What are you fermenting today?

[rebecca100]

Good I don't want to do that guessing game with bad food. My yogurt turned out good too. Especially after it cooled it thickened even more. It tasted sooo good. I bought some storebought several months ago cheap brand and it was so nasty I could barely stand to taste it. It was really bland. I bought organic from the store to use as a starter and was really suprised at how easy it was and how good it tasted!

 

[big brown horse]

My Wild Fermentation book came in this week, so if you have any requests, I would be happy to post them.

 

[freemotion]

My request is that you post any interesting recipes! What is in there that is not in NT?

I have been making kombucha for years now, and just got my very first batch with MOLD colonies on top! One gallon was good, one had two blue and white circles of mold on top of the scoby. Into the sink it went, and I bleached the jar.

It was a good reminder for me to change my spare scoby that I keep in the fridge more often. I pulled one out, but I know it is very old, at least a year or more. I put it in the second gallon and will see if it is still alive.

I must have some mold spores in my house due to this very, very wet year. I do boil everything, so it goes into the jars clean. But in the few moments before I get it covered, apparently something floats in.

I am definitely going to wait another couple of weeks to start seriously fermenting again!

Oh, who am I trying to kid? I have a bunch of peppers to do, and more herbs to make salad dressing mix with. I will take my chances!

 

[ORChick]

I think what I liked best about "Wild Fermentation" is the author's very convincing attitude that "you can do it!". Fermentation has been going on forever, and there is absolutely nothing scary about it. Whatever you do (within reason ) will probably work, and you don't need a sterile laboratory environment to make that happen. He was the one who gave me the idea to make some hominy with wood ashes - not that that is fermenting anything, but it was the first step for something he was doing. I just did that first step, and instead of corn alcohol I made tortillas . He almost convinced me, through the book, to try my hand at miso - but the South River people in MA do such a good job that ... well ... maybe some other time.

 

[FarmerDenise]

WEll, I was trying to make wine out of my grapes, but I didn't get the wine yeast. So I just let mother nature take it's course. I had added blackberries and some sugar to the mix. Every day I stirred the must for about a week or so. A couple of days ago I drained of the must, but lacking apropriate jars, I had the "wine" sitting in the bucket for two more days. Today I decided to taste it and lo and behold it is definitely not wine, but a wonderfull vinegar. I bottled it up into 5 wine bottled, I had been saving (the kind with scew caps) and 2 other bottles I had to put corks on. This will make some wonderfull salad dressing. And nice gifts too.

 

[Wifezilla]

Vinegar works too I did that once with some apple cider.

I have 2 jars of kraut on the counter. My guys eat cabbage so fast I have to buy 6 heads to make sure I had 2 to ferment! LOL

 

[me&thegals]

I have a crockpot full of fermenting cabbage--just cabbage and salt. Five jars of red cabbage with salt and water topping it of. Then, 2 jars of cabbage, salt and a little yogurt whey. This is so fun! I keep testing the lids to feel if there is any gas buildup.

 

[Wifezilla]

I added some fennel seeds to mine...but other than that it is cabbage and sea salt. I figured I would "burp" the jars later tonight

 

[freemotion]

I used some rice vinegar in a recipe this week and there was a mother on top....at least I think that is what it was, it looked like a cork because the bottle was full (but a couple of years old) and it formed in the neck of the bottle. Reminds me of a kombucha mushroom. Is this a mother? Can I use it to make other vinegars? The brown rice vinegar is organic. The plug is still in the vinegar.

 

[freemotion]

A gallon of salsa, a pint of hot peppers (minced), and a pint of scallions!

And a four-gallon batch of stinky cheese with my new order of mold powder....geotrichum candida, which supposedly won't cause the "slip skin" problem of my last stinky cheeses, where the center is liquid and the rind is separate and "slips" off when you cut it. I used penicillum candida only in the first batches, appropriate for cow's milk, but causes slip skin in goat's milk cheese. I used a mix of the two molds. Two months to go before I know if it worked! Here's to fuzzy cheese!