Kefir makes a great easy breakfast when on a camping trip. Simply strain and add milk! Probiotics are revolutionizing health and I have found that working with your own living culture is incredibly beneficial.
The amazing, living root bridges of Cherrapunji, India are strong structures which can take 15 years before being functional, but gain strength with time. Some of these bridges may be over 500 years old.
The death of my soya sauce provides a wonderful opportunity to both grieve and celebrate experimenting with food. Yes, you read that correctly, my soya sauce is dead. There will be no beautifully aged, complex tasting, umami-full soya sauce in my pantry, or in the pantry of any of my family members and friends. However, I learned a bit more…
Mold growth on soy cakes in the process of making soy sauce. I would love to know what is going on right now in the mold colonies. Why are some areas fluffy and some cauliflower-like?
As I started to write this post, I kept wanting to write: “Fermentation is not commonly used in the West.” After I wrote it though I kept coming up with examples of fermented products – beer, wine, cheese, ‘kraut, pickles, vinegar… etc. etc. We clearly ferment a lot of things. I suppose that in the East the methods and subjects are different so in some ways it feels like a different process, but fermentation is common to many cultures.
While I haven’t been able to clearly divide how different culture ferment, one thing I can say is that making soya sauce is funky involving kneading and mold and fermentation and sunlight. This ancient process takes a long time, possibly up to six months, but the end result is stunning (according to the blogosphere). Here is step 1 to delicious homemade soy sauce.
"An Englishman teaching an American about food is the blind leading the one-eyed." -A. J. Liebling
My first batch of fermented hot sauce was so successful that I have two orders for more! Never one to rest on my laurels I've decided to experiment with the second batch. I'm starting off with thai chili peppers again. I've been reading up on hot sauces and for fermentation you want to use super hot peppers. The high levels…
Suffice to say that I have a greater understanding of the scent of a medieval household after my first experience rendering suet.
I’ve been reading The Great Mortality by John Kelly, a riveting account of the black plague and how it wound its way through Europe in the 14th century. Needless to say a key ingredient in its spread was the incredible filth of households in this period. People bathed rarely and garbage (think dead animals, toilet offerings, rotten food) was strewn about the streets. They also used lard or tallow in making candles. According to Kelly, lard wasn’t a preferred source of fuel because of the smell.
So let me get this straight. People who were surrounded by rotting flesh and human excrement complained about the smell of burning lard. How could this be?
This is one of my favorite sauces in the world, but I've never known how to make it.
My fermented hot sauce was bubbling and brewing away in the corner for several days. It developed a little bit of white mold, which I promptly scraped off. I did notice mentions of mold in various blog posts so I didn't worry overly much, it seems to relate to the fermentation process. Once I felt that it was fermented enough…
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