, and with an over-abundance of habanero peppers thanks to the plant in my garden (which has given us over 30 habaneros already!), I decided to put a spicy twist on a common condiment.

All I can say is, the hubs loves me even more after this concoction. And I can also say that he’s happy that there will soon be many more habanero-themed dishes/condiments/salsas etc, because our plant is producing so many that we are giving them away! But I gotta use some of these hot peppers for us, too!

I originally was going to call this “Habanero Lime Mayonnaise”, but honestly, you can’t really taste the lime. The habanero, however, is a different story!

I immediately put some homemade roasted chicken, avocado, and tomato on that piece of bread and had a delicious sandwich. This mayo totally made the sandwich!

Ingredients:
Recipe adapted from Spain in Iowa

1 egg plus 1 egg yolk
1/2 tsp sea salt
2 TBSP fresh-squeezed lime juice (lemon juice works just as well)
1 cup grapeseed oil
1 habanero pepper

Directions:

Slice habanero and remove seeds. Put it in the blender with all other ingredients except grapeseed oil. Pulse the blender or blend on low for just a few seconds, until ingredients are mixed and habanero is blended smooth.
If using a Vitamix (this is what I use), turn on low speed (or somewhere between variable 5-7) and add oil slowly. You can add about 1/4 cup to start, then just pour through the hole in the lid at a somewhat slow pace. It should take less than a minute to make the mayo in your VitaMix. Store immediately in the fridge to keep for a week or see note below to have it keep for 2 months.
If using a regular blender, turn onto high speed and add oil very slowly until it is thickened to a mayo consistency. It may take a few minutes, but be patient because adding the oil slowly is the key (I know this because I came up with mayo water one time when I decided to add it all at once – no bueno). Store immediately in the fridge to keep for a week or see note below to have it keep for 2 months.
If you want your mayo to keep for up to two months, add 1 TBSP whey and let it sit on the counter for 6-8 hours. Whey is the biproduct of cheese, yogurt, etc. You can drain plain yogurt on several layers of cheesecloth to easily get whey. Once you have let it sit at room temperature, store it in the fridge.

Note: If you do not like things very spicy, use half or even a quarter of the habanero. If you like things ultra spicy, do not seed the pepper or only remove a few seeds. The mayo has a definite “kick”. It is perfect for me, and I like things on the spicier side. The hubs, however, requested it be even spicier (but he’s on the verge of crazy when it comes to spicy things…ha!).

This recipe was shared on Full Plate Thursday, Little House in the Suburbs DIY Linky

We make our own almond milk and pecan milk here at our casa. It has both saved us money and allowed us to control exactly what goes in it. For drinking, we both like ours on the sweeter side, so I add dates and vanilla to it to sweeten it up naturally. I also make an unsweetened version for baking and cooking, so as not to add any unnecessary flavors to the recipe.

It’s easy to make and as I mentioned earlier, it’s very cost effective. On average, a half gallon of almond milk around here costs $2.50-$3.00. One half gallon of homemade almond or pecan milk costs us roughly $1.32, so we’re saving over a dollar on each half gallon. We buy whole almonds at Sam’s Club in a 3 lb bag for $10.99 or a 3 lb bag of pecan meal (which works just as great in pecan milk as whole pecans) at a local pecan company for the same price. With as much almond milk as we use, it really saves us a lot. We use it in our smoothies, our ice cream, and in place of regular milk in any recipe I come across.

I use our Vitamix to make almond milk. If you don’t have a VitaMix, you can still make this recipe, but I would reccomend soaking your almonds for 8 hours in water so that they will absorb some of the water and soften up a bit. If you are using pecans or another softer nut (ahem! Get your mind out of the gutter!), I think you should be fine to go ahead without soaking them.

We have the Vitamix 1782 TurboBlend, 2 Speed and we absolutely love it. We use it for all kinds of things – from almond milk to smoothies, nut butters, homemade ice cream, and much more. We use it at least three times a day, sometimes more.

This milk is creamy if made with less water, and goes a longer way when made with more. We tend to make our “drinking” milk creamier, while the milk we use for recipes I like to thin out with an extra cup of water, just to stretch our dollar a little further and to get a better consistency for baking and cooking. I strain it through a nut milk bag to get out all the “grit” – and even that can be reused for cookies and other recipes!

This milk is just as delicious as store-bought almond milk, and best of all, if you want it sweeter, less sweet, or flavored with anything, you can do it yourself!

Ingredients:

1 cup raw, unsalted almonds
4-5 cups water (depending on how thick you like it)
3 dates (optional)
1/2 tsp vanilla (optional)

Directions:

Combine all ingredients in your VitaMix and blend on high for 1 minute. Strain through a nut milk bag. Discard of almond pulp left in bag or save for other recipes. The almond milk should keep for at least a week in the fridge.

*Note: If you do not have a Vitamix, soak your almonds in enough water to cover them for 8 hours or overnight before blending.

Category Archives: Make Your Own

Habanero Mayonnaise

Making Almond Milk at Home