This is a new and exciting thing for those of us at BadPixie Central. Snoe's been enthusiastically adding some of the first batch to everything he's eating. According to him, it's even a wonderful way to spice up chicken and dumplings. I've found that I enjoy it mixed in with some black beans and brown rice. It was even a success with some pork and chicken mole I purchased from one of the wonderful Green Market vendors. I'm dying to see how it is on eggs, but that will have to wait until The Bear outgrows his allergy to them.
In addition to the gastronomic delight of the finished product, the creation process is great. As a history buff, I find myself pondering the days of yore when folks regularly got together to do this sort of thing, something that is rapidly disappearing in this increasingly isolationist society. It's a nice feeling, having a kitchen full of people talking, laughing and being industrious together. The mix of personalities is as much spicy fun as the results.
Now I'm eager for more, more, more. I'm thinking fondly of asparagus spears and garlic with dill. It will also be interesting to see how the probiotic benefits affect the baby, hopefully by easing his body's overreaction to certain common foods. I think I'll do some research into that area and if I find anything interesting, I'll be sure to share it.
Thanks again for including us in this community. Great people, great food--it doesn't get any better than that!
Tuesday, December 16, 2008
The Famous Peanutbutter Mix
Isn't this gorgeous? Special thanks to hand model Patrick Bertolino. Carrots, two kinds of beets, two kinds of cabbage, and a bit of ginger. It was ready to eat right after fermenting but the flavors developed and mellowed as it aged. And we haven't been able to recreate it since! That was a special batch...
Thursday, November 20, 2008
Saurkraut
Stelly & I made saurkraut last night! We were without our fearless leader (instigator?), but it was so simple. Totally manageable for two mildly experienced picklers. Even better, it was a short process.
We'll let you know more about the deliciousness in a week!
IntraSpeck
We'll let you know more about the deliciousness in a week!
IntraSpeck
Monday, March 24, 2008
118 degrees F.
That's an important parameter for a number of biological processes. Water starts its phase-shift to vapor at that point, the liquid expanding into steam. Because of this expansion, our bodies feel 118 degrees F at the cellular level as pain- this is where our mouths start telling us "too hot!". Now, directly related, food starts losing its precious natural enzyme content at the same temperature- this is a process of cellular breakdown as water starts turning to steam. Multiple sources advocate a raw diet, primarily to maximize natural enzyme content and therefore maximize nutrient uptake. The dotted line to draw between warm and cooked is 118 degrees F. Cooking food beyond 118 degrees starts breaking down the enzymes that were there naturally, which makes your food harder to digest and keeps nutrients from getting added to our bodies. A fourth interesting thing happens just below this temperature, related in process but not culinarily- sperm dies. See: http://www.newmalecontraception.org/heat.htm. The testicles are outside the body because sperm start dying at 95 degrees F. Soaking your nuts (doesn't have to be brine this time) in water almost at the pain threshold (116) removes fertility for weeks. Men in India are having great successes at voluntary birth control using this method, take that big pharma!
Wednesday, February 27, 2008
One of the most important ingredients
Salt is an ingredient in almost every pickling recipe we use, whether it's added by the spoonful or making the brine other ingredients are soaked in. Iodized salt is bad but the rest is salt- the purpose of salt is to inhibit the growth of unwanted bacteria and other putrefactants before the fermentation process we're setting up can kick in. Lacto-fermentation takes a day or two to get started, depending on temperature, so the salt guards the door until the lactobacilli are up to the task.
If you're just getting started with fermenting, you might think that the salt will inhibit the growth of the little critters you're trying to cultivate. Seems reasonable only until you see how few pickling or fermenting recipes DON'T use salt. Or until you open something you were looking forward to sampling, only to be warned away by its smell (see the previous post). For instance, beet kvass, as explained by S. Fallon, only has three ingredients: beets, whey, and salt. Well, water, too. Kvass only takes three days to ferment, doesn't seem like much time for other bacteria to move in an set up housekeeping. And folks have complained about the saltiness of previous batches of kvass. We found out the hard way how important the salt is- the salt-light batch wound up slaking the thirst of the compost pile!
Many ingredient lists don't include salt explicitly but do call for a step of soaking the veggies to be pickled in brine- that's salt water. This step also makes sure that your veggies don't get too dry, such as when we had the problem with with floaters.
If you're making a batch of pickles without using an inoculant such as an existing strain of culture, whey (the living, liquid component of yoghurt), or unpasteurized vinegar, the salt is even more important. Root vegetables already have living bacteria in them from the soil they were grown in and can begin fermenting on their own if the conditions are right. This takes a bit longer to start than with an inoculant, so the salt is crucial in keeping bad bacteria at bay. We always use some sort of inoculant as a starter but we've learned to keep the salt in there, first. There's just too much heartbreak involved in having to dump a batch that you've put money, effort, and anticipation time into. And that doesn't even begin to cover the gastro-intestinal grief that comes with eating food gone bad!
If you're just getting started with fermenting, you might think that the salt will inhibit the growth of the little critters you're trying to cultivate. Seems reasonable only until you see how few pickling or fermenting recipes DON'T use salt. Or until you open something you were looking forward to sampling, only to be warned away by its smell (see the previous post). For instance, beet kvass, as explained by S. Fallon, only has three ingredients: beets, whey, and salt. Well, water, too. Kvass only takes three days to ferment, doesn't seem like much time for other bacteria to move in an set up housekeeping. And folks have complained about the saltiness of previous batches of kvass. We found out the hard way how important the salt is- the salt-light batch wound up slaking the thirst of the compost pile!
Many ingredient lists don't include salt explicitly but do call for a step of soaking the veggies to be pickled in brine- that's salt water. This step also makes sure that your veggies don't get too dry, such as when we had the problem with with floaters.
If you're making a batch of pickles without using an inoculant such as an existing strain of culture, whey (the living, liquid component of yoghurt), or unpasteurized vinegar, the salt is even more important. Root vegetables already have living bacteria in them from the soil they were grown in and can begin fermenting on their own if the conditions are right. This takes a bit longer to start than with an inoculant, so the salt is crucial in keeping bad bacteria at bay. We always use some sort of inoculant as a starter but we've learned to keep the salt in there, first. There's just too much heartbreak involved in having to dump a batch that you've put money, effort, and anticipation time into. And that doesn't even begin to cover the gastro-intestinal grief that comes with eating food gone bad!
Monday, January 14, 2008
Gone Bad
Humans have been recognizably human for a million years. Critters have been consuming fermented foodstuffs on this planet for longer than that; ask anyone who's observed birds eating fermented fruit if they saw any hesitation but rest assured it's been going on a while. Within this group, we try real hard to set up proper and specific conditions to create changes we're looking for but ultimately, we're putting control of things back into Mother Nature's hands. It doesn't always work out like we want and we have to be careful not to eat something that's spoiled. Case in point, two batches in a row of pumpkin seeds gone awry during the soak and dehydrate process. If you soak your seeds or nuts in saltwater overnight and then dry them slowly in the sun or dehydrator (or even oven, if you can keep things just over 100 degrees F), you will end up killing the enzyme-inhibitors that are intended to make that seed or nut pass through your bowels and make a tree later. This means you get to enjoy all the nutrients that would otherwise have fed said tree. So, it turns out that you need to change (and rinse) this water every 12 hours or so, otherwise, fermentation begins (as evidenced by fine bubbles generating and rising to the surface of your brine). If the telltale bubbles that we look for during purposeful fermentation didn't tip you off that you weren't properly soaking your nuts, then hopefully you got a putrescent scent to help out. This is a really good thing and it takes us back to the "recognizably human for 1,000,000 years" bit- our noses are exceedingly good warning devices, having evolved to detect putrescence as a defense mechanism through the years.
While fermenting or otherwise processing raw foods, always trust your nose. If you aren't sure, ask someone else to take a sniff and watch their reactions. Bad stuff makes for negative reactions and, truly, things aren't so dire yet that we need to eat putrescent food. Now, if you're some kind of mad scientist, we're all trying to figure out how buzzards eat putrefied flesh all day without getting sick but luckily, we don't yet really need this knowledge. Either way, if your nose detects an "off" odor, trust your nose and toss that stuff. Along the same lines, if you aren't trying to ferment something but wind up with little bubbles like you normally find during fermentation, be wary. And if you go to open that jar of pickles and the top wants to POP off, indicating an off-gassing inside, you might have a runaway jar on your hands. If you'll read back, you'll see that we previously had an issue with veggies that floated into the boundary layer that was meant to create an anaerobic environment for our fermentation processes. Once all the floaty bits were removed, the process was allowed to proceed. We started this culling process after fermentation had begun, so we happily tossed anything that smelled "off". And we later tossed anything that popped open once we released the lid's pressure- this indicated further putrefying activity. Jars that we weren't sure didn't have that "off" smell got labeled with a "?". These later turned out to have that telltale positive pressure and resulting "POP" upon opening. And the smell inside confirmed our suspicions- this shit ain't right. So, if that batch of garlic in oil wants to go POP when you open it, toss it. Botulism, for instance, just isn't on our menu. If that old stuff looks great but smells bad, say goodbye. Our noses are incredibly good at detecting food gone bad and our brains can spot these dangers in even more ways, it's a good thing to heed these warning signs Mother Nature offers us. Darwin Awards, after all, only benefit the living!
While fermenting or otherwise processing raw foods, always trust your nose. If you aren't sure, ask someone else to take a sniff and watch their reactions. Bad stuff makes for negative reactions and, truly, things aren't so dire yet that we need to eat putrescent food. Now, if you're some kind of mad scientist, we're all trying to figure out how buzzards eat putrefied flesh all day without getting sick but luckily, we don't yet really need this knowledge. Either way, if your nose detects an "off" odor, trust your nose and toss that stuff. Along the same lines, if you aren't trying to ferment something but wind up with little bubbles like you normally find during fermentation, be wary. And if you go to open that jar of pickles and the top wants to POP off, indicating an off-gassing inside, you might have a runaway jar on your hands. If you'll read back, you'll see that we previously had an issue with veggies that floated into the boundary layer that was meant to create an anaerobic environment for our fermentation processes. Once all the floaty bits were removed, the process was allowed to proceed. We started this culling process after fermentation had begun, so we happily tossed anything that smelled "off". And we later tossed anything that popped open once we released the lid's pressure- this indicated further putrefying activity. Jars that we weren't sure didn't have that "off" smell got labeled with a "?". These later turned out to have that telltale positive pressure and resulting "POP" upon opening. And the smell inside confirmed our suspicions- this shit ain't right. So, if that batch of garlic in oil wants to go POP when you open it, toss it. Botulism, for instance, just isn't on our menu. If that old stuff looks great but smells bad, say goodbye. Our noses are incredibly good at detecting food gone bad and our brains can spot these dangers in even more ways, it's a good thing to heed these warning signs Mother Nature offers us. Darwin Awards, after all, only benefit the living!
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