Hello, happy new year and welcome to Cooking Issues. This is Dave Arrow, your host of Cooking Issues coming to you live on Newsman Studio, the Rockefeller Center, New York City. First show of 2022. Happy to be back. Here with, of course, with uh Nastasi de Hammer Lopez.
How are you doing? Feeling, feeling, feeling good, feeling, feeling ready for the new year? Yeah. Can't be worse. Could be.
Oh, wow. Wow. All right. I mean, from a business perspective. From all perspectives.
Yeah. All right. All right. Good. Uh, and we got uh John over here.
How are you doing, John? Doing great, thanks. Yeah? Yeah. Not gonna complain at least, so nice.
I like that. That's my new that's my new thing. When people say, uh, I'm not gonna say can't complain anymore, I'm gonna say won't. Won't complain. Yeah.
Exactly. Yeah, won't complain. Leaves him thinking a little bit, just a little bit. Uh we got Hassan in booth in the booth again. Hassan Moore, how you doing?
Very good, very good. How are you? Doing well, doing well. Uh how how was your New Year's uh New Year's is good. I stayed at home and uh watched the ball drop.
Oh, yeah? They still do that? On TV, yes. Who does it? Who but who does that now that uh Dick Clark is dead?
Um I was watching Miley Cyrus and Pete Davidson, so I'm not really sure. Uh so wait, so Pete Davidson's a new Dick Clark. It doesn't check out though. He's more like a sea cresty kind of guy. Right, but he was funny.
Yeah, yeah. Staten Island zone. Gotta love it. The only Democrat in all of Staten Island. Is that true?
Is he the only Democrat in Staten Island? Probably. Yeah. Uh and we got uh Jackie Molecules. Where are you, Jackie?
Back home in LA. LA, huh? You love LA. You love it. Have you ever met uh I live here.
I mean Have you met Randy Newman ever? He's still there, right? I haven't met him. I thought when you moved to LA, you got to meet Randy Newman. I thought that was part of the deal.
I didn't get that coupon in the mail. No? I love Randy Newman. I mean, who doesn't love Randy Newman? Randy Newman's the best.
But uh enough of that. I'm super excited. We have today a guest that we were supposed to have on prior to the new year. We had technical difficulties in the studio, had to had to shut it down. We have had.
I'm just gonna tell you what it is. First of all, I'm gonna tell you the telephone number. Get ready to write this down if you're a Patreon listener. Call in your questions to 917-410-1507. That's 917-410-1507.
And if you're listening to this and wish you could call in, join our Patreon. Very easy. Very simple. But we have today, long time waiting. I'm a huge fan, Sandor Katz.
How you doing? Hi. Hi, I'd say it's a pleasure. I wish we I wish we'd had you on when you were in New York City so that we could have you like live in the studio because I've always wanted to meet you. For those of you, for the three people hearing this who don't already know who you are, you are kind of like the uh I don't know, you're the the you're the Papasian of fermentation, the Harold McGee of fermentation.
In other words, like what Harold, what Papasian was to homebrewing, although I don't know that people read his book as much anymore. You are to fermentation, or what you know, Harold was to food or is to food science, you are to fermentation. You're like the person that everyone goes back to. We've I've had, I'm you know, really good friends with like Ariel Johnson and Rich Shee, who've written great books on fermentation with you know, uh Rich with Jeremy Umansky or and with I've had David Zilber on the show, but we've never had you, and I'm super psyched to have you. It's a huge honor.
Well, I'm so happy to be with you, and um you know, I'm flattered by the analogies, but I would just point out that homebrewing is fermentation. That's true. That's true, but very specific. So your first book on ferment, not your first book, but your first book on fermentation was wild fermentation, right? I I haven't read your first first book, the one that that uh punk group I think wrote a song uh for you about called uh The Revolution uh was it, The Revolution Will Not Be Microwave.
I've not read that one. Well, I okay, actually you've got my sequence a little bit wrong. Wild fermentation was my first book that came out in 2003. Um and The Revolution Will Not Be Microwave came out in 2006. I mean, it really was uh, you know, it it's a book about um grassroots food movements, you know, largely that I became aware of uh as a result of my wild fermentation book tour of you know, talking about fermentation with so many people in so many different kinds of venues.
Um, you know, and then the Art of Fermentation came out in 2012. That's when I first started reading your stuff. Then Fermentation is Metaphor came out last year, and then I have a brand new book that's been out for about two months that's called Fermentation Journeys. That's about uh fermented foods and beverages that I've learned about mostly in my travels. So before we get into the new book, I wanna, because uh I'm super I only have the uh original edition of Wild Fermentation, which I actually bought after I read The Art of Fermentation.
My first book of uh of yours that uh I read was the Art Art of Fermentation, and that's the one, you know, for the you know, since it came out fundamentally, whenever anyone asks me a question on fermentation on this show, because we've been doing this show for God knows how many years, I uh I just say, why don't you just go read the art of fermentation because they you know he you know, Cats has a section on it, and everyone's like, oh, you should have one to show. So anyway, so here we go. Uh but what's I I I don't have your your re-revision, but I read the the the intro to the new edition of Wild Fermentation uh online, and why don't you talk about the idea of revising? Because I think revising something like that, right, which is kind of a seminal book has got to be really really interesting. You said you updated a lot, but what did you change?
And more importantly, what about your your mental attitude? Because you learned so much between the two revisions. What about the your mental attitude changed? Like w how did you approach the revision? Well, I mean that that's that's an interesting question.
I mean, uh I I mean I I I tried to really leave the spirit of the book um, you know, uh uh uh you know as as it was. But um, you know, I would say that the main thing is that, you know, as a result of what began as a book tour for wild fermentation and sort of has evolved into a lifestyle as an itinerant fermentation educator, um, you know, I just got a lot more experienced at uh you know talking about fermentation to people and and and just sort of developed a you know clearer sense of conceptual progressions and you know what common misunderstandings were. And so y you know, really I feel like I was able to bring to bear on the revised edition of Wild Fermentation, you know, just sort of my um you know experience as a fermentation educator even more than my experience as a fermenter, although, you know, certainly certainly you know that that that played into it as well. But let me let me address this question of revival. Um, you know, really the perspective I have come to have is that you know fermented foods and beverages are an essential aspect of how people, you know, everywhere make effective use of whatever food resources are available to them.
And you know, fermentation is practiced everywhere, has been practiced everywhere. Um, and you know, prior to the uh you know, centralization of food production, um, you know, which really is mostly a phenomenon of the 20th century, um, you know, fermentation was, you know, sort of enmeshed in people's lives, if not in the life of every single household, you know, in the life of every community. So people at least would be aware of the process and what went into it. And you know, part of food centralization is you know, we just become less aware of the processes by which you know our food comes into being. And so, you know, fermentation has become um increasingly mysterious to people over the same period of time that um you know the field of microbiology emerged, we became aware of bacteria.
Initially we were afraid of bacteria because we thought of them primarily as um uh uh uh uh agents of disease. Um, but increasingly, really since the new millennium, we've been hearing the flip side of the story, how important bacteria and other microorganisms to you know our effective uh uh functioning, uh to the f effective functioning of the soil, to the health of plants and all kinds of organisms. Um, you know, the revival of fermentation is really people reclaiming this important process that is such an element of uh you know all of our culinary traditions, you know, the cultures that all of us come from, um, you know, and just uh you know, how to make effective use of food resources. Don't you think it's kind of like a it's interesting because it's a it's a there's a double whammy, right? If you read So certainly industrialization, uh the kind of uh pablomification of uh food, you know, is and was a real phenomenon, especially, you know, in this country and parts of Europe for sure.
But the assault on that kind of th stuff started much earlier, as you say with the kind of with the discovery of bacteria. You read all of the books from the you know, mid uh early mid mid-1800s, Sylvester Graham, even all of these people were were petrified of fermentation, right? You right you read uh this is like the era when baking, you know, baking powder uh was considered a more healthy uh thing to make bread with than yeast because of the the nasty bugs that might uh be involved, and with God forbid salt risen bread, which is also written about. So what do you think about that double whammy, like the the fear of science and and microbiology and then the industrialization? You think they're they're both to blame, or do you blame one more than the other?
Well, I mean, I would just say I I I mean I would say I would say both of them. I mean, uh the the thing is that the the products of fermentation have never you know gone out of popularity. The products of fermentation have enjoyed enduring popularity. You know, think about bread, cheese, chocolate, coffee, beer, wine, um uh you know, vinegar, soy sauce, fish sauce. The the products of fermentation have really just enjoyed enduring popularity.
So, you know, it's not as if you know, people stopped enjoying the products of fermentation because they became afraid of bacteria. You know, it's more that people got squeamish about the process. People started sort of projecting onto it. People started imagining that you need a laboratory with controlled conditions and you know, uh uh a microbiologist with a microscope in order to do it safely. So I mean, I don't think people ever became afraid of the products of fermentation.
I mean, it's more that people began to imagine that there was some, you know, sort of uh uh you know, science or something beyond their capabilities involved in the process. Right. Well, it's uh, you know, in that in that last you know, bit you were just saying, I think one of the nice things about your book is kind of uh a go try it attitude. You know what I mean? It's uh without being unsafe, without giving kind of unsafe advice, right?
Otherwise, I wouldn't recommend if I thought you were giving unsafe advice, I wouldn't recommend your book to people. But um you know, it's like the kind of go try it attitude, I think is one of the reasons why, especially the art of fermentation so successful. Like is that was that a stated was that was that a goal before you wrote it, or was that just a byproduct of who you are? Oh, I mean, you know, my goal from the very beginning, from you, you know, um um uh, you know, my initial experiences teaching about fermentation, which was a small grassroots event in 1998, uh the zine that I wrote prior to the book Wild Fermentation, all of my books, all the teaching I do. I mean, my objective is to demystify fermentation and and um uh you know, help people who are interested feel confident in in doing it themselves at home.
And you know, fermentation is very, very much a strategy for safety. Fermentation is not dangerous. Foods that are fermented are safer than the equivalent food not fermented. Um, you know, the process is very much a strategy for safety. There's nothing to be afraid of.
You know, that's not to say that it's not impossible in any ferment that anything could go wrong. But you know, what the practice of fermentation is all about is is um manipulating environmental conditions, which has the results of encouraging the growth of certain organisms and simultaneously discouraging the growth of other organisms. And you know, really what you need to know in order to ferment successfully and safely is what are the conditions you're trying to create. If you're fermenting sauerkraut, you're trying to get the vegetables submerged. That's the environmental manipulation.
If they're all ex if all the surfaces are exposed to air, it's going to become a big cloud of hairy mold. You prevent the aerobic uh uh uh mold spores that are always there from developing by getting them submerged and depriving them from a flow of oxygen. And in that condition, lactic acid bacteria will dominate every single time. And every fermented food or beverage is something like that. It's creating the conditions where the organisms that you want will be able to thrive.
Well, on that creating condition, by the way, uh you can't know this, but you just hyper-triggered nostasia with spores and mold. How are you doing, Stas? I'm doing okay. You're doing all right? Yeah.
I uh I used to, as a jest to be mean, send her text images of mold spores and then just call her and say, Spore, just to mess with her, but you know, yeah, I'll stop. Uh on that, what so one of the interesting things I think is like, and I'll go back to the McGee analogy, Harold McGee. So, you know, when he wrote his book on food and cooking, he was interested in in kind of showing the breadth of science, but there wasn't yet this kind of uh movement in kitchens to do all of these new things using scientific techniques, right? So then, but then he became kind of uh you know uh a totemic figure for for that group of people. You write this uh you know, a series of books, and then a couple years after that, maybe as a result, I don't know, I don't know whether you want to take credit for it or not, but there's a huge wave of new styles of fermentation, some that have never been seen before.
So, first of all, an explosion of traditional fermentation in the restaurant scene I'm talking about, because a lot of our listeners are restaurant people uh in in the restaurant scene, but then also an explosion of trying old techniques on new ingredients, kind of new environments, right? So what are your thoughts on that kind of explosion? I'm sure it's gratifying in some way that, you know, because I know that a lot of these people are looking up to you or looking at your at your work. But uh what are your thoughts about some of the products that are coming out of it? And then as a follow-up, uh, you know, some of these aren't traditional techniques.
So uh traditional techniques, obviously the safety is built into the fact that we've been doing it for zillions of years and and nobody died, right? The new techniques though, or applying it to a new situation. Do you ever worry about that stuff? Well, I mean, first of all, let uh uh well, okay. Let me say first of all that it is, you know, it's extremely gratifying um, you know, that that that you know my work has resonated and um um you know that it has been you know kind of part of this um you know broad revival of the fermentation arts and and and and that's really thrilling to me.
Um you know, I don't think I can, you know, take any credit for it really. I mean, I think I I I I had I had like supremely good luck in the timing of you know, sort of m my burgeoning interest and writing a book, because you know, I think that the the single factor that has made um uh people so receptive to fermentation, and as I said earlier, the products of fermentation have never ever waned in popularity. It's just that like people weren't doing it and people weren't thinking about the process. But you know, once we started reading about the human microbiome and you know, the complexity of the bacterial populations upon wheat which we are dependent for our well-being, you know, people started seeking out probiotic foods, bacteria-rich foods, um, you know, what but really with the objective of restoring biodiversity in the gut, because that's related to our digestion, our immune function, our mental health, and almost every other system in our bodies. And I think that, you know, once there was news about the microbiome, that was a natural progression for more and more people to get interested again in um uh uh in in fermented foods and in practicing fermentation in their kitchens, whether they're, you know, just cooking for themselves and their families or they're uh in a restaurant context.
Um I mean, in terms of the innovation, I mean, you know, I mean, it's exciting to me to see so much experimentation. But I would say like nobody has invented any completely new fermented foods and beverages for hundreds and possibly thousands of years. So all we're doing is remixing. Right. I mean, it's I'm like thinking of like uh for instance Jeremy.
You know, personally I'm not I I mean I'm not especially, you know, I'm not especially worried about um um the remixing that that that the that people are doing. I you know, I hope that they're doing th in in in in thoughtful ways. But I you know, I haven't heard any stories of disasters. The biggest disasters I've heard of are, you know, people's exploding bottles of um kombucha and other homemade carbonated sugary beverages. Yeah, you know what my issue with kombucha is is that when people label kombucha, they uh they label the c kombucha but they like okay so someone gives you kombucha and they say it has X percent alcohol content, right?
And you taste it and you're like, okay, clearly a large percentage of this alc of the alcohol has been converted to acetic acid, right? But they haven't really m measured that and I'm fine with it either way by the way. As long as it so like I'm I'm on the kind of the opposite spectrum of from you and like um in the sense that I only care about taste. And I like that's that's just that's my job taste. Taste.
That's all I care about is how does it taste. Okay. And culture. Taste and culture. Yeah yeah taste and culture.
Those are the only two things multifaceted and think about multiple things. Yeah and then I I can't uh I mentally don't have the bandwidth for it. But um you know how like so you you know y you take it on a and and you write it in in the in the introduction to wild fermentation and then again in the art of fermentation kind of you started coming to it from uh you know a as you said today from a more health uh not health but it like a a more holistic like whole body whole world microbiome kind of uh viewpoint but what do you you know how much of it for you is just this stuff delicious let me clarify that a little bit yeah because I mean really like y you know I I mean my draw to fermentation started as a kid because I loved pickles. So I mean, I actually would say that I mean as much as I've written about the other things, you know, flavor uh is the first thing that sort of drew my attention to fermentation. You know, then you know, when I was experimenting with macrobiotics in my 20s, um, you know, I started reading a little bit about probiotics and the health benefits, and and that, you know, was like I and that made me think, oh, these foods that I already love are good for me too.
I'm gonna really try to make sure I eat them every day. But I was still buying them in the store. The thing that motivated me to learn how to make sauerkraut to open up the joy of cooking and find a recipe for how to make my own sauerkraut was that in 1993 I moved from New York to rural Tennessee and I started keeping a garden. And um, you know, I was such a naive city kid that it had never occurred to me that in a garden all of the cabbage would be ready at about the same time. But that's what I encountered is this obvious reality of agricultural production, and I had a nice row of cabbage, and I I knew that sauerkraut had something to do with with preserving cabbage, so uh, you know, so so I made some sauerkraut and it was delicious, and I kept on making more and experimenting and trying other ferments, and you know, that was really my gateway into fermentation.
But I would say that you know, it was the practical value of preservation was what made me actually do it. I was definitely thinking about you know health and probiotics and digestion, but ultimately, you know, I love food and I was motivated by by by the flavors, and I think that you know, all of these things and more are true of fermented foods and beverages. And you know, these are the three of the main reasons that I hear from people about what what got them interested. The fourth is culture. You know, people who um you know have some memory of some practice that their grandparents used to do in annual fermentation that you know fell by the wayside that they're trying to recapture.
So uh, you know, I I've I've talked to so many people who migrated from some other part of the world and you know miss some uh you know fermented food or beverage from home and are and are and are interested in in trying to figure out how to create recreate it. So, you know, I I mean for me one of the exciting things about fermentation is how multifaceted it is, and it's not reductionistic. It's not just about umami flavors, it's not just about probiotics, it's not just about preservation. I mean, you know, there's just so many practical benefits to fermentation. So uh cabbage, you made me think of cabbage.
Do you have any tips for doing whole heads of cabbage so that I can have the whole leaf if I'm not gonna do like giant buckets of so that I can bury them in other in other chopped-up leaves. I can't I can't bury the whole heads. What do you what what do you do for that? Do you break the leaves off and then ferment them in a pile or what do you have any tips for that? Well, uh, you know, okay, so one one hybrid method.
So I do just to just add a little bit of context, in in fermentation journeys, um, you know, I have some stories and some recipes from my time in Croatia, including the idea of um uh uh you know fermenting a bunch of whole heads of cabbage with the cores cut out in a brine and using the the the the leaves of the cabbage, the whole soured leaves as the stuffing for making stuffed cabbage sauce. It's the best ever, by the way. You know, a hybrid method that I've done a fair amount in a modest size croc, you know, let's say uh, you know, two three gallon size croc. You can't really do it in anything smaller than that, is you know, shred half of your cabbage and then leave, you know, one large or two very small heads whole with the cores cut out and just bury the whole heads of cabbage in the shredded cabbage. Yeah.
For those of you that have never made stuffed cabbage leaves with fully fermented leaves, you are missing out. You are missing out. It is the best by right or wrong. By far and away the best way to make stuffed cabbage. Like without question.
Like night and and in Southeastern Europe, uh you know, former Yugoslavia states, uh, you know, Croatia and its neighbors, um, you know, that's the typical way of fermenting cabbage is whole heads of cabbage, and then, you know, if they want to serve you sauerkraut, they'll take one of those fermented whole heads and shred it. But as you say, I mean they're used for these just extraordinarily delicious uh uh cabbage rolls, stuffed cabbage rolls. And if you live in New York City, you can go to the Ridgewood pork store and they sell whole like fermented leaves, but uh they're they're pasteurized so it's not the same. It's not they don't they no longer ferment their own the pasteurized stuff it's sour pasturized sauerkraut is so sad. Isn't it sad?
Isn't it a sad thing? Tastewise. Well I don't know. I I mean personally I would say I have never met a sauerkraut I didn't like. And um you know my my early experiences of sauerkraut as a kid were, you know, what the hot dog vendors in New York are using, which, you know, I would say now is not the highest quality sauerkraut.
It's certainly not live sauerkraut. But um uh you know I have never met a kraut I didn't like and I love to cook with sauerkraut. I mean sometimes I talk to people who are scandalized that I would ever cook sauerkraut because um you know because of the probiotics. But um I don't know. I mean it's it's it's i i it's the basis of so many wonderful dishes.
Oh my god, I love to make Hungarian sauerkraut soup. Uh sometimes I make sauerkraut pierogis. I love to make uh bigos, which is this uh Polish stew where you marinate the vegetables and kraut uh I'm sorry, the meat and kraut, and then you um, you know, and then you stew them right in the in the sauerkraut. You know, incredibly delicious. You want to make sure you eat a little bit of it raw to get the probiotics, but you know, it's it's fun to cook with sauerkraut.
Oh no, I don't mind cooking it. It's just the stuff that they sell in the packages, they don't just pasteurize it, they jack it with benzowe, and it tastes bad and the texture is terrible. Like it's just you should come back to New York and try tr get the sauerkraut that comes in the plastic bag, you're gonna be sad. Don't you John, it's sad, right? You've had it.
It is, yeah, it's not very good. It's a sad kraut. It's a sad kraut. Yeah, well, but you know, I mean, I I mean, I get it, you know, is people are used to paying nothing for their food. And and to get, you know, good quality uh good kraut from um, you know, organic vegetables.
Um, you know, I mean, there's a lot of small regional brands out there now, but none of them are cheap. And um, you know, we're all we're we're we're all trained to just buy the cheapest thing we can. But what I will say is that the largest traditional sauerkraut m uh manufacturer in the United States, Great Lakes Kraut, you know, in the last couple of years, they've introduced a line of raw kraut because that's what people want. So let me get to your new book, because I got to get your new book and then I got it, we have questions from uh from our listeners uh I want to get to before we go. So on fermentation journeys, first of all I have to say when I was reading the introduction, like very early, you say that uh I'll paraphrase you're not gonna yuck anybody's yum.
And so for those of you that have to what? Well, we say in my family, don't yuck, don't yuck somebody else's yum. In other words, you're not you're not out to poo-poo anybody else's food. Right. So you're not gonna you're never gonna come down negatively on a food stuff, right?
Because that's just not your bag. That's just not how you so you know. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, no, I mean I I would definitely I I would definitely never put anybody down for the you know, for the food that they for the the food that they'd like to eat, even if I don't, you know, even if I taste it and it doesn't appeal to me. Then I would, you know, I would just I would just think to myself, like, oh, I haven't learned to like that yet.
So for those of you that don't know, the theory of the book, right, is is that you're it's uh you're writing it during the pandemic, but it's about all of these places that you visited over the years, uh, all over the world, meeting people, doing doing uh fermentation uh courses and lectures and going to um events and just all of the great fermented things you've tasted all over the world as a result of this journey that that you know being a fermentation guru has put you on, and you're kind of putting them in in in a book. So it's not a how to in the way it's not a direct how to in the way that uh you know the art of fermentation is, it's more as it says, fermentation journeys. So you have all these around the world. So I mean it is recipe, it is practical oriented. I mean it's recipes and you know how to make a lot of foods.
Right, but the tenor of it is different. It's more like here's who I hung out with and here's the palm wine we made. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Lots of stories, yeah and context. Right.
And so instantly though, when you said you weren't gonna poo poo anything, I was like, oh man, there go half my questions. Because I want to know the stuff that we've never had. So for instance, I will tell the the listeners that you have tasted, you are the only living human I've ever spoken to who has tasted Kivyut. I don't even know whether I'm pronouncing it right because I've never met anyone who has ever had it. Uh am I pronouncing it correctly, Kivyot?
No, no, that that section was by a Greenlander microbiologist friend of mine. Oh, you didn't write that section? You didn't taste Kvyat? Oh. I misreement.
Sorry. I have not been to Greenland. Oh, man. But I would love to go there sometime. I just I just looked up the Kiwi and read the section.
I think I will because I've become friendly with this um uh you know with this young Greenlander woman who is a microbiologist. So I mean and um, you know, she's studying the traditional fermented foods of of of her homeland. You want to tell people she's you know, she she's writing about them. Tell people about it. Do you want to describe the product?
Uh describe the product to people so that they know what we're talking about, because it's like a fascinating ferment. Like it's crazy ferment. Sure. So so um um, you know, Kiviac is a traditional uh uh ferment from the northern part of Greenland. Um, you know, like, you know, literally among the most northern permanent human settlements that there are.
Um and uh, you know, in in in in the far northern places all around the world, I mean, people are utterly dependent on fermentation. People never could have settled those regions if they didn't have some effective methods to preserve food resources from the summertime to get them through the winter time. Um and the winter is long. Um and so Kiviac is basically these little birds, uh uh generally they're birds called ox, which are very easy to catch at a certain point of the year. I mean, they'll they have these nets on long poles and they can catch dozens of them uh uh in each net full.
They just sort of squeeze the birds with their fingers th you know, which stops their heart, and then they collect hundreds of these birds and stuff them in the skin of a seal. And then they sew it up and seal it with um uh some of the seal fat and then they just put it under rocks, um protecting it from the sun, and um, you know, sort of leave it in the um uh like you know near near the coast, um, you know, and and and really evaluate by smell when it's ready to eat. It's on my list. It's definitely on my list. I got it 'cause someday.
I don't actually know what I will die without trying it. I know I'm gonna die without trying it, but it's on my list. I've tried I've tried many of the other ones. I I've done the surstroming. Do you like that one?
No, you know, it's not exactly I uh you know it's not exactly an export food. It's a survival food that you know w you know, people you know, people who live in the northern communities in in Greenland uh uh uh uh uh eat. Um and you know, a lot of a lot of the ferments in the world are just do you know, just do not get shipped around the world. You know, they're just to sustain the people who are doing them. I know, but it's like uh d I again I don't get to travel that much to to places, but i there there are things that you read about that you just have no idea what they're gonna taste like, and so you just jones to taste them.
You know what I mean? And so like that's one Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, no, I I I I I I I understand that. Yeah, the uh the other one for me that I'm I know I'm never gonna get to do is um in the nineties, I think it was the FAO came out with a book called uh traditional fermented foods of Sudan or something. The title is very close to that.
That's not the FAO. That's um Hamid Durar, a Sudanese anthropologist wrote that. Oh, and uh amazing. I I read that and I was like, oh my god, I'm never gonna get to taste these like eight billion different awesome ferments like that uh produced from you know the the products there, I'm never gonna get to t I have no I have no referent even to what they're gonna taste like. It's so uh you know, I guess it's good that you die with wanting more, right?
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Absolutely. Absolutely. And I mean one of the br brilliant things about that book, and I mean I really I I love that book. Um, you know, to me that is just one of the best books about fermentation that's ever been written.
Um but I mean uh it's very, very detailed. I mean, I have made things uh based on descriptions in that book. Now, I've only made things out like I made I made a a style of sorghum beer uh from Sudan using his description and it worked really well and it was it was incredibly delicious. I wrote about it in Art of Fermentation. But um Yeah, you know, I mean certain of the foods just require specific plants that are from that region that you're not gonna be able to find in New York where you are or in Tennessee where I am, or you know, in most places that aren't Sudan.
Yeah, yeah. Now again, it's fine to die wanting to try more things. Uh what to what what to you is the most challenging style of uh fur ferment, like uh for 'cause I think one of the things about, you know, here you know, standard like American western western palate, we do a lot of we're fine with most lacto stuff, right? Uh you know, over the past couple of you know, years we've all become you know more accustomed to uh you know to other styles of ferment, but we don't do that well a lot of us with uh with uh um perfings based stuff. Like some people can't do the salt risen bread or like redded cassava.
Uh some people here have issues with uh things like uh stinky tofu, although I like it. You know what I mean. So like what do you find for kind of like standard, you know, mid American Western palate is the more or the more challenging styles? Natto, yeah. No, I was I was I was thinking I was thinking about Natto.
That was that was the first thing that came to my mind. And uh, you know, NATO is this Japanese soybean ferment. Um I have a big section about Natto Um in fermentation journeys, and actually more than about Natto itself, about um uh uh NATO like foods found in other places. Um, you know, really in many places across Asia, let's see in um uh you know, China and Burma, um I've encountered them. Uh I met a woman from uh Naga land in the far eastern part of of of uh India, and uh uh they use something like Natto there, um all across West Africa.
People use condiments that microbiologically are just like Natto, um, except they're made with different kinds of beans like African locust beans. Yeah, but they those things are I mean that's a that's a food that like I actually have come to find incredibly delicious and flavorful. Um but you know, my observation about how outside of Japan almost everybody is using it is instead of eating it wet, sticky, slimy, and I do think it's the texture more than the flavor that you know so many Westerners are squeamish about with Nato. But in most of the other traditions, it's dried. Yeah.
And then it's ground up or pulverized and used as a seasoning that way. And I've been doing that at home, and uh, you know, I have yet to meet anybody who doesn't like it. You know, even people who are very squeamish about food, who I'm absolutely certain would not go for uh fresh, sticky natto, love the condiments that I've been making based on dried natto. So I think for a lot of people it's really the texture more than the flavor that they find kind of um you know scary. So if I dry natto, you think it's gonna taste or you you're telling me it's gonna taste similar to like uh netatu.
What's the Nigerian word for netatoo? It just went out of my head. Oh my god. Uh um dawadala? Yeah, yeah, like parkia like fermented parquia big lobosa, yes.
Uh like um, yeah. So the um I'm gonna tell you that that that that there's very similar, I mean, they're made from different beans, so there's a different flavor, but the flavor of the fermentation, the alkaline byproducts, the the whiff of ammonia is the same. Delicious. Um I have to ask these questions uh that are specifically for you, or I will get my uh head taken off by my crew. All right.
From Prashank and Mesh. Uh this is Prashant from Florida. I've been making yogurt at home for the past eighteen months. Of course, this came in a while ago, so it's been a lot longer than 18 months now, Pashant. Sorry.
Uh using yogurt culture from my family. I was unable to make yogurt for two months and would like to know how to restart making it. When I started making it again, the taste seems off in all four attempts. One, it was extremely sour. Two, it had a a weird taste that he doesn't know how to describe.
And he was wondering if he had uh any suggestions for how to revive uh his family's yogurt starter and make it taste better. And I was also wondering if you had suggestions on how to best preserve the culture when I'm not able to make it for an extended period of time. So that's from Prashant. Yeah I mean I would tell say that I regularly go two months between batches of yogurt. That's about how frequently I make yogurt.
Sometimes I'll go three or four months. The key is to always leave a full fresh jar to use as your starter. If you're using a jar that you've been slowly eating and um you know it's 90% empty what that empty space becomes occupied with is air. Air has oxygen that supports a whole other set of organisms being able to grow that will thrive in the presence of oxygen. So you know my observation is that uh you know a half empty jar of yogurt that sits around for several weeks gets this yeasty flavor.
Its flavor is transformed by this sort of new group of organisms that are able to flourish as a result of the abundance of oxygen in the environment. So, you know, the way I've dealt with this is I just always keep uh you know uh uh um an unopened jar. I mean wh every every batch that I do, I I I I generally do it in pint size mason jars. And one jar I'll just pick out and I'll almost mummify it in masking tape. All right, starter do not eat.
I'll bury it in the back of my fridge and um you know, use that as the starter. So it's an unopened batch that hasn't developed that that that kind of yeastiness. So that's my you know, that's my suggestion for how to avoid this problem. I wonder if a vacuum is. Now, as for how to bring back the you know, the starter that's gotten, you know, uh excessively sour and yeasty, I I I mean, I don't even know that you can.
Um but you know, what I would do is try doing a couple of generations and see if it comes back. And um, you know, this is you know, this is one of the reasons. I mean, just because fermentations can go bad when you have a starter that's important to you, you know, it's really good to not be the only guardian of the starter. It's that's why it's that's one reason why it's really good to share these things and make sure, you know, other members of the family and you know, and friends of yours use it so that you know if you have a problem with yours, you know, there it's decentralized. There are there are backups around.
And this in from Tark Roshdy, uh I had some trouble with fermenting a hot sauce in my hot, humid New York apartment this past summer. Basically, keeping my jar outside the fridge made it ferment too fast, but inside the fridge it was too slow. Are there any hacks to achieving a happy medium in terms of temperature when I can't really control the ambient temperature in my kitchen very well? Thanks. Well, I mean, I definitely have the same issue.
I mean, I I would just never make hot sauce in the middle of the summer. You know, I I would always wait until you know, I mean, pepper plants start producing in the heat of the summer, but they keep on producing until it cools down. And when it's cooling down is the time to ferment them if you want to ferment them for any length of time. You know, definitely, you know, if it's in the, you know, if it's in the you know high 80s and 90s, uh, you know, if you try to ferment things at, you know, at ambient temperature, they're going to ferment super, super fast. I mean I would say the better option would be to put it in the fridge where it's going too slowly, wait for ambient temperatures to cool down and then ferment it at ambient temperatures.
Yeah. Also your kitchen's going to be the hottest place and also in your kitchen up high is going to be the hottest place and also anywhere near above your fridge because your fridge is putting out heat is going to be your hottest place. So the worst place in the world to keep that ferment is up high on a shelf somewhere near your fridge in the kitchen. Absolute worst place in your entire house to keep something if you want to keep it cold. Yeah.
From Monty Zikowski, uh are there any ferments involving oil? I remember a Chicago pizza place with pickled vegetables and olive oil as a condiment and it was oh so good. I assume they brine the veggies first then packed in oil always wondering what other fermented products involve oils. Thanks, Monty from Jacksonville, Oregon Well I mean there are lots of fermented products that involve oil um but the oil becomes a limiting factor in them. So sure I mean there's a lot of uh um oh my god I made this wonderful like um uh um um eggplant escabeche and an Arch Argentinian recipe.
Um and it was all an olive oil. It was so delicious, so delicious. But you know, it's not something that's designed to be preserved for um you know for six months or a year. It's something that like sits on the your counter for two weeks and then you want to eat it. So you know oil just becomes a bit of a limiting factor because of its potential for rancidity.
Like when I visited um the the Momofuku test kitchen years ago and and um uh Dan Felder was was running it and and he was showing me their process for making pistachio miso um you know they had to run the the pistachio mash through a centrifuge to remove the bulk of the oil in order to prevent it um um um you know getting go going rancid. So you know there's a lot of fermentation traditions that use either a little bit or a lot of oil but generally they're for you know shorter term preservation as a result of the oil. Yeah they used my centrifuge to do that. Pistachio oil intensely delicious by the way. But I'll tell you what making pistachio oil with a centrifuge pain in the behind.
Pain in the behind. Well what about though people who use uh very kind of uh rancidity resistant oil right like uh so like uh uh mustard oil and Indian oil based pickles but like what is the function of the oil yeah and also generally those are using very small proportions of oil. Right but what's the function of an oil and of the oil in an Indian oil pickle. That's interesting. I'm I'm I'm actually not I'm I'm actually not certain.
You know I mean I I I've always imagined that it was primarily um you know about flavor but I couldn't say. Yeah, me neither. I uh I love them and yet I have no idea why they they're made the way they are. But they're so delicious, right? Well, you know, you know, one of the things that I've just been learning over time is, you know, these things don't always have a totally rationalistic explanation.
You know, sometimes people just do them because that's how they were shown to do them. You know, people don't under always understand like why they're doing what they're doing. Um I mean I think that's just a reality. And there's there's a lot of you know, interesting folklore around, you know, fermentations that um, you know, I'm uh you know, I I I I don't think you need to do necessarily. Right.
Will Robinson writes in, I have a batch of soy sauce fermenting at the moment. It's approximately seven months old. Soybean and a bunch of what, I'm sorry? Uh soy sauce. Uh it's approximately seven months old, soybean and roasted barley.
I'm wondering what I should do with the leaves when I strain and bottle it. Are there any culinary uses aside from back slopping into a new batch or using it to kickstart some miso? I'm having a surprisingly hard time finding any applications. I'm assuming it's too high in salt for the compost pile, and I'd hate to waste it. Thanks.
Will from Chicago. Well, I mean I I mean I certainly wouldn't worry about putting it in the compost pile. You know, I mean that's all that salt will get distributed and and you know it's it it w will it will break down. But I mean it's flavorful. Like when I've done that, um uh you know, I've I've incorporated it.
I I mean I haven't found like a great use for a large amount of it, but it's full of flavor. Like, you know, you can mix it into stuff. You can use it as a seasoning. Can you dehydrate it? And powder it?
Yeah, I'm sure you could dehydrate it. Yeah, dehydrate and powder it and then it'll last forever. Dehydrate and powder everything if you can, right? If you have it. I dehydrate a lot of things.
I mean, I, you know, I I have uh you know, I dehydrate kraut. I have um I you know I have um you know crystals of brine salts, I have uh, you know, um um what I call eau de kraut, which is just you know kraut juice cooked down uh uh to uh uh uh a level of intensity. Um but yeah, I mean dehydration is a is a a great thing to do. The other thing is if you really, you know, if you use a press, you'll end up with, you know, shockingly little residue. So what kind of press do you recommend?
What kind of press do you recommend? Like uh I mean my I have a serious adjustment. You know, I just have a little press that I that I uh uh uh that I bought online. It's uh its capacity is probably like two quarts. It's it's very small.
Um uh it has uh um uh you know a uh a cylinder and then there's a uh a a top that fits inside the cylinder and then you just sort of screw it down and then there's a spigot at the bottom and it sort of forces it forces the liquid out that the the tighter you press it. Yeah, I used to uh so when I was at the bar we had uh we had a a a serious uh hydraulic press, you know, like from a a shop that I modified, but then we bought a bunch of super bag material that was really cheap to put in the press. Do you use what what kind of uh fabric do you use? Do you have a good source for that stuff? I just use like a nylon mesh bag.
Yeah. Oh like a like a like a re repurpose paint strainer kind of a situation? Uh no, I mean I th I I um I I bought it at a culinary supply place um you know th those are all repurpose paint strainers. What I use this mostly for is uh you know, I make a lot of uh sake, meju, different styles of rice alcohol, and then after the fermentation um you know I like to give it a good you know I I I I always use those bags to strain it and you those I'll typically just press with my hands but you know to get as much of the um you know fermented liquid out. Um and then I mean I love to I love to play with the kasu that's the Japanese name for the residue from making sake the you know decomposed rice along with all the organisms of it but it's beautiful flavor still has so much enzyme activity it still has so much yeast activity um you know it has just like incredibly varied applications and I have a little section of fermentation journeys about it.
Right. Ten years ago I thought sake leaves was going to become huge. Uh sake leaves was everywhere and then all of a sudden it's like almost like it was the same way that I thought fennel pollen was going to be the new it thing and it like it was about to become the new it thing and then it didn't I don't know what happened. Like uh people the thing is that you need sake. You you need to be making sake or mijo to have so to have uh uh uh kasu so I mean I don't really see how that's gonna become the next big thing unless sake becomes the next big thing.
People are working on that. And you know these things don't have to be the next big thing. You know it's it's it's fine for um you know it's fine for them to be um um you know obscure things that you know only the people who are playing with those ferments get to get to experiment with that's not a terrible thing. Yeah. Uh Miguel Miguel Kunz writes in uh kind of a basic question, but what are Sandor's top tips for avoiding calm yeast in lactoferments.
And so that's the white garbage that goes on the top. I just kind of ignore it. Am I wrong? Maybe that's me. I I just kind of take it off and then don't worry about it.
Am I wrong about that? But what are your top tips for avoiding? No. That's exactly what I do too. Um so I mean, you know, my observations are it gr it grows much more vigorously in a warm environment than a cool environment.
If you can keep it in a cooler spot, you'll have less issues with that. But you know, it's it's it's it's uh I mean it's nearly inevitable. Unless you have some sort of uh engineered system designed to protect the surface of your ferment from oxygen, you know, the surface is the place that has the interface with the oxygen rich air, and that's where aerobic life forms are going to uh be able to flourish. And you know, that's what calm yeast is. It's entirely um uh uh uh harmless.
In in China I watched the chef of a 500 seat restaurant just mix the calm yeast right back into the um uh uh uh crock of of pickled vegetables. Um typically I don't like to mix it in. I try to remove it as best I can, but if some of it dissipates in, I don't worry about it at all. Um uh there's a broad consensus that it's utterly harmless. Um, you know, if it really bothers you, I would say the thing to do is, you know, invest in one of these uh uh uh engineered systems designed to protect the system from uh the the the surface from oxygen.
Personally, I generally don't use those because you know, I am kind of compulsively interested in looking, smelling, tasting as they develop. And you know, if you have one of those specially designed systems, every time you open it to look, smell and taste, you're letting the oxygen in. You're defeating the purpose of your um uh cleverly engineered system. So I mean I just I just don't use that and I just don't worry about it. But if it really bothers you, there are there are several different kinds of systems for fermenting um uh in ways that protect the vegetables from you know any kind of exposure to oxygen.
Great. Will feed them writes in. Uh this is an exciting episode. Thanks for having Sandor on. I'd really love to know about tempeh with non-soy substrates.
Tips, techniques, and pointers. Uh and second question, if allowed, can we get any more details on techniques for exotic flavors from Koji and how to find the strains that create them? So, like non non-soytempe and then like exotic strains of uh of Koji. Okay, let me answer non-soytempe, and then you might have to remind me uh what part two is. So non soy tempeh, you know, you the the the tempeh uh uh spores, the rhizopus uh oligosporus are are actually very versatile.
And um, you know, you can grow them. I I mean I've used different kinds of beans. Generally I mix a grain component in with the beans. The key uh uh with the beans is not to cook them till they're soft. You know, when I eat beans, uh, you know, the other the other day I I hooked up some pinto beans.
Uh oh. Uh oh. They're gonna be able to do it. Wait, wait, wait, Sandor, we lost you. We last we lost you a pinto bean.
Start with pinto beans. You can't let that happen. You need to maintain the shape. So, you know, for soybeans, I'll use I'll split them because it can the the um uh the uh fungus can't grow through the hull, so you have to get the hulls off, and splitting them also gives them more surface area so they you know sort of lock more um densely. Um but soybeans, I only cook for half an hour, maybe 45 minutes, which you know barely is getting them cooked.
Um so the key is to just undercook things, cook things very lightly. If you're using something like split peas, which make a wonderful tempeh, you know, you're really talking about cooking it for like five minutes. You know, some things have a very, very short cooking time, just until they're soft enough to get your teeth through. You don't want them to be luxuriously soft. If I if I mix in grains, what I usually do is I I add less water than the grains need.
Um so I'll cook them roughly one part grain to one part water. So when they're when they've absorbed all that water, they're still thirsty for more water, and then I'll mix them with the um beans that have been cooked in water and are are are have wet surfaces, and the grain will absorb a lot of the excess water from the grains. Or uh the grains will absorb the excess water from the beans. So I mean, those are some tips you also can make. I mean, I've made I have a recipe in in fermentation journeys for potato tempeh, which I encountered in Switzerland.
Um so you definitely can can venture out, you know, beyond grains and beans. The tricky thing is you don't want things to be soft and falling apart, and you don't want things to be excessively moist. It like excessive moisture um you know will will support undesirable bacterial growth. So you you have to make sure whatever you're fermenting isn't too too wet. So those are the those are the major variables.
But you know, definitely, definitely experiment. I mean, you can make tempeh, you know, out of a uh a wide range of substrates. It does not have to be soybeans. Now, what was the second part of the question? Uh, second part of the question was uh any uh more details on techniques for getting exotic flavors from koji and where to find uh the strains that create them.
So like the citric acid koji and things like that. Well, okay, let me first of all say, like I I have not I I have not really grown out, you know, lots of different strains of Koji. I I've really only, you know, I've I've worked with the strains that um gem culture, so I've been buying um uh um my uh koji spores from for 25 years. Uh you know, they have like um um you know five different strains that are mostly about different substrates, and those are the ones that I've used. I am aware that as there's been more international interest in fermentation, some of the big Japanese koji spore houses have been exporting them.
And on my website, which is wildfermentation.com, I have a bunch of um uh you know uh links to fermentation-related resources, and I have a link to one of those Japanese um koji kin uh uh manufacturers where you can buy all of those different varieties, but I I have no personal experience um um you know with with these other uh uh varieties. Most of my experiences come with varying the substrates upon which I grow the koji. So like I have some chestnut trees outside of my house. I've been making for the last few years uh chestnut koji. Incredibly wonderful, the best shiokoji I've ever had.
You have American chestnut trees? So, you know, I think uh um um you know I I like to vary the flavors really more than anything by varying the substrate um and I haven't really experimented uh uh much at all with um you know uh uh some of the more um specialized strains of Koji Starter. Uh we have a we have a collar for you, but do you have American chestnut trees? No, no, no. You know, there those those those are uh I mean I I I mean I have um chestnut trees that are of you know Chinese or European origin um in my Tennessee uh yard.
Right, right, right. Uh we have a caller for you. Caller, speak up because he's having trouble hearing our connection, which I apologize for. Sander, uh this is Paul from Seattle. I um I was curious about uh if you had any tips on longer term storage of uh of Kasu of sake leaves.
Um I've got a pretty big tub in my fridge from uh um uh from uh recently getting into it, but I'm not sure about like how long it lasts or uh what the best storage conditions for it are. Well, okay. I I I mean I can just tell you what I've been doing is I've got mine in a ziploc bag in the fridge. And what I like about a Ziploc bag is you know, I can get rid of most of the air. Like the you know oxidation you know, and aerobic organisms are at the root of, you know, just so so so much food spoilage.
So I've just found it too, I mean, I've actually been just using the same quart-size bag for a year and a half. I just keep adding fresh kazu to it and taking kazu out to do things with it, and it's been fine. It smells great. Um, it tastes great, it's still enzymatically active. Um so I mean that that's sort of what I would recommend.
And I think that what's better about a Ziploc bag than a tub is you can eliminate the air space more easily. Okay. Um I've noticed with the um the little tub that I've got is it's that the um stuff that's probably oxidized closer to the surface seems maybe a little grayish and once you get below the surface it seems a little uh pinkish. Uh is that does that sound normal to you? Oh okay interesting.
No I've never seen mine turn pink. I've never seen that happen at all. Uh it's just really stayed a nice white color. But I would certainly remove anything that gets discolored uh pink. I would I would get I would get rid of that.
Sure thing. Um do you mind if I if I uh ask really quick um do you have any uh recommendations for um like maybe longer term um vegetable-based uh ferments with it. Um I've only used it for uh like as a marinade for like short cured meats before. Oh you're saying the kasu. Yeah.
Well sure I mean kasuzuke. I mean that's amazing. That that's just like basically vegetables pickled in kasu. So in my new book Fermentation Journeys um there is a section written by my friends uh Kevin Farley and Alex Hogan of the pickled uh of the cultured pickle shop in Berkeley. But um um, you know, one of the really interesting styles of pickles that they make are kasuzuke, and they shared their method for kasuzuke, and I've followed it and had wonderful, wonderful results.
Um but I mean m you know like roughly nine months for most vegetables is how long that would take. So that is definitely a longer term process. It's not just vegetables and kasu. You mix some sugar and some salt in with the kasu um and uh uh uh you know and and it takes some time and you can go much longer um uh um you know and especially with certain vegetables or smaller pieces of vegetables you could potentially go go shorter um but I mean that would be an excellent um like longer term vegetable uh uh uh pickle that you could you could use kasu for okay cool well yeah this is uh um just like you can use kasu to raise bread I mean I make bread all the time where I use kasu as the leavening oh really do you mix it with yeast no no it has yeast I mean because they you know what what what what fermented the yeast uh what fermented the the carbohydrates in the rice into the sake you know it's got yeast oh cool yeah so you just it's got it's got yeast it's got lactic bacteria it's got um um amylase enzymes I mean it's got it's got a lot going on but really you know my favorite everyday way that I use it I mean not every single day but frequently is a like a tablespoon of it in with a couple of scrambled eggs just gives the eggs such a beautiful flavor. Wow okay cool well this is a a lot of reasons to uh to get the book.
Thank you so much there obviously go by welcome. Uh and John, we have a couple of late coming questions in from Patreon. You want to go? Two quick ones, yeah. Um so this one is from Biff Dit.
Recently, my combo chat has gotten slimy and viscous. I pitched the mother and restarted using a store-bought bottle, but it seems to be happening again. What can I do? I'm just gonna say that's a terrible phrase. Pitch the mother is a terrible phrase.
But go ahead. Um I I I'm I'm I'm actually not sure. I mean, uh, before I would pitch the mother, I would always do a second batch and just see if it was just a one-off or you know, I I would do another small batch and just see before I pitch the mother. Okay. But I couldn't tell you what the cause of that is.
Sorry. No worries. And then this one is kind of a double pronged question, blackening and fermentation, touching on both the same things. So but uh sorry, how to wet? It's this one touches on two things.
So quickly blackening rather than fermentation, but I figured it's worth asking. Uh this one's from Payman J. I make so like black garlic. Yeah, but then wanting to make a balsamic out of it. So I want to make black garlic balsamic.
I was thinking of vacpacking garlic and putting in an insulated water bath at 60 centigrade for six to eight weeks following the NOMA uh guidelines. Any issues with doing it that way, anything which will kill me, and then any tips when it comes to making vinegar from that, or any tips when it comes to aging it in barrels, where to source them, what to source. Prefer not to wait quite a long time and end up with something awful. I have no experience with balsamic vinegars or barrel-aged vinegars. Um, you know, the vinegars that I've done have all been like sort of shorter shorter term, um, you know, countertop vinegars that are not, you know, um um aged and and uh uh uh concentrated like that.
So um I'm sorry, I I I I I I'm afraid that I don't really have um you know much to offer you. From a safety perspective, if you can reliably keep the product at 60 degrees centigrade, centigrade, which is 140, you you could keep it there for the rest of your life and it's not gonna damage you from a bacteriological ain't nothing growing at that temperature that is going to damage you. So it's 100% safe. As to how it's gonna taste, who knows? Who knows?
Uh I never had it before. It's like I tell my son when he eats uh more uh squid ink than any human being has ever eaten before. It's like nobody knows the health impacts because nobody's done it. Try it, right? Um Yeah, it's true.
I mean, I've you know some people who I've talked to, like what they like about you know the this method of speeding things up by keeping, you know, keeping keeping them at uh uh 140 degrees Fahrenheit, 60 degrees Celsius, so that the um you know Koji enzymes can optimize and do their thing, you know, really quickly. Um what some people like about it is that you know, sort of, you know, most bacteria can't grow at that temperature. Um, you know, on the other hand, m most cannot, but some can, and some of the ones that won't be growing because the temperature is so high are the acidifying bacteria, which are the things that would typically protect a food from you know, from other kinds of bacteria. So you really the you know the the answer is I don't know. Um you know the fact that we haven't heard of any problems like suggests that it's probably not a problem, but but but but I um uh you know definitely could not say for sure that um um uh you know you could keep something at that temperature indefinitely without any uh uh uh uh uh uh concerns.
Uh one last quick troubleshooting question. This one from me. Uh I have a lot of uh this is personal real. Uh I have a lot of bran in my house, like just a lot of brand, like a lot. And so like uh I was doing brand pickles, um, but wheat brand, not rice brand.
And they are are delicious for about a month and then all of a sudden something turns in them and they're not delicious anymore, and I know I'm supposed to be able to keep it forever. Do you have any any experience with that your brand pickles just turning bad all of a sudden? Well, yeah. I mean, for me it was called summertime. Yeah, maybe it's just too hot in my kitchen.
I live in a place that just gets really hot. And what I learned in Japan is that like a lot of people just but rest their nukah in the fridge for the summertime. So I don't know, you know, without knowing about what time of year, like I mean the most obvious thing to me is the thing that changes the weather. Well, I mean I live in an old school New York City apartment. But that would be my first guess.
Yeah, my my my kitchen's eighty to ninety a hundred percent of the time 'cause I'm in a New York City apartment. Like a hundred percent of the time it's eighty to ninety degrees. Well the thing is you can't necessarily do every ferment in every environment. I mean mm you know, it's uh you cannot maintain a nuka uh uh you know, nuka with uh um uh you know with a delicious flavor. I mean y um um uh you know, necessarily in every environment.
Like maybe it needs a cooler environment. Yeah. All right. I'll try to find a cooler place in my house a as the as the other as the other uh uh listener questioned earlier in the day. Well listen, I I really appreciate uh you coming on.
I'm sorry we had the technical stuff and you can't really hear uh too well what we're saying. But if you you know you have a permanent invite whenever you're in New York, come in, say howdy to us. It's been a real honor having you on. Okay, great. Well, I would love to do it in person uh uh uh uh next time, but it's been a pleasure speaking with you.
Um, you know, thanks so much for um uh having me on and for your excellent questions. And um I look forward to uh speaking again sometime. All right, well thank you. And the book again is Fermentation Journeys Out Now. Uh Sandor Katz.
Thanks so much. Cooking issues.
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