Kimchi, Kefir, Sauerkraut and all other fermented foods

I've used the basic and easy to remember formula of 100% vinegar, 50% water, 25% sugar and 12.5% salt by weight for quick pickling.

Pickling is definitely not fermentation though.

Thought was the best thread to post on, as I thought it was a sort of fermented food.

Also looked on line on, so many different recipes such as softening the onion rings by rinse them in boiling water.

I have never pickled anything in my life, but fancy the sliced red onion pickle that you get in certain areas of India.

Don't worry I wasn't criticising your choice of thread.

Softening the onion is good but I'd just go for a simple recipe and see if you like the results and go from there. See how best you can recreate the sliced red onion pickle you speak of.

Puy lentil tempeh. Used to make it a bit but got out the habit. Gonna tempehfy all the things.

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Oh exciting, do you need a inoculation as a starter?

Yeah, white powder you can buy online. Fucked up a batch of soy as it was too wet so thought I’d try lentils. No hulling required, which makes it so easy

white powder you can buy online

🤔

Anyone got any recommendations for weights for jars? Would ideally like a known company rather than some random box from eBay

A small Ziplock bag full of water works well.

Anyone want some live milk kefir grains? Our production has vastly outnumbered our consumption, so lots to spare.

Anyone making yogurt? Gave it a go the last couple of days and it's great.

First batch was with probiotic capsules, edible but weirdly bitter and not tangy.

Second batch was with a couple of spoons of live yog from the shop - perfect. 12hrs on a heat mat then 2 hours straining to get super thick Greek yog / skyr style. Only yields ~400g from a litre of milk so not really crushing the supermarket on price but still satisfying.

Also discovered Arla BOB milk, which is fat free but has some kind of added or filtered process to increase protein content to give the mouthfeel of semi-skimmed. Also means my yog is mad protein rich at ~14g per 100g.

Next step is soya or coconut yog for my lactose intolerant wife. Looking at powdered coconut milk to save on food miles & cost.

Beware that most powdered Coconut milk will have some powdered Milk in for anti-caking properties

For yoghurt making, I can recommend this which is cheap, small (all the containers stack inside making it counterspace/cupboard friendly) you can adjust to get exactly the ferment you want, and it comes with a strainer for perfect greek yog. I have also used it to make cultured butter (highly recommended) and experimented with soft cheeses.

As a fellow lactose-intolerant traveller I find milk-aid lactase drops work really well if you drop 3-4 in at the start of your milk ferment and I find the end-product is easily digestible (also the longer the ferment the better). I plan to give skyr a go too, which seems basically the same as yoghurt just with added casein for extra whey extraction.

If you want really high-protein greek yoghurt (and also to increase your yield from that litre of milk), whisk in a couple of tablespoons of skimmed milk powder at the start. And if you cba with the faff of heating the milk to denature the proteins before the ferment, just buy 1l UHT bottles from the shop (most supermarkets have them in packs of 6 where they are c. 90p per litre). The best culture to start with is definitely a tablespoon or so of supermarket greek yog, but I notice that the 'potency' (activity I guess) of the culture definitely declines after two or three batches meaning you need to refresh the starter culture with more supermarket yog periodically. Not 100% sure why this is and it is something I would love to figure out!

I should probably quote myself directly into the Guardian thread; but I bought one of those for getting a good temperature for Sourdough starter. Annoyingly whilst it says it goes down to 25°c it's actually closer to 35°c. Not sure if it's a fault or just the way it is. Otherwise a tidy bit of kit.

Edit:

but I notice that the 'potency' (activity I guess) of the culture definitely declines after two or three batches meaning you need to refresh the starter culture with more supermarket yog periodically.

Based on the above; I would assume that since yoghurt is fermented at a relatively high temp, you end up killing more of the bacteria than can reproduce. You could try taking a small amount out each time into a separate jar and feeding it with milk and keeping at room temp and using that as your starter

Yeah I should've mentioned it is always about 5°c above where it says the temperature is. I tend to confirm its at temperature I want with a kitchen thermometer

Lactase, that’s a top tip. She’s got the pills but I didn’t know the drops existed. That’s ideal, much less faff & expense if I can just make big batches of cow yog.