Pickle. Preserve. Ferment. Enjoy.
It’s been stressful around here for a minute, but there’s a little breathing room for creativity again. I’m putting up a batch of country-style kimchi, anticipating that we’ll use it for delicious recipes, garnishes, and little snacks. We have enough to share, would you like …
Oh boy. I really had the best intentions: using the ingredients I had on hand; waste not, want not; making delicious snacks while being frugal, all sorts of virtue being expressed in a jar. However, the whole experiment was a sad fizzle, at least to …
I was so good at updating when I started, and then the Fall semester hit – boom! Anyway, even though I wasn’t updating, I was pickling regularly, so I have quite a backlog to go on with. Many of the jars I put up were …
Had a wonderful date with the wife on Sunday where we headed to Harpers Ferry WVa and enjoyed three hours of kayaking on the Potomac followed by a workshop on Kimchi making at an outdoor Pavillion! River and Trail Outfitters runs a host of fun …
Life has been crazy busy around here – we bought a house, moved, and have been simultaneously fixing up the old place while unpacking the new place. The new kitchen took nearly a month to reach functionality, and several more weeks to get back to …
We don’t eat a lot of kimchi (yet), but we like it for a few recipes and occasionally find ourselves buying an expensive pint from the grocery store. I finally got up the gumption to do a little research about it, and decided to try …
We’ve had a crazy few weeks around here, and I haven’t been in the kitchen much (thank you, China Wok!). Therefore, the fermentation project was quick and dirty: ginger beer. I got the idea for this from Katz’s Wild Fermentation, which is a fabulous little …
After the great sauerkraut triumph of February, I’m continuing with the fermentation while conditions are good. I don’t know if it’s the right temperature in my house, or if we happen to have some good yeast floating around, but I’m striking while this iron is …
When you think of pickles I know you think of the taste, that luscious combination of flavors that goes with everything. May be you enjoy a nice pickle based cocktail? But what you didn’t know is that pickles can very well save your life. This …
We’ve had a crazy few weeks around here, and I haven’t been in the kitchen much (thank you, China Wok!). Therefore, the fermentation project was quick and dirty: ginger beer. I got the idea for this from Katz’s Wild Fermentation, which is a fabulous little book with all sorts of fermentation projects. This one is barely 3 steps, and pays back with bottles of lovely homemade soda.
First, the ginger bug: this is just like sourdough starter, but instead is for delicious beverage projects. I grated 3 inches or so of ginger into a jar, added a tablespoon of sugar, and topped up with a cup of water. Stir the whole thing, and cover with a clean cloth. I usually use a scrap of cheesecloth, and secure it with a canning ring. Then let sit in a dark corner for a few days. I feed it every day with a bit more grated ginger and another teaspoon of sugar.
Once that bad boy started to bubble after a few days, I started the next step, which was to boil a half-gallon of water with ginger and sugar. I used about 4 inches of grated ginger (I didn’t bother to peel it) and 1.5 cups of sugar, and boiled for 15 minutes or so.
When the ginger/sugar mixture cooled, I added the bug to it. Then I added the juice of two lemons. I save some of the bug to keep it going with my feeding routine, so I can make more ginger beer quickly if I feel like it.
Finally, I strained out the solids and added enough water to get a gallon. I bottled it into some bail-top bottles (like Grolsch bottles), and stuck those into a dark corner. We have to wait a few weeks, but then will be rewarded with sweet, gingery, and bubbly deliciousness 🙂
