I'd like regular ancestral cooking emails!

Ancestral Cooking

Ancestral Kitchen Challenge!

Want to move forward in your kitchen? Been meaning to try that new ferment? Find a bread recipe for your family? Tackle that recipe you’ve been avoiding?! Looking for ideas, support and encouragement? The Ancestral Kitchen Challenge is here to … Read More

Eat More Processed Food

Eat more processed food; I believe that so strongly that I want to get a t-shirt with it emblazoned on. I’m not, however, talking about eating more industrially-processed food. The stuff made in a factory, from unrecognisable ingredients, packaged in … Read More

What is Good Food?

The knife, in my right hand, hovers above a vastness of smooth, deep red. My left hand, spread wide, comes down onto this mass – a whole beef liver – to hold it steady while I slice thin strips. The … Read More

My story

My Son Gabriel’s Natural Birth

My son, Gabriel, was born on April 7th 2014 at home, in water, with minimal assistance and no drugs. I did not come from a family of home-birthers. The only births I’d seen were on television (and they are always … Read More

Alison in Pictures

My life, body and eating habits have changed dramatically through the years. Here I share with you some pictures which hopefully help instill the idea that change is totally possible and by altering what we eat and how we live … Read More

Reading, Listening and Learning

Recipes

Sprouted Fermented Buckwheat Pancakes

I would much rather eat nutrient-dense real food than take a supplement. Why pay extra for a supplement (which has been packaged and shipped to you) when you could generate the same thing in your own kitchen from real food?! … Read More

Breakfast Bone Broth Bowl

It doesn’t have to be hard to get your daily dose of the amazing nutritional food that is bone broth! Check out my article My 5 Favourite Ways To Use Bone Broth and then cook up the simple, warming and … Read More

Sourdough Oatcakes

Oatcakes were the one of the staple foods of the Scottish, Welsh, Irish and nothern English populations long before the advent of the more modern grain, wheat. The ‘cake’ in their name may make our modern minds think that they … Read More

Traditional Scottish Oatcakes

Are you with me in your love of oats? Creamy, golden, comforting, filling…what is there not to like?! Enjoying oats is not just about porridge; oats are far more flexible than mainstream food would have us believe. The British have … Read MoreRead More

Come Preparare il Kefir d’Acqua

Cosa serve? Un barattolo di vetro della grandezza di circa 1 litro con un coperchio o un tovagliolo con elastico per coprirlo Una bottiglia di vetro con un tappo ermetico Un colino abbastanza piccolo preferibilmente in plastica Un imbuto preferibilimente … Read MoreRead More

How To Make Fermented Gingerbread Cookies

If you want to try some long-maturing honeyed gingerbread dough for Christmas cookies, don’t think October is too early to start! Traditionally, doughs with flour and honey were laid down to ‘ferment’ for months before the final recipe was mixed … Read More

Fermented Oat Bake

Want a delicious, creative way to use fermented oats? This is tasty, easy and it keeps really well in the fridge or freezer. Eat slices hot and fresh, cut a chunk off from the leftovers as a quick snack, and … Read More

Crunchy Pig Skin

Thank you to Meredith Leigh for posting this on her Instagram and lighting my ancestral experimentation fire! Crunchy pig skin is a marvel. A product that looks like waste, transformed into a light, crispy, crunchy joy of a snack. I … Read More

Sourdough Spelt & Carrot Cake

Making a cake should be easy. But what if you can’t eat eggs, you don’t use refined sugar and you want it to be sourdough? That’s where this recipe came from and if you want to have a go, you’ll … Read More

Slow-Cooked Beef Heart

Slow-cooked beef heart is a staple in our house. It’s simple, economical and can feed my family all week. Those three things in one dish feels like the holy grail to me! A lot of people feel intimidated by organ … Read More

Milk Kefir Spelt Bread

There are so many other ways to naturally ferment bread than sourdough. Any form of live culture – yogurt, sauerkraut, beer – is a potential bread-maker! In this recipe, I’ll show you one of my favourite methods; using milk kefir … Read More

Chocolate-Coated Garlic & More

There aren’t many foods more amazing, yet seemingly humble, than garlic. It truly deserves the title of super food. Our ancestors knew of garlic’s medicinal power long before science explained the hows and whys. For centuries it has been lauded … Read More

Super-Simple Sauerkraut

Here is the way I make sauerkraut: Remove a large outside leaf from your cabbage and set aside, then chop the rest of it into small pieces. Put the bowl on your scales and put the cabbage into it, weighing … Read More

Sourdough

#51 – Your Sourdough Questions Answered

“How do I use different ancient grains in making sourdough bread?” “How do they behave differently from wheat?” “How do I freeze and store dough or finished bread?” “And why do all those loaves on Instagram look like THAT, and mine looks like THIS?” All these questions and many more crop up when we discuss sourdough bread.… Read More