Saving $700+ per year on soymilk/tofu

[Roothy]

We use a lot of soymilk in my home--about 2 gallons a week. Two gallons costs about $14, for the Silk Unsweetened kind. I realized that was, almost unbelievably, well over 10% of our entire food budget! 

I bought this soymilk maker for about $140 (much, much easier to clean than older models, like I had about a decade ago before giving up on it after less than a couple of weeks using it) : "Soyajoy G4 Soy Milk Maker and Soup Maker - Largest capacity, with All Stainless Steel Inside" and 13 pounds of Laura soybeans for about $25 (easy to find coupons online to save $5).

The 13 pounds of soybeans should last 6mos to a yr--not sure yet. 

Savings: $14/wk X 52 weeks/yr = $728 - $25 for the beans.  (The breakeven for the cost of the machine will be 2.5 months.)

Bonus: you get lots of okara (soybean pulp) which is very healthy, and can be used to cook all kinds of stuff, and replaces tofu in many things.  For instance, I can now make an okara "meatloaf", that supplies six adult servings of food for less than $2 in other ingredients.

Another bonus: you get to control what goes in your soymilk.  You can also make other kinds of nondairy milks.

There *is* a trick to making it so that it doesn't taste "beany" (a flavor that apparently the Japanese really like) and is very neutral/bland, like Silk.  Namely--don't cook it like the instructions say.  If anyone is interested, I can give you my recipe, which works flawlessly.

Drawback, it takes about 30 minutes to make about 1.7 quarts, though only about 5 of that is active time.  I do it while I'm already doing other stuff in the kitchen, and I make 2 batches back to back, which lasts us a few days.

[nzmamma]

Go you. Sounds like a winner :-)

[forummm]

Cool! Nice going! It would be great to get cheap and unsweetened stuff.

[meadow lark]

I used to do this.  I preferred a mixed flavor - part soy beans, part almonds, part rice.  And then a dash of vanilla at the end.

[Mrs. PoP]

Neat!  I'd love to see your recipe as I go through ~1 gal of soy/cashew/almond milk per week.  But the cost savings wouldn't be quite as dramatic as the most I'll ever pay is $2.89/half gal, which is the price of our store brand organic generic when nothing else is on sale for cheaper. 

[kkbmustang]

I've got a serious medical condition, so I don't always make my own almond milk. But when I do, it's pretty easy. (I feel like a Dos Equis meme.) I use a cup of almonds, some vanilla bean paste and water. I blend it in my Vitamix, then strain it using a nut milk bag. The pulp can be added to homemade granola or muffins.

[Cookie]

I had never thought to make my own! We go through a lot of soy.

[FrugalBugle]

I have been drinking almond or oat milk for a while now. One of them is always on offer here in the UK, but still costs £1 per litre.
So I decided to cost how much they would be for me to make myself.

Almonds are around £10 a kilo and IMHO the margin I could save would be very small. Now, oats on the other hand I can get for 75p per kilo and it only takes 50grams of oats and a litre of water to make one litre of "milk", I decided to add a little dessicated coconut to the mix and a pinch of salt.

Total cost per litre:
Oats=3.75p
Coconut=<1p
Salt=<1p

Lets say 5p per litre.

Now, for a product I consume around  5 litres of every week, and that used to take up a good chunk of my grocery bill, that is a serious saving.

[okonumiyaki]

Yep, we make our own soy milk, normally ginger flavoured, sometimes black sesame.  Sometime mix oats/ soy.

[Cookie]

So you convinced me to purchase it! I'm also excited for the reduced trash because we will no longer have tofu and soy milk packaging to deal with.

[Roothy]

The trick to not having "beany" tasting soymilk is to NOT soak the soybeans ahead of time. Instead, boil up some water (ideally in a large kettle--you'll need quite a bit).  Pour it over the beans you are going to use, and let it sit for five minutes.  Drain, then pour fresh boiling water over the beans again, for five minutes.  Drain, and either put it in the machine, filling with boiling water, or do one more quick-soak/drain cycle (I don't find a third makes that much difference).  Turn the machine on--I use the "unsoaked beans" button.  Twenty minutes later, voila, you have 1.7 liters of soymilk.  I strain once into the plastic pitcher they sell it with, using the sieve they supply you with.  But then I strain it a second time into my own pitcher, using a much finer sieve.  Then I pour into a very large mason jar.  I'd like to find a nice glass pitcher with a lid for the fridge, but won't buy one until I see a perfect one on sale, or something at a thrift store.  You will also be left with about two cups of okara, for use in cooking.  (Or composting--I can't eat it as fast as I make it.)  Recipes here: http://okaraproject.blogspot.com/

Other tricks: the okara pulp is really sticky.  Immediately--and I mean immediately--wash the metal soymilk maker pitcher and grinding mechanism with a soapy sponge.  I do this before I even strain.  A quick rinse in water for the plastic pitchers is fine.  Also--trust me on this--don't buy the soymilk maker with an integrated strainer.  It is an absolute bitch to clean.  Finally, I like to make two batches sequentially.  This leaves me with less total clean up.  Final trick--use Laura soybeans.  They are more expensive, but they really do make a difference in how the milk tastes: http://www.laurasoybeans.com/.  I suppose, though, if you add sugar to your final product, this wouldn't matter as much.

Almond milk is easy to make--you don't need a soymilk maker for that, as the previous poster wrote.  Just a blender and a strainer.  You can also add various grains to the soymilk maker, again as previous posters noted.  I haven't done that.

[bludreamin]

Brilliant idea. I'll have to look into this some more. Thanks for the ideas!

[AJ]

Mind = blown! Thank you for posting this :)

Bonus: you get lots of okara (soybean pulp) which is very healthy, and can be used to cook all kinds of stuff, and replaces tofu in many things.  For instance, I can now make an okara "meatloaf", that supplies six adult servings of food for less than $2 in other ingredients.

Do you have a recipe for this "meatloaf"?

[Roothy]

Like all meatloafs (meatloaves?), it's a pretty forgiving recipe.

I mix together two cups of damp okara, a small can of tomato paste, a half a cup of dry oatmeal, a cup of vegan "ground beef" crumbles or cooked lentils, a large minced onion, about a tablespoon of spices (sage, oregano, whatever), a couple of tablespoons of vegan worcestershire sauce (which you can make--find any recipe on the internet), about a third a cup of nutritional yeast, a teaspoon of salt, and that's pretty much it.  Put into a loaf pan, top generously with ketchup, and bake in a 350-400 degree oven for about 75 minutes.  Variants include grinding up sun dried tomatoes instead of the tomato paste, adding sriracha, grinding up sunflower seeds to add, etc.