Homemade Almond Milk {THM-FP}

I used to have to spend $2.50-$3.50 per week on a 1.2 gallon of Unsweetened Almond Milk.  Sometimes we would use more than a 1/2 gallon in a week and it was really getting too expensive for us to be able to afford.  So I asked some of the other Trim Healthy Mama fans on the Facebook Fan Page, if anyone made their own Almond Milk and if so, was it less expensive, and was it difficult?  I received a lot of responses and one of the admins even responded to make sure we were all getting the right information.  I had looked on several Pinterest links for recipes on making Almond Milk but all of them said to use 1 cup of almonds but apparently that is more than what the store bought almond milk has in it and to keep it a "Fuel Puel" (Trim Healthy Mama lingo), you should only use 1/4 cup of almonds.  So, one of the admins cleared it all up and between her help and several Pinterest posts I read, I came up with a wonderful recipe, and found a few helpful tips to make making my own almond milk easier.  

So here is my recipe & instructions on 

Unsweetened Almond Milk 

Step 1.  

Place 1/4 cup of almonds into 2 cups of water.  

*I buy my almonds at Sam's Club.  It costs me $17 for this huge bag.  It has 9 cups of almonds in it.  This makes each 1/2 gallon of homemade almond milk to cost me about $.50!!!  Yes, that is way way way cheaper than buying it at the store.  And there are no preservatives in it! 

 Step 2.  

Allow almonds to soak for 24 hours. 

Step 3. 

Peel skins off of the almonds.

*This takes me all of about three minutes to do.  If you don't plan on using the pulp to make almond flour, then you can skip this step.  But it's so easy to make almond flour from the pulp and it saves you so much money from not having to buy almond flour at the store.  The cheapest I have found almond flour is about $9/pound! 

Step 4. 

Fill a high-power blender (like a Ninja) with 8 cups of water.  Then add your almonds to the water.  Blend for about 1-2 minutes. 

Step 5.

Strain your milk through a Nut Milk Bag. 

 *I got my bag from amazon and I love it so much.  It makes this process so easy.  You could probably use cheese cloth, but I love that this bag makes it non messy, and I can just wash it and use it over and over!

Step 6.  

When you are done straining your milk, simply life the nut milk bag out of the jar and gently squeeze out any milk that is still left in the bag.  

Step 7.

Congratulations!!!  You just made your first batch of homemade almond milk!!! And wasn't that SO easy???!!!  

*You can make this Vanilla Almond Milk by either adding Vanilla Extract to it after you've removed the pulp, or (something I want to try) adding a vanilla bean to it and blending that up with it.  Also, you can add a sweetener of your choice to it once you've removed the pulp to make this Sweetened Almond Milk.  

*Homemade Almond Milk lasts for 5-7 days in the refrigerator.

Now if you don't want to make your own almond flour just throw the pulp away.  But if you like to cook with almond flour and want to save some more money, then here is how you make almond flour from the pulp...

Lay some parchment paper on a baking sheet.  Spread your almond pulp onto the parchment paper.  Bake at 200 degrees for 2-3 hours.  And that's it!  

I usually freeze my almond pulp until I've made a few batches of almond milk and then cook up a bigger batch at one time.  

I hope this post was helpful to you and saves you lots of money!