Almond milk sour cream (vegan)

Silky smooth vegan almond milk sour cream from simple ingredients.

Store bougt almond milk: In the olden days a good quality almond milk could be used instead. But nowadays most of them contain so little almonds that it's simply not posible. If you want to try, go for the almond milk with the highest amount of fat and protein but no emulsifiers (they hinder the curdling from happening)

Keyword dairy free, lactose free, vegan

Servings dl (3 cups) of almond milk that turns into 2,5 dl (1 cup) of almond sour cream

Author Nina fra Plantepusherne

Ingredienser

150 gr just under 1 cup almonds (blanched or not)
8,5 dl or 3,5 cups of water for soaked almonds. For unsoaked almonds use 9 dl (3,75 cups)
Pinch of salt
0,75 dl (1/4 cup + 1 tbsp) freshly squeezed lemon juice

YOU'LL ALSO NEED

A colander and either a thin cloth or kitchen towel - or simply a not too narrow nut milk bag.

Sådan gør du

MAKING THE MILK

Using soaked almonds - do NOT discard the soaking water!

Cover your almonds with water yesterday and today drain the soaking water into a meassuring jug. Add water so you have 8,5 dl (3,5 cups) of water all in all.
Now blend the soaked almonds witth just under half of the water for a couple of minutes, add the rest of the water and blend it again shortly.
Pour the blended milk into a cloth lined colander placed on top of a bowl or a nut milk bag to strain the milk. You should get 7,5 dl (3 cups) of milk.

Using unsoaked almonds

Place your dry almonds in the blender and add just under half of the water. Blend for several minutes. Let it sit for 30-60 minutes. This should soak the tiny almond grids.
Blend again for a couple of minutes and then add the rest of the water. Now blend it up shortly.
Pour the blended milk into a cloth lined colander placed on top of a bowl or a nut milk bag to strain the milk. You should get 7,5 dl (3 cups) of milk.

TURNING ALMOND MILK INTO SOUR CREAM

If taking milk from a bigger batch, remember to shake before you meassure it it so you don't risk working with just the thin, watery part.

Curdle the milk

Heat the almond milk untill very hot but NOT boiling. If it starts to boil you need to cool it since the heat will destroy the lemoon juice enzymes and make curdling less efficient (see Tips section). It should definetly be too hot to touch.
Pour the lemon juice in a bowl and mix in the salt. Pour the hot almond milk in while trying to distribute it evenly.
It should start to curdle almost instantly. GENTLY stir it with a spoon to distribute the lemon juice and allow for a more even curdling. EDIT: Now gently put the bowl in the refrigerator until chilled. This is what it will end up looking like:

Separate the curds from the 'whey'

Now we want to separate the whey from the curds that will become our sour cream. This is NOT to be handled roughly like when straining the pulp from the milk: In slow motion pour the curdled almond mass into a cloth lined colander or nut milk bag. (Handling it gently and slowly helps it stay curdled and allows for easier separation of the whey).
Hang it up to drip for a while and finally squeeze the remainder of the whey out. I like to let it drip into some sort of measuring equipment and when the whey reaches about the 5 dl (2 cups) mark, you can unwrap the curds.

Blend to make it smooth

It looks very messy at this stage, but nothing that a god 1-2 minutes with an immersion blender or a very small food processor won't fix. Blend untill completely smooth, adjust the taste with tiny amounts of sugar and salt to your liking - and enjoy!
or press it even harder and proceed to making an amazing almond milk cream cheese.

Noter

- Trouble shooting/first aid: If you followed the recipe without any substitutions or alterations and you feel like your milk did't curdle at all within 10 minutes, don't be discouraged. Proceed with gently pouring it into a cloth lined colander or press and let it drip for 1 hour. It might very well still separat, just not as easily as with good, clear curds. Proceed with blending it as described.

- If you don't trust the blending ability of your blender and own a coffee grinder, use this to turn the almonds into almond meal. And make your almond milk from this. Note that you'll need 150 grams or 1,5 cups of almond meal.

- In my experience the almond curds are more fragile than soy curds. For this reason I don't recommend doubling or trippleing the recipe. The bigger the batch you have to handle the more you'lll unintentionally mash it up and reunite the whey and the curds, This makes it very difficult to strain awway the whey.

- Lemon juice substitutes: The curdling will also take place if you use a vinegar. But this will NOT taste very good if eaten straight. But if the sour cream is used in baking or cooked in savory dishes it might be palatable. I recommend an apple cider vinegar.

- What to do with the leftover pulp from making almond milk?
Throw it in a bread or cookie dough. It won't last long in the fridge, so freeze or dehydrate it for prolonged shelf life. Get more creative inpiration from Pinterest or Google.