Washing powder finale

This week I came to a conclusion, I could keep hunting for the “perfect” washing powder recipe or I could stick with one I have. Really what was so wrong with it? It gets most of my things clean and smelling fresh… just spray the stains. I am happy that I am getting our clothes and linen clean with less chemicals and go with that. Then I discovered a recipe for homemade stain-remover spray (which I have not tried yet) and this… Australian Botanical Soap, you can find there website here.

So I made some up into washing powder, the lavender smell is so strong that I did not need to add any essential oil. It actually looks and smells exactly like regular washing powder (the nice kind). It cleans the clothes and makes them fresh. I also liked that they used sustainable palm oil. This is important as it gives the communities who would destroy orangutan  forest, an alternative way to survive; allowing them an income for now and setting up for future generations. This soap also feels closer to the castile soap in texture, so I have hope that I may (after a few washes) need the pre-wash spray less.

I used the 2nd washing powder recipe and after the 3rd recipe I have become accustomed to the freshness that comes with the addition of acid so now I add a small cap-full of vinegar to each wash instead of powdered citric acid. When grated, this soap makes about 1.5 cups I used a “1 cup” ratio and then made the second part with my 1 cup a quarter cup… this saved me a maths equation.

Update

I have not found the Natural New-Age Mum’s pre-wash stain remover that I found here to be particularly effective, however it might work for you, and it does make the wash smell nice. I have read that Lemon essential oil is an effective stain remover as is tea-tree oil. I also read that coconut-oil based soaps are more effective for laundry soap powder, I may experiment with adding the above oils and coconut oil soap to my powder. If you are still searching for your “goldilocks” laundry powder recipe you may find this helpful.

Smurf

OMG how cute is this. There was a staff email to come and see the new goats at the Ag farm where I work so I went down and had a long cuddle of this little guy, “Smurf”. He just closed his eyes and snuggled in and probably would have stayed there all day if I let him!

If we didn’t have melioidosis in our soil I would get some mini’s in a heart beat!

New recipes with Thermie

I love Chicken Tonight Honey Mustard sauce, but I am not keen on the additives. This week I found on the recipe community a recipe that is how I remember it tasting, but looks slightly brighter in colour. Recipe here. Honey was not as excited as I was but he ate it without too much complaining. I also decided to try “filleting” chicken legs. there were a few bones that made it in, but I liked that I saved some money on the chicken meat, and our fury child had a huge treat he would otherwise have missed out on. It didn’t take that much longer to dice the chicken and it helped to have it slightly frozen still. If we didn’t have a huge Meremma that would be offended if we didn’t share our yummy food with him, keeping the bones would be invaluable for a delicious chicken stock. I now regularly offend our fury son by keeping our bones aside to make stock.

What was somewhat disappointing in Honey’s reaction to the fist recipe, was completely restored in his reaction to the next one I tried this week, Chicken Satay also on the recipe community here. There were many to choose from, I did not have all the ingredients so made some substitutions… Fish sauce for oyster sauce, soy sauce for tamrai, sweet chilli sauce for a chilli, masala for fennel. Also honey is anti-mixed food, so I kept the veggies separate, steamed in the varoma.

The first batch of Satay I made, I added mushrooms to, as we had some and it was nice too. Our visitors enjoyed the food, and we enjoyed their company. Probably the next best part of having so many people love the food I made, was making some peanut butter. Honey turned me off buying some once by mentioning the “rats per tonnage” thing… We had lots of fun making it in under a minute with a Zero RPT.

Tonight I made this recipe. If you are not a member of the group you may not be able to see the  I used mostly fresh herbs- ginger, garlic, onion, chives (from our garden) and corriander. I made the sauce in Thermie and poured it over some chicken wings (minus the “finger” parts, Snuffy enjoyed them) in the slow cooker and went off to work (I got this idea from a TM consultant who is in the group, she used drumsticks). When I returned home I cooked the rice and veggies in the TM bowl and varoma. It was very nice. However I think I will add some sweet potato next time to the curry. If you have any type Thermomixer machine, or even want one; I absolutely recommend joining this group on FB. Also worth a look is Thermobextas and Thermostruck.

Chicken Madras - HCG P2 Compliant, Paleo, Grain Free, Dairy Free

By Nikalene Riddle (Skinnymixers FB group)
I used Sweet chilli sauce instead of chilli flakes,  Omitted 2 handfuls of baby spinach and served with brown rice in lieu of cauliflower rice