Opened a quart of pears I put up in Splenda syrup in August 2009 today.
Made a nice cobbler with powdered ginger mixed in with the pears and
cinnamon mixed into the dough. Instead of dropping dollops of dough into
the pears and syrup I made a crumb topping this time. And, since Miz
Anne is now lactose intolerant, I added soy milk versus skim cow milk.
Wonder who milks all those soy beans? Once it cools we will see how it
tastes. Only have eight more quarts from the 106 lbs of pears we picked
in '09 and all the pear jelly and pear sauce is long gone too.

George Shirley wrote:

> Opened a quart of pears I put up in Splenda syrup in August 2009 today.
> Made a nice cobbler with powdered ginger mixed in with the pears and
> cinnamon mixed into the dough. Instead of dropping dollops of dough into
> the pears and syrup I made a crumb topping this time. And, since Miz
> Anne is now lactose intolerant, I added soy milk versus skim cow milk.
> Wonder who milks all those soy beans? Once it cools we will see how it
> tastes. Only have eight more quarts from the 106 lbs of pears we picked
> in '09 and all the pear jelly and pear sauce is long gone too.

dang, makes my mouth water... glad to hear
things are going well.

quite easy to make soymilk, i hope you're joking
here? (easy compared to canning most things)

it also could probably be canned, but it's so
easy to make when i need it i wouldn't bother.
mostly i drink it or use it for Thai curries.

for those who've not made it and would like to
try it...


short version:

soak soybeans 24hours, change water a few times.
(about 1 & 1/3 cups of dried soybeans per gallon of
water -- remove the obvious bad ones, stones and
rinse any dirt off)

blend in some water to make a runny goo.
(i divide each batch in half to blend, with
about a cup and a half of water -- the two to
three extra cups (over a gallon) of water
used while blending makes about a gallon
when strained)

cook runny goo plus one gallon of water until
the foam goes away.
(i tend to stir it constantly at medium high heat
until it boils and then turn it to simmer until
the foam goes away) 20-25 minutes. it can boil
over if you turn your back on it. the foam is
very glossy and looks like meringue when you start
cooking.

strain out the bits o' beans.
(i use a large metal sifter to get the big stuff
and then strain through a coffee filter (the reusable
kind) to get out the small pieces -- i squish it
with a big spoon to get the liquid out) i used
cheese-cloth to strain at first, but after a while
decided to switch to the coffee filter so i wouldn't
have to keep buying cheese-cloth. a real blender
might reduce the amount of bits to sift out, but
we haven't upgraded our old clunker...

cool and enjoy.

the bean bits can be used in all sorts of
ways (muffins, breads, cornbread, worm food). most
the time i end up having it for breakfast with some
cinnamon sugar.


longer version:

search the web for "milking the soybean" and
you'll find plenty of information. i found a
three part series that was great that went into
the making of soy milk and then the next step
of making tofu (decided i don't really like
that as much as i like the soy milk).


extra things i've learned through experience:

field grown soybeans from the farm next door
probably won't give you as good a result as
organic or soybeans from a chinese food store
or natural foods place (likely a different
variety of soybean).

i was surprised by how different it tasted
once i ran out of the beans i grew last year
(gleaned from the field next door) and switched
to organic ($2.19/lb) then i had a chance to
pick up some soybeans ($4/5lbs) at the chinese
food place so tried them. i will plant the
remaining organic soybeans this spring for the
next crop and see how they taste. it could be
the climate/soil. we shall see...


songbird