Coconut Milk is one of my favorite plant based milks to drink and cook with. I love creamy Thai coconut curry! I love drinking a creamy coconut milk based smoothie. And although, I have been making all of my own nut milks at home, I have been a little intimidated to make my own fresh coconut milk. How the heck do you do that? Doesn’t the milk come straight from the coconut?
Facts on Coconut Milk:
Coconut milk comes from the flesh/meat part of the coconut. Mature coconuts have more natural milk, while younger coconuts have more water. In order to obtain the natural milk from the coconut, you have to grate the flesh of the coconut and squeeze the milk, in most cases you have to add water to the freshly grated coconut flesh to obtain more milk.
While I was in Thailand, I drank coconut water (not milk) right directly from a fresh coconut. However, because I live in the USA coconut trees aren’t available, darn! But my local organic market has organic shredded coconut or frozen organic coconut flesh, which makes it easy to make your very own coconut milk at home.
Coconut Milk Recipe:
Ingredients:
- 1 1/2 cups of shredded organic coconut.
- 3-4 cups filtered water
- 1/4 sea salt
- Vanilla bean
Directions
- Add all ingredients to your Vitamix or high speed blender.
- Blend well.
- Once blended pour milk through a mesh cheese cloth and squeeze through.
- Enjoy creamy smooth coconut milk.
- Store in a mason jar in the refrigerator for 3-5 days. (It is so good I highly doubt it will last that long.)
You can use this coconut milk in smoothies, lattes, curries, etc. Just keep in mind that coconut although full of vitamins is also high in fat, because if this I like to incorporate it into my diet along with other plant based milks, so I’m not over indulging in just coconut milk.
Enjoy!
What’s your favorite nut milk? Have you made coconut milk before homemade?
