I Admit It. I Still Ferment.

Can't Stop The Rot.

It’s been really fun to ferment at home, without any pressure *rim shot*. In fact, some of the ferments are happening without us even doing anything!

We still joke about pickle PTSD. The joke being that making firm, crispy pickles is really challenging whether its a quart jar, or even more so when it’s thousands of pounds of cucumbers. I can revisit that bit of anxiety managing low stakes projects like salinity in a quart of kimchi, or if my thermophilic yogurt culture can handle 117f/47c instead of 115f/46c.

Here are some fermentation projects I am working on currently:

Today as we cleaned the kitchen, I pulled this old jug of fruit juice out of our fridge, and it was swollen with carbon dioxide because some wild yeast had situated itself in the bottle, and slow fermented in the fridge, which in itself is beautiful and fascinating.

This is probably my favorite part of fermentation - this moment where you do not know, yet the potential is virtually unlimited. Lindsay and I opened it slowly, and it was just gently carbonated. Whenever we taught fermentation, we really highlighted that if a ferment is bad, you will know. Almost always, it becomes rancid (rotting top layer exposed to oxygen for too long), or unbearably funky in its aromatic (mold).

Well. In the end, this was delicious, and wasn’t even boozy. Funny enough, we had this juice ferment on us another time when we made a chia seed water with a bit of this fruit juice for a bike ride. We left it in the car for days and when we brought it back in, it was unopenable. If I would have opened it, I would have caught an unsuspecting blow to the face! #petnat #seltzer #funkywaterbottle

A normal DIY fermenter nerd now, I become disinterested in paying $10 for live cultured Bulgarian yogurt at Whole Foods even though I feel horrible saying that after fighting for people to pay premium dollars for ferments for a decade. I eat a lot of food, especially when I’m working out or deep in training for something so a quart of yogurt can disappear in one or two days if I’m really vibing.

Like a normal DIY fermenter nerd who isn’t running a commerical fermentation business, I bought a Bulgarian culture off Amazon for $18. I made some ok batches at first, and even skipped the straining step. But I noticed Lindsay wasn’t really enjoying it so I started to take a bit more care.

I double boil to 180f/82c one gallon of local milk. At 180, I turn the burner off, set a 15 minute timer, and let it rest around 170f-180f for 15 minutes. I strain the protein that firms up on the surface. I then cool in the sink in a water bath. After that, it’s so simple. I add 50 grams of older yogurt to each batch in the Instant, and I use the yogurt setting. I wait at least 12 hours because I am not weak and I like tart yogurt, punks. Really I like 15 hours. After that, I strain through cheese cloth. I loose about 25-30% volume after boiling and straining. Now it’s a premium f$$$ product and I’m a true Yogurt Daddy and I text friends every now and again and ask, “Hey I am thinking about starting a fermentation business. Thoughts?”

I crave fermented foods now, because for over a decade, I permiated my gut with them daily. Kimchi is a go-to ferment for us, after having made it commercially for many years. We started off making really mediorce product, but really had some banger stuff towards the end as we got more diligent.

One of our favorite recipes was this Apple and Bok Choy Kimchi. If I remember correctly, we made it because a local orchard had a bunch of seconds they were going to sell us for cheap, and the Napa wasn’t coming in just yet. So we used bok choy.

I can’t ever make enough kimchi. It just goes fast. I also generally always over salt it and really took care with Lindsay talking through it with me to not have that happen this batch. I generally just salt it like sauerkraut, and unless you’re about to age it for a long time, it’s just not a good fit.

I truly never make enough. But it’ll be good with all these local vegetables in it from Snow’s Bend.

Andrew from Belle Meadow grows the best pickling cucumbers around. I shouldn’t tell you because now it’ll be even harder to get them, but it’ll be great for him. I preordered what I felt like was a lot, but I swear I can’t ferment enough ever. Half the issue is I ate half the cucumbers raw while I watched Tottenham play. These were very good, I think. One of my batches sucked because I did some math wrong, but one was very good and I think this was it.

The way to make good lactofermented pickles is to cut the blossom end off, ice bath, and add tannic leaves to the fermenting vessel. Additionally, it helps to ferment them quite chilly. Like in the low 70’s, but not too cold. I put these on an air conditioning duct on the floor because it was so hot outside. You create the brine for the total weight of water and cucumbers, not just the water, and not just the cucumbers. It confuses me so much, I doubt myself writing this. Don’t listen to me - I truly don’t know how to make cucumber pickles. It was so hard to measure 55 gallon barrels and now it isn’t hard to measure a half gallon glass jar so that’s pleasant.

I made some beet kvass (fermented beet brine) with Mountain Sun beets earlier this year, and was super into adding seltzer and lemon water to it. It’s absolutely outstanding. I love how the fermentation allows you not to piss red for days, and absorb some of those goodies.

In regards to getting probiotics in my daily diet to aid digestion and my mental health, hot sauce has to be the easiest addition.

I made this with Ireland Farms peppers. I don’t remember what I picked but it was five or six varieties. It’s quite mild but still has some heat. It’s been a fan favorite at work. I even shelf stabilized some for the dining room table with apple cider vinegar.

After fermenting the chili paste pictured above, I Vitamix it to puree and package it in a repurposed squirt bottle of shitty Whole Foods hot sauce I’ve reused three too many times. I did make a metric f$$$ ton of this sauce, and have nearly 50oz. But all of these moochers are destorying my stash so I gotta let em know what’s what, I swear!

Last but and definitely least is this subpar picture of this Dill Pickle Kraut I made with so much dill and garlic. It is pretty pungent solo but on some pork with rice and beans, it’s been a mind bender. It’s cool to consider making ferments for dishes, in contrast to the side of a salad, in contrast to scooping them out of the jar with a fork.

P.S. You can see an epically failed bronze fennel and peach vinegar in the background. P.S.S. I have a horrendous track record with legit vinegar production.

P.S.S.S. I’m about to start my charcuterie journey of which I have waited twelve years for. It was actually my first ferment love, beside Lindsay. I wanted to raise pigs and make salami in Alabama in 2012 in a state that had actually never regulated fermented foods in recent memory. We baffled state and federal for years, until our FDA inspector was a Korean woman who really enjoyed what we did, and was strict yet reasonable in her regulations, well knowing that kimchi is quite safe. Comment below your favorite ferment if you’ve read this far.