Homemade Almond Milk + Paleo "Granola"

I have used store bought almond milk for a good few years now. As I have no problems with dairy, my reason for using almond milk is mostly because I liked the way it tasted in my cereal. And it was lower calorie than regular milk. But now that I have sworn off (almost) all grains...and looking for low calorie options for that matter...I use it for smoothies and almond milk ice cream...things like that. Anyways, I recently found out that most commercial almond milks contain very little almonds, costing a fraction of the price to produce, but still charging us close to $3 for a container. Not only do they contain few almonds but they add a bunch of crap that just doesn't need to be added. But, you know, almond milk companies are still a business and they need to make their $$. And they aren't going to do that if almond milk isn't a real viable replacement for cow's milk and all of the vitamins and minerals it has according to conventional wisdom. So what's an almond milk company to do? Pure almond milk certainly doesn't stand up to cow's milk. Add artificial vitamins! And for some reason almost every company out there that makes almond milk adds carrageenan to it. Ok, ok. I know why they add it. To make it creamier and because it acts as a stabilizer. Forget that it is known to mess with your digestive tract and cause inflammation...and has even been linked to cancer. Nope that doesn't matter as long as in the end you have a thicker beverage that doesn't separate. Amirite?

Ok I feel like I have been ranting a little bit here. When I found out some of the things up there I knew that making my own almond milk was an option, but to be honest I was kind of scared to do it. I thought for sure that it would be hard and time consuming and messy. Well it turns out it's actually super easy. Maybe a little messy. But if you ask J he'll tell you that I make a mess in the kitchen no matter what I'm doing. So maybe messy is up for debate. It's also way cheaper (how much cheaper will depend on how thick you want it). So, here we go:

1. Take 1/3 - 1/2 cup of raw almonds (use more if you want it thicker, less if you like it thinner) and soak for 4 hours. 
2. Drain. Rinse if needed.
3. Place almonds in a blender and add 4 cups of cold water.
4. Blend. Blend. Blend! 
5. The milk and the almond meal now needs to be separated. How you do this is up to you. You could use a cheese cloth. What I do is strain it through the re-usable coffee filter that comes with my coffee maker. I pop that into one of these pour over coffee things that way it's easy to get the milk into a mason jar. I personally find this method to be incredibly easy. 
6. done! That's it. Now you have your milk :) 
7. If you want pumpkin spice almond milk just add 1 tsp pumpkin spice before blending. Vanilla? Add some vanilla extract. The possibilities are endless. Sort of.
   
   

Now. What to do with the almond meal? You could use it for our meatballs. Or I like to make hemp protein balls. Or you can make this pumpkin spicy granola...it's quite delicious I tell you!

[INGREDIENTS]

• 3/4 cup almond meal
• 1/3 cup raw cashews, broken into pieces (or bought as such if you think ahead)
• 1/3 cup pecans, broken into pieces (or bought as such)
• 1/4 cup sunflower seeds
• 1 tsp. pumpkin spice
• 1/2 tbsp. honey
• 1 tbsp butter, melted (preferably grass-fed!)

**Note: you can honestly use any combination of nuts you want. This is just what I had on hand.

[DIRECTIONS]

1. Pre-heat oven to 300.
2. In a bowl mix together nuts, pumpkin spice, butter, and honey. Lay out on a cookie sheet.

   

   Like so.

3. Cook in oven for 15 minutes. Take out, move everything around, and put back in the oven. This will take 10-15 minutes. I didn't want to burn it so I kept checking every 5 minutes, but it ended up taking about 15 minutes more. It should have a nice golden color and be crunchy now.
   
4. Eat! and Enjoy! 

   

   Mmmm look at that goodness.