Nuts are a fantastic food for your health, being high in protein and health giving essential fats, and rich in minerals such as calcium, magnesium, zinc and iron. The problem is that nuts are notoriously difficult to digest, meaning you may not be getting all of these juicy nutrients into your body.
You can bypass this problem by activating your nuts, a process in which you soak them to make them more digestible and better for your health. This is especially useful for those with digestive problems or those with nutrient deficiencies, both of which often go hand in hand.
How to do it
Activating nuts is very easy. All you need to do is…
- Soak them overnight in pure, filtered water.
- Discard the water and give them a good rinse. This help to remove any naturally occurring ‘enzyme inhibitors’ – compounds that can impair the digestion of the nuts in question.
- Now you need to decide how you want to use them. You can eat them right here and now, in their juicy hydrated form. This is the best option if you’re making them to put into smoothies or power balls or the like.
If you want to eat them like you would normal dried nuts, you can actually dry them out again. You’ll need to do this at a low temperature (under 40 degrees Celsius) using a dehydrator for best results. You can also try putting them on a tray in your oven on the lowest setting, with the door slightly ajar. If you’re storing them for a while then make sure you dehydrate them until they are nice and crisp, to prevent spoiling.
Another thing you can do is put the rinsed nuts in a paper bag in the fridge. This will dry them out slightly and last a week or so until they go bad. You can also freeze your hydrated nuts to use in smoothies so you have them on hand.
A note on salted nuts
If you have a hankering for salted nuts, you can achieve this by adding some Himalayan or Celtic sea salt to the soaking water. The nuts will take up the salt and if you dehydrate them you’ll be left with crunchy, salty goodness. Enjoy!
