As many contemplate how the increase in flour prices will affect their bills for foods like doubles and roti, one woman, Natasha Lee said she will not be affected because she has been making her own flour at home since 2014.
“I went and bought a pack of coconut flour and this was in 2014. There was only one brand available at that time and it was $83 for a pound of the flour,” Lee told Guardian Media during an interview at her home in Couva yesterday.
Turned off by the high prices then, she plugged in her food processor and got started on making flour using seven simple steps.
According to her, you start by shredding cassava or coconut in the food processor then wash and squeeze dry using a cloth; lay the shredded pieces in a tray to be placed in the sun for about two to three days; then toast it in an oven for about 10 minutes before putting it in a blender to get the fine powder.
“The hardest thing is going to be peeling the cassava or cracking your coconut to chip it out but once you get to that stage and you grate it and put it in the food processor and you get it to this fine consistency this is all that you are going to put into a cookie sheet and put out in the sun to dry. What is going to take time is the drying process,” Lee explained.
Natasha Lee squeezes out the starch from the cassava.
NICOLE DRAYTON
Other than this part of the process, it takes about 15 to 20 minutes to complete.
“If you want to speed it up, just stick it in your oven on about low heat for about two hours and you have flour instantly,” she suggested.
She said most root crops can be used to make flour.
“When cassava is cheap, I pay about seven pounds for $20, you can buy and freeze it and use it. However you want, because frozen cassava works really good for cassava flour as well,” Lee stated.
“Even if I have to use regular flour because we have to use regular flour if you’re going to make a regular bread so nobody is saying you’re going to stop buying but when I do bread, instead of using the six cups of regular flour, I will use one cup of flour,” she noted.
Apart from spending less, Lee said it is a much healthier alternative since there are no preservatives.
“Some people will never change from the regular flour because they are afraid to try it. There are some people who are stuck in tradition and their ways so they say ‘I not trying that’ but there are many people who are opting for that healthier option even if they are not looking at the price of it but they are looking for that healthier flour,” according to Lee.
A cup of grind cassava flour.
NICOLE DRAYTON
She added, “You are not going to put any preservatives in it so you’re not putting salt, sugar or anything like that, it is just the raw product. As I said, grate it, dry it and turn it into a powder so just as you have your cassava that you would have boiled and eat, just grate it, dry it, turn it into a powder and that’s it!”
Pancakes made out of cassava flour.
NICOLE DRAYTON
