The idea of fermenting at home might seem scary, but it isn’t, it is super easy and is an excellent way to prevent food waste as well as improve your health. As part of our Root For Our Future project, we held a workshop to ease into the world of fermentation, providing a bit of an introduction, some key rules to follow and a couple of easy recipes to get started.
What is food fermentation?
Humans have been fermenting foods for thousands of years, and we continue to do so today although now it is largely done through industrialised processes. It’s very likely that you have eaten some fermented food recently – yoghurt, cheese, olives, miso, kimchi, tempeh, salami are all part of the modern diet and are all the product of fermentation. Before the invention of refrigeration, people used all sorts of methods to store food, including fermentation, allowing them to enjoy the bounty of the summer harvests throughout the winter.
Fermenting essentially introduces conditions where good bacteria can thrive, making it difficult for bad bacteria to establish, so prolonging the life of the food. Fermenting has the added benefits of improving the flavour of foodstuffs and making nutrients within the ingredients more readily available to our digestive systems so improving their nutritional value. And, as we all now know, the microbes in raw fermented food are key to the maintenance of a healthy gut microbiome – note the use of the term raw, some fermented foods available in the shops have been pasteurised, killing the microbes.
❗A quick word on botulism! Botulism is a potentially deadly neurological disease caused by a toxin produced by the bacteria clostridium botulinum. There has been a lot of scaremongering about the likelihood of getting botulism from fermented food. This is absolutely untrue. In fact the conditions created when fermenting are the complete opposite to what botulism spores need to grow. There has not been a single recorded case of botulism caused by consuming fermented foods, so rest assured! That is not to say that ferments can’t go bad, they can, but when they do you will know about it – mould, the stench of rotting cabbage – and you will not want to eat them!
So, what can you ferment?
Pretty much any fresh, raw vegetable and fruit! Cabbage is the traditional basis of things like sauerkraut and kimchi, to which things like carrots, apples, radishes, herbs etc can be added. Root vegetables like parsnips and carrots make delicious ferments on their own, and a spicy salsa can be made from tomatoes, peppers, onions and chillies.
🥒🥕🥬 The possibilities are endless! 🌶️🧅🍅
It is entirely possible to make a delicious ferment using only the slightly sad (not mouldy) looking vegetables at the bottom of the fridge, but it will be infinitely better if these are mixed with something fresh too, aim for 50% fresh to 50% not so fresh.
During the workshop we focussed on lacto-fermented vegetables, probably the easiest form of fermentation that can be used to create a vast array of krauts, kimchis and pickles.
Key rules to follow
Before we get to the recipes, here are a few key rules which we advise you to follow to ensure the best result for any kind of fermentation:
- Wash vegetables well, and peel carrots, ginger etc if they are not organic.
- Chop all vegetables to approximately the same size.
- Having clean equipment is important – not sterile, do not use sterilising tablets or similar, but wash everything in hot soapy water before you start (including your hands!), and wipe down surfaces. This will help prevent contamination.
- Glass jars are better than plastic for fermenting, although food grade plastic containers will do if that’s all you have available.
- If making a brine, try using filtered water if you can as water straight from the tap contains chlorine and other chemicals than can interfere with the fermentation process. Tap water can be used if it is boiled and left to cool for a few hours as this will get rid most of the chemicals.
- Always leave about 2-3cm of headspace at the top of the jars to allow the ferments to expand otherwise you could end up with a messy overflow! On that note, it is always best to put your jars onto a plate when they are fermenting to catch any liquid that bubbles out.
- ‘Burp’ your jars daily when they are fermenting to release the carbon dioxide – this is as simple as slightly undoing the jar lid to allow air out.
- Make sure the vegetables are always submerged below the liquid to keep them in an anaerobic environment and to prevent mould growth.
- Mould is not good! Any mould in your ferment means that it has been contaminated and should be composted.
- Your ferments will sometimes develop an opaque, white-ish dusty looking film on the surface which is called Kahm yeast. Unlike mould this is harmless and can just be scraped off and the ferment will still be fine to eat.
- If you leave your ferments for a long time in the fridge the top few centimetres might dry out and darken. When this happens just remove the darkened vegetables and enjoy the ferment below.
- Trust your nose, if it smells off then it probably is! If you do have a ferment that goes bad you can feed it to your compost which will thoroughly enjoy all the microbes.
Recipes!
Kimchi (makes about 1 litre)
- 1 large white cabbage
- 6 tbsp sea salt
- 2-4 tbsp gochugaru Korean chilli powder or any dried chilli
- 1 large carrot
- 3-4 cloves of garlic
- Thumb-sized piece of ginger
Coarsely chop the cabbage and place it in a bowl. Make a brine using 1 litre water mixed with the salt, stir well to dissolve salt and pour over the cabbage. Press the cabbage down using a plate or other weight to ensure it is under the water then leave out on a kitchen surface for 8 hours or overnight.
After the cabbage has soaked in the brine grate the ginger and the carrot and chop the garlic. Drain the water off the cabbage, retaining about 200ml. Taste the cabbage, it should be salty but not too salty – add more salt if you can’t taste salt.
Mix the cabbage with the carrot, garlic and ginger and then add the chilli powder – start with a small amount, tasting and adding more until you are happy with the flavour. Pack the kimchi into a jar, pressing down firmly with each addition to release liquid. Fill the jar nearly to the top, leaving some space for expansion, ensuring that the liquid comes over the top of the vegetables. If there is not sufficient liquid top it up with some of the reserved brine. Add a weight, close the jar and leave to ferment, burping the jar daily. Taste it every week and once it has reached a level of sour spiciness that you are happy with put it in the fridge where it will keep for months.
Quick kimchi
Using the same ingredients above but shortening the soaking time. Chop the cabbage and add the salt, massaging it through the cabbage until it starts to soften. Pour over 1 litre of water and weight it down with a plate and leave for up to 1 hour. Then follow the post-soaking instructions above.
Fermented garlic
- 2 or more heads of garlic
- 2% brine solution (1tbsp salt dissolved in 1 litre water)
Remove the loose skins from the garlic cloves and then place them into a clean jar. Cover the garlic with brine leaving space at the top of the jar for expansion. Weight the garlic down, close the jar and leave it at room temperature to ferment for 4-6 weeks.
After 4-6 weeks, store in the fridge and use for salad dressings, sauces, whatever you would normally add garlic to! But, don’t cook it as you will kill the microbes, just add it to cooked sauces at the end of the cooking time.
The garlic cloves might turn a grey/blue colour which will look alarming but is perfectly fine, its due to the sulphur compounds in the garlic. The cloves will still be edible.
Resources
There are many resources on fermentation out there, and with so many there can be conflicting guidance given. We suggest starting with a book from a reputable fermenter, and these are some of Amelia’s (our fermentation queen) favourites:
- ‘Wild Fermentation’ by Sandor Ellix Katz
- ‘The Cultured Club’ by Dearbhla Reynolds
- ‘Fermented Vegetables’ by Kirsten and Christopher Shockey
- ‘Fermentation’ by Rachel de Thample (River Cottage Handbook No. 18)
Our Spring Fermentation Workshop was a free event and part of our Root For Our Future project, funded by the The National Lottery Community Fund/ Cronfa Gymunedol y Loteri Genedlaethol.