{Note from Jessica: Today’s post is shared by my sweet friend Jess Kuh. Jess is a fellow real food lover with a passion for natural living, herbs, and anything that keeps her family and home healthy.}

Coffee. Really, the word itself is enough to bring comfort to me on cold mornings. Bliss in a cup. I know it sounds funny but some days it is the little things that bring joy to this stay-at-home mama.

I know it sounds silly, but I don’t need the  coffee for the ‘get up and go.’ I like it for the warmth it provides. I will also admit that I like my coffee creamy and rich. So good!

I also like flavored coffee but ick, not the chemicals and fake flavors that are in it. That’s when I started playing with different flavor combinations to come up with something lovely.

Hazelnut and vanilla are common but I wanted something more fall-like without the pumpkin spice. That’s when I decided to play with a maple coffee flavor.

I love maple syrup but putting enough in my coffee to get that rich flavor I was looking for made it sickeningly sweet (and trust me, I like sweet but not this sweet).

This recipe totally knocked it out of the park for me. I got the maple flavoring I wanted without being heavy on the sweetness. Plus, I was able to use coconut milk to keep it dairy-free. (If you can tolerate dairy, this works well with raw cream.) This dairy-free maple coffee creamer works great in both hot and cold coffee applications. Or, use in your tea if you’re coffee free! 

Coupons for Dairy-Free Maple Coffee Creamer Ingredients 

I am always asked about my favorite ingredients and what I use in my own kitchen. I have linked to the products from my affiliate partners that I personally use and recommend. And now, here are the special coupon offers that select affiliate partners are currently offering:

• Thrive Market: If you sign up through this link, you will get 15% OFF your first order.
• Amazon, of course, has everything you need for this recipe. Their prices are often very good, though I love to shop around and sometimes find that Thrive Market has better deals. If you like saving money, it’s good to shop around! 🙂

Important Note On Gelatin/Collagen Types 

When it comes to gelatin or collagen, you don’t want any old product off the supermarket shelves. You want to look for 100% grass-fed gelatin from healthy animals. Just like other animal products, quality is important.

That is why I recommend Vital Proteins Grass-Fed Gelatin products and Perfect Supplements products exclusively. I have compared these brand with other brands on the market and the quality far surpasses anything else I’ve tried. I am thrilled to be one of their affiliate partners and support such great products and companies.

Perfect Supplements offers a grass-fed hydrolyzed collagen (cold-soluble) right now and has a gelatin (hot-soluble) in the works for 2016. Read my review of their product here or watch the video below. You can order their own products via their own site here or on Amazon here.

 

Vital Proteins offers two types of gelatin. The green top (Collagen Protein) is what you need for this recipe and for recipes where you are making gummies, “jello”, etc. The blue top (Collagen Peptides) is cold water soluble and does not thicken or gel like gelatin does. Both are very nutritious, but can’t be used interchangeably. You can order their own products via their own site here or on Amazon here.

 

Dairy-Free Maple Coffee Creamer

Yield: Approx. 2 cups

Prep Time: 5 minutes

Total Time: 5 minutes

This recipe totally knocked it out of the park for me. I got the maple flavoring I wanted without being heavy on the sweetness. Plus, I was able to use coconut milk to keep it dairy-free. If you can tolerate dairy, this works well with raw cream.

Print

Ingredients

• 2 cups full-fat coconut milk
• 2 tbsp maple syrup
• 2-3 tsp. of maple extract
• 1 tbsp. grass-fed collagen 
• A pinch of sea salt

Instructions

1. Put all ingredients in a measuring cup and whisk until all incorporated.
2. Store in the refrigerator in a closed pint jar.
3. You may need to shake before use if your coconut milk separates.
4. Will keep in the fridge for up to a week.

Recommended Products

As an Amazon Associate and member of other affiliate programs, I may earn a small commission from qualifying purchases.

• 
  Perfect Hydrolyzed Collagen 
• 
  Aroy-d Coconut Milk 100% Original Net 8.5 Oz.(pack of 12)
• 
  Frontier Co-op Maple Flavor, Non-Alcoholic, 2 Ounce Bottle

Nutrition Information:

Yield: 32 Serving Size: 1
Amount Per Serving: Calories: 25Total Fat: 1gSaturated Fat: 1gTrans Fat: 0gUnsaturated Fat: 0gCholesterol: 0mgSodium: 20mgCarbohydrates: 3gFiber: 1gSugar: 2gProtein: 0g

This website provides approximate nutrition information for convenience and as a courtesy only. Nutrition data is gathered from Nutritionix and we often find their calculations to be slightly inaccurate based on the whole food ingredients we use on this site. Nutrition information can vary for a recipe based on many factors. We strive to keep the information as accurate as possible, but make no warranties regarding its accuracy. We encourage readers to make their own calculations based on the actual ingredients used in your recipe, using your preferred nutrition calculator.

A totally easy recipe to replace the chemical-filled, store-bought creamers.

A word of advice though, watch your extract because some contain sugar and even high fructose corn syrup, so keep an eye on the labels.  No need to get some junk in your awesome new coffee creamer, right?

This creamer would also work really well with Jessica’s herbal coffee blends or a hot cup of chai tea. Don’t limit to just your coffee.

I’m so happy to a clean coffee creamer to share, so tell me, what are some of your favorite coffee creamer recipes? 

Want to Make Your Own Gourmet Herbal Coffee Blends & Support Your Stress Response, Adrenals, Thyroid, and Whole Body Through Herbs?

When it comes to supporting overall wellness, herbs are a great tool to have in your toolkit, especially those who may be dealing with chronic illness of some type. Since 2009, when I started this site, I have met thousands upon thousands of people through my work and by far, the #1 health complaints are:

• adrenal fatigue (or adrenal dysfunction of some sort) (click here to read all of my adrenal health articles)
• thyroid disorders (hypo-, hyper-, or autoimmune) (click here to read all of my thyroid health articles)

Because of this, I wanted to add in a section into this post about the benefit of using herbs with chronic illness. Adaptogens are by far one of the most used herbs when it comes to working with people who have low energy, fatigue, and overall imbalance in the endocrine system (thyroid, adrenals, and blood sugar).

While the benefits of adaptogenic herbs extend far beyond just supporting that one system, this tends to be one of the main reasons people turn to adaptogenic herbs in the first place. That said there are a lot of other herbs out there that offer amazing support for the body, especially those dealing with chronic illness which is why I wanted to share this section today.

If you are dealing with any type of chronic illness, I’m sorry to break it to you, but caffeine may not be your best friend. 🙁 While you can find lots of info online in both the pro- and the anti-coffee camps, the fact of the matter comes down to the fact that are a lot of people dealing with chronic illness, especially thyroid and adrenal problems, that simply cannot tolerate coffee and caffeine.

While those with sluggish adrenal glands tend to feel run down and in need of a regular pick-me-up (like coffee and other caffeinated beverages), in the long run, caffeine can do more harm than good while you are healing. I go into the “whys” around caffeine and your adrenals in this detailed post here. In addition to the caffeine, there are other constituents, molds, and mycotoxins that can show up in coffee that some people find they react to and can further exacerbate the toxic load on the body.

When I was diagnosed with autoimmune disease and adrenal fatigue, one of the first things that had to go was coffee. In addition to dealing with these issues, we suspected that I was having some detox pathway sluggishness so we wanted to also focus on supporting the liver and lymph systems. Most people who are dealing with chronic illness are also going to have issues with detoxification of the body, which is why herbs can play such an important role. 

To be honest, I never drank coffee because of the caffeine. I drank coffee for the taste and aroma, as well as the emotional experience I felt to my morning cup of joe. For me, it was a ritual that I looked forward to every day (and sometimes multiple times a day). Whether I was brewing it at home or going to my local coffee shops, the experience was one that I clung to tightly.

But, when I was faced with new health struggles, I knew I had to do whatever I could to support my body and give it the tools it needed to heal. Giving up coffee and caffeine was one step in this direction.

And it sucked.

I turned to the coffee substitutes on the market in a desperate attempt to recreate the ritual I had grown so fond of, but nothing ever tasted the way I wanted it to. Nothing ever gave me that same experience that my cup of “real” coffee did. I knew there had to be something better, but I simply could not find it on my health food store’s shelves.

Necessity is the mother of invention so that is why I created my own coffee substitutes. They were made with organic, sustainably harvested herbs with zero grains, zero gluten, and zero caffeine. Just herbs.

Herbs that not only tasted delicious but supported my body’s function, like liver detox, bile production, digestion, etc. All of the herbs used in my “coffee” blends have been used for thousands of years to support the body’s normal functions and help everything work a little better — something we all need in today’s toxic world! (psst, dandelion is one of the herbs!)

When it came to creating these blends, if I could get something to not only tasted amazing (and helped me recreate my dearly loved ritual), but also did amazingly supportive things for my body, then it’s a no brainer!

I sold these pre-made blends on Etsy for awhile and the demand was more than I could keep up with. People literally LOVED these blends and were stunned at how much like coffee they actually tasted. Customers who had been dealing with a variety of chronic illnesses had given up coffee to heal their bodies, but like me were deeply missing their morning cup of joe ritual.

After careful consideration and work with some highly experienced advisors, I decided to stop selling the pre-made blends and instead share my proprietary recipes in the form of an eBook. That way I could arm people with the knowledge and recipes they needed to make their own caffeine-free, gluten-free, grain-free blends in the comfort of their own home. 

That is why I created the best-selling DIY Herbal Coffees eBook: A Complete Guide To Making Delicious Herbal Coffees to Support Healing & Stress Relief.

Now in its second edition, this ebook features:

• All of my proprietary herbal blend recipes to you can craft a homemade herbal cup of “coffee” at home.
• A ton of researched information about coffee’s impact on the health of those dealing with issues like adrenal fatigue, blood sugar dysregulation, autoimmune disease, thyroid disease, and any other chronic illness.
• Information about all of the herbs used, why I selected them, how to source them, how to prepare and store you “coffees”, and much more.
• Access to your own personal coffee shop where I show you how to recreate your favorite coffee shop drinks and pastries with wholesome, nourishing real food ingredients. No junk here. Only real food.

This book truly is a comprehensive guide to supporting your health, reducing your stress, and bringing a little something special back into your healing journey. You can learn more and download your own copy of this revolutionary wellness guide here, or simply click on the image below.