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Thank you to all who contributed to last week’s seasonal recipe round-up featuring spinach. I selected three recipes to feature, and below I’ll tell you why.

Remember, you can continue to add your spinach recipes to last week’s round-up. And join us next Friday, the 25th, for a round-up featuring rhubarb.

Featured Spinach Recipes

Featured post bloggers, please grab the badge above and display it on your site! Link it to this post or last week’s round up. See below for how to get your free thank you video for being featured.

Here are the spinach recipes I chose to feature. As you look through these and the others in the round-up, you’ll see that almost none of them call for steaming the spinach before using in the dish, as we discussed one should do to reduce oxalic acid.

I really think this is okay. Maybe not ideal, but not detrimental if done occasionally. The first two recipes could easily call for pre-steamed spinach, in my opinion. The final recipe could, too, though it might suffer in texture. In any case, enjoy browsing and give these bloggers a pat on the back for their tasty contributions!

Chicken and Spinach Sausage from Debbie at Easy Natural Food. Debbie makes her own breakfast sausage so she knows exactly what goes into it. (Have you seen the ingredients list on most packaged sausages?) These little beauties look terrific. Since we like to make our own sausages, too, and we’re growing a bunch of spinach, I’m saving this recipe to my Evernote for later. Thanks, Debbie!

Spanakopitta with Eggs from Madeleine at NZ Eco Chic. Madeleine loves spanakopitta and she adapted a recipe to create her own featuring spinach. She says it freezes very well, though it doesn’t last that long. It calls for three sheets of phyllo, and to be honest, I’ve never run across a whole-grain substitution for this. Does anyone have any suggestions? With only three sheets, and it being white flour which lacks phytic acid, it probably isn’t a big deal to just leave it be. Unless you’re allergic or on GAPS, of course.

Spinach and Kale Rabe Baked Eggs from Kristin at The Intentional Minimalist. Gorgeous, isn’t it? Using not only spinach but other seasonal vegetables as well (kale, chives, shallots, and eggs), serving this dish would bring joy to any table. Mmm…

Go check out the rest of the seasonal recipe round-up because many recipes look temptingly good!

Free Thank You Video

Featured bloggers (Debbie, Madeleine, and Kristin) please use the contact page to send me a message telling me which thank you video you’d like.

Seasonal Recipe Round-Up Schedule: April through June

Here’s our round-up schedule again, so you know what’s up ahead.

• Friday, April 27, 2012 — Chard
• Friday, May 11, 2012 — Spinach
• Friday, May 25, 2012 — Rhubarb
• Friday, June 8, 2012 — Asparagus
• Friday, June 22, 2012 — Strawberries

All seasonal recipe round-ups are (and will be) listed on the Recipes page.

Have a blessed weekend, everyone!

P.S. Just a reminder: don’t forget you can get 10% off your orders at MadeOn Hard Lotion through May 31, 2012 by using coupon code gnowmay12. Click here to browse or buy.

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Welcome to our second Seasonal Recipe Round-Up! This time we’re featuring spinach (and next time is rhubarb — see schedule below). I’m sharing my tips and a favorite recipe, and you can participate by sharing your own tips and/or recipes in the linky or in the comments.

Keep reading for details on how to get a free eCourse thank you video by participating!

What is Spinach?

Spinach is a dark leafy green (like chard, kale, beet greens, collard greens, mustard greens). There are many varieties of spinach, categorized by leaf type. Savoy has curly, springy leaves. Then you’ve got flat-leaf spinach, and finally baby spinach. I find the flavor earthy and a little sweet. Definitely mild.

Though spinach can be grown year-round in the right conditions (not too hot, not too cold), its seasons are really March through May and September through October. Our property is cool (north-facing) and we’re just getting our gardens in — one of the first things I’ll plant will be spinach.

The Good and the Bad

Spinach one of the more nutritious vegetables, being high in vitamins and minerals, especially Vtamin C. However, it also (like other dark leafy greens) contains an anti-nutrient called oxalic acid. Oxalic acid binds with minerals in the digestive tract just as phytic acid does. To reduce oxalic acid, you should steam or ferment dark leafy greens. The recipe I’m sharing today is a fermented spinach recipe — spinach kraut. For more fermented green recipes, see my online class in lacto-fermentation or my book The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Fermenting Foods.

How to Steam Spinach

Steam for just long enough to wilt the spinach (about a minute), but keep it brightly colored — this reduces oxalic acid yet preserves other nutrition. You can use a steamer basket, or you can put the spinach right in a few inches of simmering water in a pot.

Once steamed, drain the cooking water and discard it; it contains oxalic acid plus other impurities (like pesticides or nitrites if the produce was conventional). Then toss with additional ingredients or add to soups or dishes. For an example of this technique, see my Feta and Chard recipe.

You might run into recipes that call for an addition of greens to be cooked right along with everything else. This keeps the oxalic acid in the dish. Instead, steam the greens separately and add them to the dish after draining.

My Mom’s Lemon Spinach

This is my mom’s delicious and simple steamed spinach dish, and we made it just this week during her visit. We saute onions and garlic in butter while steaming the spinach separately. Then we toss them together, season with salt, and drizzle with lemon juice.

What About Green Smoothies?

It is best to add raw greens like spinach sparingly, rather than regularly. As an alternative, consider steaming the spinach, then adding it to the smoothie after it is cooled. If you have an abundance of spinach, steam it then freeze or dehydrate it to add to smoothies over time.

How to Store and Use Spinach

Store unwashed leaves in plastic bags in your refrigerator (preferably a crisper drawer) for 2 to 3 days, or up to a week. To use, wash and dry leaves. Trim off ends and any bad spots. Then use in recipes.

My Recipe: Spinach Kraut

In today’s Seasonal Recipe Round-Up, I’m sharing a fresh and lemon take on kraut — Spinach Kraut. We love to take this on picnics or serve alongside cold meats, cheese, crackers — or any kind of eggs!

Click here to see my recipe for Spinach Kraut.

Now, it is your turn to share! See below for details on how I might feature your recipe/tips and how those featured get to choose a free eCourse thank you video.

Share Your Spinach Recipes and Tips!

Use the linky box below (or post in the comments) to share your spinach recipes and tips. Use old or new posts and as many as you’d like. The linky will not close, so you can come back later with your recipes if spinach is not in season for you yet. I look forward to seeing what you’ll add!

Here’s the fun part! Next Friday, I will feature a select group of the recipes and/or tips shared in this link-up. Everyone featured (whether blogger OR commenter) will get to choose a free eCourse thank you video!

Seasonal Recipe Round-Up Schedule: April through June

• Friday, April 27, 2012 — Chard
• Friday, May 11, 2012 — Spinach
• Friday, May 25, 2012 — Rhubarb
• Friday, June 8, 2012 — Asparagus
• Friday, June 22, 2012 — Strawberries

All seasonal recipe round-ups are (and will be) listed on the Recipes page.

Check back next week to see if your recipe or tips are featured! Then come back on Friday, May 25 for our rhubarb link-up in the Seasonal Recipe Round-Up.

This post is shared with Simple Lives Thursday.

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Did you know you can ferment all manner of greens? Yes, you can — and it is a good idea because dark leafy greens are high in oxalic acid. Fermentation (and steaming) reduces this anti-nutrient which otherwise would interfere with mineral absorption.

Spinach kraut is a lemony fresh and salty take on regular old cabbage kraut. We love it. Love, love, love it. (My new book, The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Fermenting Foods and online fermenting class  include recipes for fermenting lemon and dill spinach sticks, too.)

Spinach Kraut

• 15 cups tightly packed fresh spinach
• 4 cloves garlic, diced finely (optional)
• 1/2 tablespoon sea salt
• 1/4 cup whey –or– leftover juice from another ferment –or– double the salt (here’s more info about whey and substitutions)
• a quarter lemon wedge (optional)

Makes 1 quart. Chop up the spinach coarsely and toss it with all the other ingredients (except lemon) in a bowl. Cover the bowl with a tea towel and just let it sit for about a half hour. During that time, the salt will begin to pull juices out of the spinach and the mixture will get juicy. You can mash it to help it along. Pack it all in a quart size fermenting container. Tuck the lemon wedge in, too. Leave 1″ space at the top of the jar. Cover the jar tightly with its lid or with airlock if you’re using that. Let ferment at room temperature for about 2 to 3 days, then transfer to cool storage.

MMMM…. I wish I had some of this now. We love taking this on picnics! Are you willing to give this a try? Let me know if you do!

I’m sharing this recipe in the Seasonal Recipe Round-Up featuring spinach, Simple Lives Thursday, Pennywise Platter Thursday, and Fight Back Friday.

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Thank you to all who contributed to last week’s seasonal recipe round-up featuring chard. Now it is time to feature some of your recipes. As I looked through what was submitted, I found I wanted to try so many! I selected three recipes to feature, and below I’ll tell you why.

Remember, you can continue to add your chard recipes to last week’s round-up. And join us next Friday, the 11th, for a round-up featuring spinach.

Featured Chard Recipes

Featured post bloggers, please grab the badge above and display it on your site! Link it to this post, or last week’s seasonal recipe round-up featuring chard. See below for how to get your free thank you video for being featured.

I’ll be choosing a set of featured recipes from each seasonal recipe round-up. Honestly, I had a hard time picking just these because all the recipes looked so good!

Spiraled Meat Loaf with Swiss Chard and Spinach from Amanda at Iron Rich Food. I am definitely planning to make this! What I most love about Amanda’s meat loaf is the creativity. This is meatloaf with the wow-factor. From a nutritional stand-point, the greens are steamed before getting rolled up in the loaf — ensuring that oxalic acid is washed away. The finished meatloaf looks gorgeous. Who wouldn’t be proud to make such a dish? The recipe looks easy enough in the recipe steps thanks to great pictures of all the steps. Great recipe, Amanda. Thank you for adding it to the chard round-up!

Swish Chard Quiche from Hannah at Mountain Musings. Hannah’s beautiful and simple quiche uses pre-steamed chard for good nutrition. I also love that this dish centers around two other foods usually found in abundance this time of year — cream, cheese, and eggs. With eggs and creamy, sweet milk coming out our ears (or our farmer’s ears), this quiche makes lovely use of those other seasonal foods, too. The best part of Hannah’s recipe post was her Granny’s recommendation to freeze chard to make this all year.

If you’re on GAPS or dairy-free, check out Starlene’s chard and onion quiche which uses a coconut four crust and is, of course, GAPS-friendly. Starlene blogs at GAPS Diet Journey and offers a great free download to newsletter subscribers — a list of approved GAPS foods. In the comments, Holly and Starlene discuss steaming the chard first. They’re one step ahead and ready for you. Great step-by-step photos in this post, too. Thank you, Starlene!

Honestly, I could just keep going… I loved all of your recipes! Go check out the rest of the chard round-up because all the recipes are worth being featured.

Free Thank You Video

Featured bloggers (Amanda, Hannah, and Starlene) please use the contact page to send me a message telling me which thank you video you’d like. May’s video is not listed yet, but can be chosen: GAPS-friendly cinnamon and walnut almond flour muffins.

Seasonal Recipe Round-Up Schedule: April through June

Here’s our round-up schedule again, so you know what’s up ahead. I’ll see you next Friday, May 11th, for spinach!

• Friday, April 27, 2012 — Chard
• Friday, May 11, 2012 — Spinach
• Friday, May 25, 2012 — Rhubarb
• Friday, June 8, 2012 — Asparagus
• Friday, June 22, 2012 — Strawberries

All seasonal recipe round-ups are (and will be) listed on the Recipes page.

Have a blessed weekend, everyone!

P.S. Just a reminder: don’t forget you can get 10% off your orders at MadeOn Hard Lotion through May 31, 2012 by using coupon code gnowmay12. Click here to browse or buy. There might yet be time for Mother’s Day! The DIY hard lotion and lip balm kits are frugal and fantastic.

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Welcome to our first Seasonal Recipe Round-Up! This time we’re featuring chard (and next time is spinach — see schedule below). I’m sharing my tips and a favorite recipe, and you can participate by sharing your own tips and/or recipes in the linky or in the comments.

Keep reading for details on how to get a free eCourse thank you video by participating!

What is Chard?

Chard is a dark leafy green (like spinach, kale, beet greens, collard greens, mustard greens). You have probably heard of swiss chard or rainbow chard, and there are others. Rainbow chard is a variety of chard all growing together — and it is beautiful!

Chard is a spring green, though it can grow through the winter in mild climates, especially under a cold-frame roof. Our friends with whom we gardened last year have a few chard plants that grow perpetually under the cold frame so we ate it all spring, summer, fall, and winter.

The Good and the Bad

Chard, and the other dark leafy greens, contain abundant vitamins, minerals but also an anti-nutrient called oxalic acid. Oxalic acid binds with minerals in the digestive tract just as phytic acid does. To reduce oxalic acid, you should steam or ferment dark leafy greens. To ferment greens, see my online class in lacto-fermentation or my book The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Fermenting Foods.

How to Steam Chard

Steam for just long enough to wilt the greens (about five minutes), but keep them brightly colored — this reduces oxalic acid yet preserves other nutrition. You can use a steamer basket, or you can put the chard right in a few inches of simmering water in a pot.

Once steamed, drain the chard and discard the cooking water because it contains oxalic acid plus other impurities (like pesticides or nitrites if the produce was conventional). Then toss with additional ingredients or add to soups or dishes. For an example of this technique, see my Feta and Chard recipe.

You might run into recipes that call for an addition of greens to be cooked right along with everything else. This keeps the oxalic acid in the dish. Instead, steam the greens separately and add them to the dish after draining.

What About Green Smoothies?

It is best to add raw greens like chard sparingly, rather than regularly. As an alternative, consider steaming the chard, then adding it to the smoothie after it is cooled. If you have an abundance of chard, steam it then freeze or dehydrate it to add to smoothies over time.

How to Store and Use Chard

Store unwashed leaves in plastic bags in your refrigerator (preferably a crisper drawer) for 2 to 3 days, or up to a week. To use, wash and dry leaves. Trim off ends and any bad spots. Then use in recipes.

My Recipe: Feta and Chard

In today’s Seasonal Recipe Round-Up, I’m sharing our favorite way to eat chard — Feta and Chard. Though the chard is delicious, too, what makes this so good is the butter, the salt, and the feta.

Click here to see my recipe for Feta and Chard.

Now, it is your turn to share! See below for details on how I might feature your recipe/tips and how those featured get to choose a free eCourse thank you video.

Share Your Chard Recipes and Tips!

Use the linky box below (or post in the comments) to share your chard recipes and tips. Use old or new posts and as many as you’d like. The linky will not close, so you can come back later with your recipes if chard is not in season for you yet. I look forward to seeing what you’ll add!

Here’s the fun part! Next Friday, I will feature a select group of the chard recipes and/or tips shared in this link-up. Everyone featured (whether blogger OR commenter) will get to choose a free eCourse thank you video!

Edit: Here are the featured chard recipes.

Seasonal Recipe Round-Up Schedule: April through June

• Friday, April 27, 2012 — Chard
• Friday, May 11, 2012 — Spinach
• Friday, May 25, 2012 — Rhubarb
• Friday, June 8, 2012 — Asparagus
• Friday, June 22, 2012 — Strawberries

All seasonal recipe round-ups are (and will be) listed on the Recipes page.

Check back next week to see if your recipe or tips are featured! Then come back on Friday, May 11 for our spinach link-up in the Seasonal Recipe Round-Up.

This post is shared with Simple Lives Thursday.

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I’m excited to tell you about a new feature, an idea suggested by Holly from InkPaperStamps. I love her idea and I know you will, too.

Every other Friday, we’ll feature a seasonal ingredient and we’ll all share our traditional, real food recipes or tips using the featured seasonal food. Say we start with chard, and the next round-up might be for carrots or radishes or eggs. You get the idea, don’t you?

For my part, I’ll share tips and ideas for harvesting, using, storing and preparing the featured food. I’ll share old and new recipes. Then it will be your turn…

You can link up your tip or recipe posts using the featured food in our thumbnail linky box (same type I use for Simple Lives Thursday). New or old posts work. The link-ups won’t close so you can come back and add recipes at a later date, too. Please edit your posts to include a link to that week’s Seasonal Recipe Round-Up.

If you don’t have a blog, feel free to post your recipes or tips in the comments.

The seasonal recipe link-ups will be included on the Recipes page, so you can easily find them in the future.

Excited? So am I.

Here’s the schedule for April through June — start thinking about what you’ll contribute. We start next week on Friday, the 27th of April!

Seasonal Recipe Round-Up Schedule: April through June

• Friday, April 27, 2012 — Chard
• Friday, May 11, 2012 — Spinach
• Friday, May 25, 2012 — Rhubarb
• Friday, June 8, 2012 — Asparagus
• Friday, June 22, 2012 — Strawberries

I’ll see you next Friday for our first Seasonal Recipe Round-Up, featuring chard. If you have any questions, please feel free to ask.

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Today, I’m a guest on Beyond The Peel TV, hosted by Joshua and France of the Beyond The Peel blog. Joshua and I talk about my family, my classes, how easy it is to get started with traditional foods, and lots more. Joshua is a great host. No wonder he’s doing an internet TV show — he’s a natural!

That’s our video interview above. Be sure to visit the Beyond The Peel YouTube Channel and subscribe. Joshua and France are creating some great videos — and often!

And, here’s their refreshingly honest review of my online classes.

Links Mentioned

I mentioned some links in the show, and here they are.

• The free video and instructions for starting your own sourdough starter
• My new book: The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Fermenting Foods
• My online classes
• GNOWFGLINS on Facebook
• The book that got my family started on this wonderful journey: Nourishing Traditions
• Simple, no-pound sauerkraut (recipe below)

Simple, No-Pound Sauerkraut

I described this process on the show, and here’s the print version of the recipe. People used to pound cabbage to get it good and juicy for fermentation. Pounding isn’t necessary when you let salt do the work instead.

• 1 medium head cabbage
• 1 tablespoon fine-grain sea salt (or 1/2 tablespoon sea salt + 1/4 cup leftover kraut juice from a previous batch)

Makes 1 quart. Quarter and core cabbage, discarding outer leaves. Shred cabbage by hand or in food processor. Put in a large bowl and sprinkle with salt. Cover bowl with a tea towel and set aside for half hour. Remove towel and stir. Recover with tea towel and set aside for another half hour. Remove towel and stir. It should be getting juicy. Transfer cabbage to a sterilized wide-mouth quart canning jar. Press down firmly to remove any air gaps and pack cabbage tightly. Fill jar to within 1″ of the rim. Cover tightly with metal band and lid. Leave at room temperature (around 70 degrees Fahrenheit) for 3 to 7 days, burping daily to remove pent-up gases. (Or, use an airlock jar.) During the first 24 hours, open the jar a few times to press the cabbage down beneath the level of the juices. Transfer to refrigerator or cold storage, where it will continue to age for many months. Can be eaten any time.

Remember to come and chat with me on Thursday for the Fermenting Foods TweetChat!

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We’re down to the last of our yearly grass-fed beef. All the ground beef is gone — long gone — so I’m finding ways to cook the odds and ends in the freezer: stew meat, tri-tip, some gorgeous grass-fed steaks, and various roasts. Necessity is the mother of invention, they say, and I would agree. I’ve had a fun time learning and getting better at cooking grass-fed meat.

Looking for resources on grass-fed meat cooking? It doesn’t behave the same as feed-lot meat. My favorite resources are: the Grass-Fed Cooking blog by Shannon Hayes or her book Grass-Fed Gourmet. And in Fundamentals II eCourse, I share everything I know — including all my favorite recipes — in the lesson on Pastured Meats.

Last night, I made a warming beef and cabbage soup from beef stew meat. Mmmm… the soup got rave reviews from all five of us. We can’t wait to eat the leftovers for lunch. A keeper for sure!

Warming Beef and Cabbage Soup

• 4 tablespoons butter, divided
• 2 to 3 pounds grass-fed beef stew meat (or lamb, buffalo, goat or wild game)
• 8 cups stock or water, plus additional as needed
• bay leaf
• 1 to 2 onions, coarsely chopped
• 4 cloves garlic, crushed
• 6 ounces wild mushrooms or organic crimini mushrooms (optional)
• 1/2 cabbage, cored and chopped into bite-size pieces
• 2 teaspoons sea salt, plus additional as needed
• 1/2 tablespoon pepper
• 2 tablespoons dried parsley (or 1 tablespoon fresh chopped)
• 4 cups cooked brown rice* (see instructions for soaking and cooking here)

*If you want to cook the rice along with the soup instead of separately, add 2 cup of soaked rice grain to the pot where you see the * in the recipe below.

Over medium-high heat, melt 2 tablespoons butter in a large stockpot. Add the stew meat and brown thoroughly on all sides. Add the stock or water and the bay leaf. Bring to a simmer, reduce heat and let simmer several hours, covered, until meat is tender. Replenish water as needed to keep it to the same level. *If using pre-soaked rice grain, add it when beef is tender. Let rice simmer and cook with the meat for another half hour, or until tender, before proceeding with the recipe.

Over medium heat, melt 2 tablespoons butter in a cast-iron skillet. Add the onions, garlic and mushrooms. Cook until tender, about 3 minutes. Add to stock pot. Add cabbage to soup. Simmer until cabbage is tender, but still has crunch. Add sea salt, pepper and parsley. Taste and adjust seasonings. Serve over warm, cooked brown rice (unless rice is cooked in the soup according to alternate instructions above).

What are your favorite ways to prepare grass-fed meats? What do you do when you’re down to the odds and ends of a bulk pastured meat purchase?

This post is shared with Simple Lives Thursday and Pennywise Platter Thursday.

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We’re coming up on Easter, when we’re sure to be surrounded by heavily-sweetened, white-sugar laden, conventional treats. Here’s a whole food treat you can make instead! It is perhaps a wee bit on the sweet side, but that can be a good thing on a special occasion, I think.

Watch me make this treat in the video above. Below is the print recipe.

Coconut-Honey Candy

I came up with this candy recipe after trying out these really yummy paleo no-bake cookies from The Unrefined Kitchen. Boiling the honey for two minutes sets it up like candy, and then I kept tweaking the recipe to create these chewy little candies. I know you’ll love them.

• 1/2 cup honey
• 1 cup coconut butter*
• 1/4 cup cocoa powder (could omit for a non-cocoa candy)
• 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
• 1 cup unsweetened shredded coconut (omit if you prefer a smooth candy)

Heat honey in a saucepan over medium heat until it boils. While stirring constantly, boil for two minutes. Remove from heat. Add coconut butter, cocoa powder, and vanilla. Stir. The heat from the honey will melt the coconut butter. Stir until smooth. Add coconut. Stir well.

Press into a parchment paper lined 8″ square cake pan. You might see liquid pooling on top of the mixture. Leave it there or pour it off as you desire. (This liquid is water or oil from the coconut butter.)

Chill for 30 minutes. Pop out of pan. Peel off parchment paper. Cut into strips and then cut the strips into squares. Put in a refrigerator dish with lid. Store in refrigerator. They are especially yummy served cold, but hold up well at room temperature too (getting a little softer).

*Coconut butter is the pureed meat of the coconut. It is not coconut oil. It can be pricey. You could try substituting natural almond butter or peanut butter, though I think the candy will end up softer overall. If you try this, please come back and comment with your results!

Like my weekly free videos? Please use the buttons at the top of this post to share this video with others. And subscribe to the GNOWFGLINS Channel on YouTube — you can give this or any other video a thumbs-up!

What Easter treats are you planning to serve? Please let me how you like these!

This post is shared with Simple Lives Thursday and Pennywise Platter Thursday.

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Use homemade pre-soaked oats (where you soak rolled oats and then dehydrate) — or the fabulous Touch’O Honey pre-soaked oats from JoshEWEa’s Garden — to offer a breakfast of yummy choices for everyone! Breakfasts around here are usually self-serve, so this granola bar fits the bill.

With a gallon jar full of pre-soaked oats, and toppings such as crispy nuts, shredded coconut, assorted fresh and/or dried fruit, raw honey, and raw milk, each family member doctors up a bowl to suit. Then each digs in with a smile!

Plus, a homemade (and easy) granola bar offers an excellent alternative to today’s highly processed, nutritionally devoid, and extruded breakfast cereals.

I have a confession. When I went to Wise Traditions 2011 and sampled the pre-soaked oats from JoshEWEa’s Garden, I realized how hard-as-a-rock my homemade pre-soaked oats were — and even my soaked granola. Since then, I’ve worked on how to soak and dehydrate oats without releasing all the starch that gums them up like glue. I think they’re pretty good now, and I shared my “secret” (if you can really call it that) in this month’s thank you video.

Another tasty use for pre-soaked oats is with yogurt or kefir. Each morning at Wise Traditions 2011, the breakfast provided by the Farm to Consumer Legal Defense Fund (FTCLDF) included maple-vanilla yogurt, Touch’O Honey pre-soaked oats from JoshEWEa’s Garden, and fresh blueberries. They offered other things, too, but I always chose the yogurt topped with granola each morning. It was so good!

The following recipe is more a formula than anything else. Enjoy!

Soaked Granola Bar

• 1 cup of pre-soaked oats per person (homemade or Touch’O Honey pre-soaked oats from JoshEWEa’s Garden)
• sliced bananas
• dried fruit
• soaked, dehydrated nuts, chopped
• unsweetened shredded coconut
• other fresh fruit as desired, cut into bite-size pieces
• raw honey or Grade B maple syrup
• sprinkle of cinnamon and/or pinch of nutmeg
• whole milk

Serves as many as needed. Put 1 cup of pre-soaked oats in each bowl. Let each person top oats as desired. Yeah, that’s it — pretty easy. And don’t forget tasty!

Have you tried JoshEWEa’s Garden pre-soaked oats or other soaked cereals? Do you make your own? What do you like to put on your granola?

Not only did I try JoshEWEa’s Garden Touch’O Honey pre-soaked oats at Wise Traditions, but Michaeleen (the owner) sent my family a box of assorted pre-soaked cereals and nuts to try out. They didn’t last long, and our house was humming with oohs and aahs as long as they lasted, only to be replaced by sighs once all the packages were empty. So I can happily say I have no reservations about recommending JoshEWEa’s Garden foods to you!

Remember, JoshEWEa’s Garden is giving away 2# of sprouted spelt or sprouted wheat berries in the grain mill drawings we kick off next week at the webinar. Have you signed up for the Grain Mills free webinar yet?

This post is shared with Simple Lives Thursday, Pennywise Platter Thursday, and Fight Back Friday.