What's fermenting in your kitchen?

Jason Hernandez wrote:This thread reminds me of my epic fail as a Peace Corps volunteer in Namibia. While it lasted, I got to experience the traditional kefir made by the Herero tribe. Too bad I didn't get to stay long enough to learn how to make it.

I know some Dominican fermentation techniques, though. First and foremost, since I have my own cacao trees, I have to ferment the beans as part of the processing -- let them ferment, preferably in the sun, until the berry pulp is gone, then the fermented beans go to the roasting stage. I have not done coffee beans, but I am told they work the same way.

More interesting, though, is a folk remedy taught me by a retired professor in the village. He swears by it to maintain a healthy prostate. I would have to find my notebook with the exact recipe, but two of the most important ingredients are annatto berries and garlic, and of course the fermentation culture obtained from the previous batch. He uses it as a condiment on most of his food.

Hey Jason,  are you still on Permies?  You have lots of interesting ferments mentioned here.  like to know more.  

Kombucha is always brewing.   One gal in  the fridge for drinking. Two gal jars on the countertop at various stages of fementation .  Right now we are also eyeing our cabbage for Kraut.

I don’t have much going.  Just kombucha and sourdough.  The more I read the more I remembered.  I have some lemons in salt, and some vinegar… mostly ACV from local apples but if someone brings me wine and there’s leftovers, I pour that in the vinegar.

Except wait!  I just began reviving my kefir.  Last fall I didn’t have goats to milk, so I just left the jar in the frige, loosely covered.  I kept meaning to refresh or feed , but nope!  All the water had evaporated out of it and the flavor was too sharp for me, so I rinsed the milk solids and cream off - really, just today, and poured some milk in.  It may take a few feedings to wake it up, but I think it counts…
And I am inspired to do more when the local fruit and vegetables begin.

I saw there was one reply I gave 6 years ago. Since then I have done (and am doing) more fermenting.
- There's the water kefir. Some years ago a friend gave me a small jar of it to start with. Ever since then I have it going on, feeding it new water with sugar and dried apricots every other day, so I can have the probiotic drink it made (I mix in a little fruit syrup/cordial). When I go away for more than two days I put it in the fridge. It's easy to revive.
- There's garlic honey, made with the first garlic I harvested this season. It's only one small jar, so I'll only use it when I feel I really need it.
- Two jars of 'kimchi' (made without a recipe, using a mix of vegetables and spices) are in the fridge now, so the fermenting won't go on any longer.
- And I have lemon-with-salt. Although it's more salty, I think it's fermented. I use small bits (half teaspoon) of it in salads.

Milk kefir is forever going.  Natto was incubating over the gas stove pilot until last night.  Now it's in the fridge.  Totally subjective, but I feel better eating a serving every day prior to exercise.  I will also forever maintain that natto will head off nasty GI bugs before they really get started -I would like to see this studied. I have decades of strictly anecdotal data about this.

Robert Neville wrote:Milk kefir is forever going.  Natto was incubating over the gas stove pilot until last night.  Now it's in the fridge.  Totally subjective, but I feel better eating a serving every day prior to exercise.  I will also forever maintain that natto will head off nasty GI bugs before they really get started -I would like to see this studied. I have decades of strictly anecdotal data about this.

Hi!  Natto? - this is new for me. Of course I can google it, but anything you’d like to share?
 
I recently got the craziest good book on wild ferments but am traveling at the moment.  I ll share it over the weekend. I can’t wait to try out some of the ideas.  Everything from fermenting bark and weeds to more traditional ferments.

As for my home; I have kombucha in various stages, need to dig out my water kefir grains, recently killed a generously donated sourdough starter, some fermented apples, an ages old honey garlic mixture that’s turned black, but I used it over the winter with no ill effects (and used it due to ill effects, ironically) usually some onion in honey that I like to drizzle on toast.  I often ferment oatmeal on the counter if I’ve made too much and then after it’s nice and sour will add some flour and make a loaf of sorts. I have a cabbage that’s been waiting to become kimchi, and a pineapple to become tepache. I have a few fruit peel vinegars in my cupboard.  

It’s nice to make a list.  I was thinking I don’t ferment much but my list was longer than I realized.  

I’m so glad to see this thread revived! There were a lot of inspiring  things here.

R Overman wrote:

Hi!  Natto? - this is new for me. Of course I can google it, but anything you’d like to share?

Natto is a Japanese soybean ferment through a bacteria, bacillus subtilis.  It's quite the hardy, spore-forming bug.  It's my understanding it has survived trips to space unprotected against vacuum, absolute zero and cosmic radiation.  On earth, it can survive inoculation into my hot, pressure cooked soybeans to at least 140F, briefly anyway.  I seed some dry spores in a quart (dry volume) of such beans, stir in a couple tbsp brown sugar to give them a jump-start, cover in perforated foil and incubate over the pilot of my gas stove at roughly 105F for about 20 hours.  I'll crack the door to modulate the temp.  The result is an odd bean ferment with stringy strands of polysaccharide that trail off your utensil like stands of hot mozzarella.  Some object to that texture or to it's odor -which I don't find very objectionable in the homemade variety.  You can find dry spores for sale imported from Japan, or you can go to an Asian grocery and buy frozen natto in single-serve styrofoam packets that also work passably well to get your own batch going.  

A further interesting aside is that it was once used to treat dysentery and was under investigation for it's antimicrobial properties before the advent of modern antibiotics.  I've found it useful to have in my own personal pharmacopeia.  

I love forum culture, it does my heart good seeing this thread that was active when I last used the site, revived some weeks ago after 6 years.

My ongoing projects:

-Sauerkraut made from cabbage and scallions rescued from work.
-Tomatos, salted & splashed with just a bit of that kraut water, for NOMA-style "lacto-tomato water." 2 days into the ferment it smells unbelievably fruity, in a way I associate with Berliner Weisse-type ales. I can only assume I've got some crazy wild yeast going on.
-Vinegar I started from some truly bizarre wine that I ended up with, a commercial white with blueberry flavor and blue color added. The temptation of having a blue vinegar on hand was too much to resist. I'm curious to see if whatever blue color they put in it will kill the acetobacteria or something.
-Birds eye chili, bitter melon & garlic relish

Welcome back to Permies!!!

Roxy Van wrote:
-Birds eye chili, bitter melon & garlic relish

Could you tell me a bit more about this? People know I love bitter melon and I often find myself with a bunch on hand, I'm always looking for new things to do with it.

NOMA style lacto-tomato water.

What is it?  How would I make it?  Any chance it would exacerbate irritable bowel?

In the last 15 months my diet has had to change radically.  I can barely eat tomatoes or chilies, or leafy greens or fruits other than bananas.  I fear for my nutritional status, as I have to eat bland foods, sourdough can even bother me.  

I look forward to when I can again eat my former favorite foods.  But if I have learned one thing, carefully and cautiously is the only road.

Tereza Okava wrote:
Could you tell me a bit more about this? People know I love bitter melon and I often find myself with a bunch on hand, I'm always looking for new things to do with it.

Sure! With the caveat that it's a new experiment. The recipe was based on something similar I did last year with serrano chilis and bitter melon flavoring some fermented daikon. I thought I had a radish in the crisper drawer but didn't and went ahead making something because I wasn't sure how long bitter melon would stay good.

I chopped half a small white onion, one bitter melon (I buy them only a few times a year at most and cannot really even guess at how the size of mine compared to an "average") around 4 ounces of birds eyes, and about half a bulb's worth of garlic fairly fine, mixed them into a paste and added about 4% salt by weight. I also poured in about two tablespoons of my friend's backyard honey. I wanted to add mustard seeds but I don't have any of those right now either.

Thekla McDaniels wrote:
NOMA style lacto-tomato water.

What is it?  How would I make it?  Any chance it would exacerbate irritable bowel?

I got the recipe from "The Noma Guide To Fermentation," published by a chef who worked at a really fancy restaurant of the same name (I somehow thought it was NOMA, stylized in all caps, but it is not.) It's basically just tomatos fermented with 2% salt for 3-7 days with the juice strained from the solids.

I don't have IBS or currently cook for anyone who does and don't want to offer any health and/or wellness advice based on pure speculation.

Thanks Roxy . Your answer is perfect!
I think there’s a lot of variability among IBS sufferers.  I’m currently hoping I don’t have the condition, just in an “episode.”

Just sauerkraut, kimchi and apple vinegar fermenting away in our house at the moment.

Burra Maluca wrote:

For years I've wanted to go round and do a photo-shoot of his sheep and cheese-making system but I've kept away for a year as it just felt too awkward, but I think it's time I made myself do it anyway.  

Did you ever get around to doing the photo shoot Burra? Would love to see it!

Megan Palmer wrote:Did you ever get around to doing the photo shoot Burra? Would love to see it!

Alas, I did not.  

Covid happened, we moved house, he's gotten older and cut his operation down quite a lot. And we very rarely see him now.

I did however find this video about a very similar cheese made nearby, with the same breed of sheep in a similar area. It's a much bigger operation with a dedicated factory but you get the idea.



And of course, whilst I consider 'my' sheep-man's cheese to be the best in the world, the one shown in the video has officially been declared to be the best in the world at the world cheese awards a couple of years ago.

I have started making ginger bug sodas over water kefir this summer. Either one gives me that carbonated cold drink that is so good after a hot day outside. The ginger bug method slightly less work than water kefir. Even though I use crystallized ginger sometimes in the water kefir ferment the ginger bug gives the drink a stronger ginger bite when finished.

My multigrain sourdough starter is smelling really good just now.  It's too hot to bake in the oven this summer, however.  So I'm making flatbread & pancakes.

Garlic, beets, sour cream in the fridge, and green beans started tonight.

Already finished eating the sunroots, and radishes.

The fridge also contains a jar of commercial sauerkraut.

Making a new mother of kombucha since about six days ago, and have a barrel of hard apple cider that's slowly turning to vinegar.

I really like the self-burping lids.