Lemon, ginger and garlic cold remedy and immunity booster drink!

Okay so it's that time of the year again , no not Christmas, although that is coming up faster than I can prepare for. Happens ever year somehow I always run out of time getting ready for Christmas but that's a whole other story. I talking about cold and flu season. This immune booster drink is the perfect helper  It tastes good, is easy to make, it's all natural and most importantly it works. If you don't want to spend this winter indoors being sick then this wonderful delicious immunity booster drink is for you. Ever since I've started taking this drink (3years) I haven't had a cold or flu, that only makes this drink worth while.

You need fresh lemons, lots of fresh raw garlic, I used Russian garlic it's the best, fresh ginger and unpasteurized honey. You can leave out any of these ingredients if you like but you really get the best results when you use all of them and fresh ingredients is best :)

Lemons - Lemons are high in vitamin C which help support the immune system. The juice's  anti-inflammatory qualities help soothe sore throats. 

Honey - Honey is a great immunity system builder. Thanks to it's antimicrobial properties honey not only soothes the throat but it can also kill certain bacteria that causes the infection. Honey cures most coughs, colds and helps clear congested chest. It's best to use unpasteurized honey because the pasteurizing process removes many of the help benefits.

Garlic - Garlic is a natural antibiotic  Numerous studies have proven  it to be a bacterial, fungal and virus killing machine. Garlic promotes healthy immune system function, and strengthens the body's defenses. Do worry about garlic breath with all these health benefits it's worth while and worse case scenario pop a breath mint :) 

Ginger - Ginger helps stimulate perspiration  which cleanses the system and brings down the body temperature. Ginger is helpful for settling upsets stomachs, as well as nausea  vomiting and cold sweats. It also helps soothe a sore throat.

As you can see all these wonderful, natural and healthy ingredients pack a powerful one, two, three, four punch in combating any cold or flu. Try this recipe today and prevent any cold or flu bug from attacking you or your loved one. This immunity booster drink can be taken all year round just as a general immune booster.     

You'll need : A big jar, I use a 1 gallon glass jar

Food Processor

Spatula

1 1/2 cup honey

8 cups boiled water - cool to room temperature

5  fresh lemon

1 medium sized ginger

fresh garlic as any as you desire

Wash lemons and remove any blemishes, and stem. I leave part of the skin on, the skin contain many vitamins and oils. Peel the ginger and garlic cloves. I use a lot of garlic, I love garlic so the more the better.  
   

Place the honey into the glass jar. Put the lemon, ginger and cleaned garlic cloves into the food processor. Cut the lemons and ginger into smaller pieces in you need to. 

Grind all the ingredients on high.

Pulse until all the ingredients are finely chopped up. The aroma is so wonderful.

Scoop the lemon, garlic and ginger mixture into the glass container with honey already in it. 

Add the 8 cup of boiled water. Make sure you allow the boil water to cool down to room temperature.

Stir the ingredient for 2-3 mins. to combine all the ingredients.

Allow the lemon, ginger and garlic drink to stand and develop for 7 days in the fridge. Shake mixture once a day and continue to let stand for 7 days.  Strain the mixture through a mesh strainer and/or cheese cloth. The immunity booster drink is ready to enjoy.   Pour into smaller glass containers for easier pouring, just give the jar a shake before taking.

 I take 1 ounce shot every day in the morning and/or evening. It's so fresh, and lemony tasting. Anytime I feel like I need a boost of energy I make this drink. I hope you enjoy it!! 

It lasts up to 3 weeks in the fridge.

Wishing you all a healthy cold and flu season.

Thanks for stopping by,

Love Katya

Homemade Fruit and Berry Herbal Tea

So I've decided to continue my summer berry countdown with: Red and Black Currants. This homemade tea has a lot more than currants to it but I think that it's safe to say that the two prominent flavours I get from this tea are definitely red and black currants. 

Seriously though if like drinking tea then just this once try making your own homemade tea. it's so easy to make and totally worth it. The best time to make it is summertime when fruit and berries are at their peak. It's still warm enough outside to sundry all the fruit, berries and leaves you'll need to make tea. 

Both currants are known for their high content of vitamin C which has vital protective antioxidant properties. Just by drinking the tea with these berries/berry leaves you add to your vitamin C intake. Both red and black currants can ease the symptoms of rheumatism, arthritis and gout.

They are both very high in fiber, which helps in the proper functioning of the digestive system as well as the development of the appropriate gut micro-flora. With all these health benefit associated with these to berries it only makes sense to add them to this tea not mention the delicious tart flavour it adds too!!

Just think while sipping on this homemade fruit and berry tea not only will you enjoy the delicious flavour but you'll be boosting your immune system too!! And it gives you one more tasty reason to take a break during the day to sit down, relax and drink tea. If anyone asks just tell them you're in therapy, even Dr. OZ says so!  

All you need for this homemade tea is your favorite fruit, berries and edible leaves. Here's my recipe:

~ Katya Homemade Fruit and Berry Tea ~

Dried red currants

Dried black currants

Black currant leaves

Dried raspberries

Dried raspberry leaves

Apple leaves

Wild blueberry leaves

Saskatoon berries

Fire weed flowers and leaves

Rose hips



Smaller batch - approx. 2 cups per ingredient
Larger batch - approx. 4 cups per ingredient 

Gather the berries when they are ripe and ready. Wash, dry and de-stem any berries that you need to. Place the berries on a cookie sheet single layer and place in a warm, sunny place to dry. You can use a dehydrator if you have one.

***Tip: Best place to dry the cookie sheet with fruit, berries or leaves is in your car. Sounds silly but it works great. In the summer your car has a tendency to be really hot, so it's the perfect place. It hot, bug free and you can usually get the tea ingredients dried in a day!! Bonus is your car smell fruity and great*** 

Collect nice, green fresh undamaged leaves from a clean area. Wash and dry the leaves, then dry single layer on a sheet or with a dehydrator. If you cut off a whole branch, of leaves, you can hang then from the ceiling to dry at room temperature. 

Make sure your fruit, berries and leaves are completely dry before storing to avoid mold.They should be stored in a glass jars in the dark, but Ziploc bags work too. You can mix the tea ingredients together or store each ingredient separately.

These are the fruit, berry and leaves I chose but you can use your own favorite ingredients: mint, lemon balm, strawberries, dried apple chunks, thyme....be creative. Only ever use fruit, berry and leaves from plants you can identify for certain.

If your making a smaller batch of homemade tea then use 2 cups per ingredient. Once the berries and leaves dry they will shrink to have the amount. I make a large batch right away because this tea is so good and I need it to last through the fall and winter. 

Smiley Face

~ Steeping your herbal tea ~

Combine 1/4 cup scoop of each tea ingredient in a bowl. Add the fruit and berry tea ingredients into a 

clean coffee press.....or

brew the fruit and berry tea in a pot...

 Pour boiling water over the tea.

Let it steep for 5-7 minutes. Keep it warm on a warmer and enjoy your tea all day. Most herbal teas are not bitter, so sweetener is unnecessary although a little bit of honey is always a great addition.

Nothing warms you up better than a warm cup of tea on a cold winter day!! 

Making your own herbal infusions is fun and easy!! No matter what the recipe, you'll feel good, literally, after drinking what you've made.

Homemade herbal teas also make great gifts! Try making some, you'll be glad you did !

If you like tea as much as me check out my tea inspire Pinterest page, it's all about tea!! 

Thanks for stopping by, 
time for some tea therapy for me. Till next time:)

Great news to all you tea lovers out there, Ikea has glass tea brewer, and the best part is they're cheap. 

Works like a charm too. My sister bought one for my mom and she loves it :)

Source: tumblr.com via Katya on Pinterest

Love,
 Katya

Almond tea + Cinnamon Kringle = Yumminess :)

I tried the most delicious tea ever, so good that I had to share it with you. I never bought this tea myself, my sister gave me this tea to try which she got from a friend and now I have to admit I'm wanting more and need to find some asap. The tea is almond tea, it's slightly sweet, nutty, and has a wonderful almond flavor. Just get out your favorite cup, boil some water add almond tea, stir, sit back and enjoy. It makes the perfect healthy, low calorie dessert...yes it's that good :) Now my mission is to find more of this wonderful, delicious tea, if you happen to find some try it is so good....yum! 

Almond Tea...So Delicious!! 

A cup of wonderful, almondy delight :)

Okay so we got that out of the way now onto something just as wonderful and delicious. Cinnamon Kringle...yum!! I first saw this beautiful and delicious sweet dough treat on Pinterest. You can find the originally post here but it is in Romanian language so instead of trying to translate the recipe I just used my own sweet dough recipe and filling. I just followed the steps how to shape it and it is really, really simple but oh so good.

Because the dough is rolled up and then twist into a braid the result is delicious layer up on layer of sweet dough, cinnamon, sugar and walnuts. The originally recipe doesn't call for nuts but I love nuts so I added walnuts . Unfortunately I didn't have almonds otherwise I would have definitely used them. 

I posted my sweet dough recipe in an earlier post you can find it here which I use to make Apricot Piroski as well but I will repost again. This recipe is a larger portion recipe it will make 8-9 Cinnamon Kringles, you can cut ingredients in half if desired , use 2 eggs if doing so.

~ Sweet Dough ~

 Ingredients:

1/2 cup warm water

1 tablespoon yeast

Pour the warm water into a small bowl, sprinkle the dry yeast onto the water and set aside to develop. Yeast will dissolve, foam and become bubbly when ready. 

7 cups all purpose flour

2 1/2 cups warm milk

4 tablespoons melted butter

1 Tablespoon olive oil

1/2 cup sugar

1 teaspoon salt

3 eggs (room temperature)

In a large mixing bowl combine warm milk, melted butter, olive oil, sugar and salt. Add eggs and blend mixture well. Add the developed yeast mixture and stir to combine. Start adding flour one cup at a time. You can use a wooden spoon but I find that stirring in the flour by hand works best. Add flour until you have a soft, sticky dough. You may need to adjust the amount of flour you add, therefore don't just add the whole amount at once. It's better to have a softer, sticky dough because you can add more flour when your kneading the dough. If you add too much flour the dough will be tough and stiff. Your pastries will not be as light, fluffy and soft if the dough is to stiff.  

Once you've added enough flour to make a soft dough, turn the dough out onto a lightly floured work surface. Knead the dough, until the texture goes from soft and sticky to smooth and pliable. Tuck in edges of dough, shaping it into a ball   Lightly oil the bowl and place gently place the dough ball back in the bowl (seams down). Covered the bowl with plastic wrap and a clean dish towel, put in a warm place to allow dough to rise and double in size.

While the dough is rising you can prepare the Cinnamon Sugar Walnut filling.

~ Cinnamon Sugar Walnut Filling ~

4 cups brown sugar

8 tbsp ground cinnamon - you can use less or more

2 finely chopped walnuts 

Combine the ingredient in all together in a  bowl. Set aside.

3/4 cup butter

In a small pot melt 3/4 butter. Set aside.

Once the  dough has doubled  you can start making the Cinnamon Kringle.

I first start by portioning the dough out. Just pinch off approximately the same size pieces of dough with your hands. Just very lightly fold in to shape into a circle, don't work the dough a lot. 

Once all the dough is portioned out, cover the dough balls with plastic sheets. I use up-cycled cereal bags. Click here  for up-cycled cereal tutorial.

Work with one dough ball at a time.

Roll out into a rectangle shape. You can gently pull and shape the dough with your hands. Roll out dough 1/2 thickness.

Brush the rolled out dough with melted butter. Be generous...butter is good. 

Sprinkle with cinnamon and walnut sugar.

Leave about a 1/2 inch dough unsprinkled so it's easier to pinch dough roll shut. Be generous with the cinnamon sugar but don't go overboard as it will make it hard to twist the dough.

Roll up the dough fairly tightly, try to keep edges even, pull them out gently if needed.

Pinch the roll shut. Turn over seam down and turn so it's  lengthwise in front of you.

Press the dough roll down to flatten slightly and cut the roll in half with a sharp knife.Leave an inch uncut at the top. Cut all the way down to the end.

After you cut it in half, carefully pull the two side apart.

Start twisting the dough one strand over the other and keeping going all the way till the end. Pinch end together.

Once you pinch the end together, cut the top uncut portion and twist it and pinch it together too.

Form the twisted log into a circle, gently pinch and fold over the ends trying to keep the shape.

Don't all those layers of dough and cinnamon sugar look so good? Just wait till it's baked and golden brown!! 

Brush the rings with an egg wash or extra melted butter. Bake at 350 degrees for 25-30 minutes until golden brown. Carefully remove from baking sheet with a spatula after cooling slightly. Remove and place on a wire rack before the cinnamon kringle cool completely because they will stick to the sheet.

Oh my!

Next time your craving cinnamon buns try making these cinnamon kringle instead. They are just as simple to make but Oh so good. 

Happy Baking,

Add caption

Source: google.ca via Katya on Pinterest

With Love,