How to Make Almond Milk with a Vertical Slow Juicer

A few months back, I finally smoked my ancient Juiceman II juicer.

It was whirling right along, turning cucumbers and carrots into a frothy fountain of juice, when I noticed that tell-tale “burning” smell of an appliance gone bad.

I was disappointed, but not surprised that it died. I was actually impressed that it lasted so long.

I didn’t have $400 for a new juicer, so I went on Craigslist and found a well-used Omega vertical slow juicer and a Champion masticating juicer together for $75. Sold!

I got back to making juice.

Then I discovered how easy it is to make my own delicious, fresh almond milk using the Omega vertical juicer.

In this video, I show you how I make almond milk from raw, soaked almonds, and some reasons why you might want to do the same.

(If you prefer to read, scroll down below the video.)

To make almond milk, soak a cup of raw almonds in water overnight in the refrigerator.

Rinse the almonds and place them back into a container with about 4 cups of water.

Turn the slow auger juicer on and get the almond milk started by dropping in a few almonds WITHOUT water. This gets the discharge feed working properly.

Then I start adding almonds and water, about a 1/3 cup at a time. This juicer does a really good job of emulsifying the almonds and the water.

It makes a nice almond milk with good body and a good neutral taste I can use it all my cooking and baking.

Once I am done adding all of the almonds and water, I turn off the machine and dispose of the almond meal. (Yes, you can dehydrate it and use it in recipes, but I usually don’t find the time, so I just toss it.)

The container of almond milk looks great, but it contains finely ground almonds that get through the juicer’s basket.

To get rid of that, I use a reusable nut milk bag. It’s made of a very fine nylon, and it only cost me $8.99 on Amazon (cheaper than cheesecloth.) Pour the almond milk into the bag that is set inside a large measuring cup or container. Massage and twist the bag to squeeze out the milk.

The bag rinses out easily. Just turn it inside out, put it under running water, and set it out to dry.

To the container with the milk, I add some water to get the volume to 4 cups. But you can make it thicker or thinner to your liking.

You may be wondering why you would want to make your own almond milk. There are some good carrageenan-free brands at the store, but most of them contain stabilizers and extenders and only use a really small amount of almonds.

How does homemade almond milk compare to store bought?

I get the almonds on sale at the local grocery store for $4.99 a pound. When they go on sale I stock up. There are about 3 cups of almonds per pound, so if you do the math, that’s about $1.66 for 4 cups of fresh almond milk. Pretty inexpensive.

The best part is, it tastes great!

If you have an auger juicer, or you see one on Craigslist, go ahead and pick one up and you can make almond milk along with your juices.