March In The Kitchen Tips

Healthy Home / Vitamix / March 24, 2014

This time of year with trying to get the garden revamped and ready for planting, there’s not a lot of time for recipe developing and testing, I’m actually lucky I’m even getting these Kitchen Tips posted. I hope you are starting to see the beginnings of Spring in your area and getting outside to enjoy them.

Some Kitchen Tips for the month of March.

When purchasing produce at a store that sells organic and non organic produce look for the little sticky label and make sure the number starts with the number 9. This tells you that what you are buying is organic. Unprocessed is a post that will help you understand why this is important.
Flax seed-Don’t buy pre-ground flaxseed. Buy whole flax seeds and grind them in old coffee grinder or vitamix just prior to needing flaxmeal. Once flax-seed is ground it begins to lose its nutrients.
Lemon storage-I just scored a big bag of Organic lemons at Costco and was wondering the best way to store them, as I really didn’t need them yet but didn’t want to pass them up as I am always using lemons. According to The Kitchn, they did some testing and found that storing the lemons in a sealed bag in the refrigerator got the lemons to last the longest.
Broccoli- break it apart and let soak in bowl of warm salt water for 10 minutes before preparing it to cook or use in a dish. Get’s rid of all the buggies that might have hitch hiked along for the ride.
Oven-new or not so new it’s always a good idea to check the temperature of your oven. Buy an oven thermometer, put it in the middle of your oven, set your oven to 350 degrees and if your oven is like mine it has a certain amount of minutes it says it will take to reach 350 degrees. When that time is up, check the temperature on the oven thermometer and make sure it agrees. If not, time how much longer it takes to warm up to 350 degrees. If it never reaches 350 degrees, then you will have to adjust the temperature setting. End result, if your oven isn’t preheating in the time it says, than at least you are aware and can plan ahead to let it warm up longer. If it’s only reaching 325 degrees, then you know you have to bump it up to 375 degrees to get it up to 350 degrees. If all else fails tell the hubby you need a new oven.
Coconut flour- When using coconut flour, don’t pack it into your measuring cup, shake up the bag of flour to fluff it and then scoop out what you need
Excess lemons-If you have too many lemons you don’t think you will use before they start to shrivel, squeeze out the juice using a lemon squeezer and either pour into ice-cube trays and freeze or pour into glass jar and store in refrigerator.
Mangos-they are in season and are easy to freeze. Wash, peel, slice and freeze. That way in the middle of December you can still be enjoying them in your smoothies and salads.
Coconut Milk-Tired of paying the high price for non-dairy milk in the carton, which contains carrageenan? Use this recipe to make a super simple version of Carrageenan free coconut milk.
Baby food-no need to get fancy and no need to buy expensive store-bought baby food, simply steam up some vegetables of your choice or the baby’s choice and put them in the blender for a quick whirl and freeze in ice-cube trays. Pop out, keep in a container in freezer, take out as you need them.