Tag: fermented

Salsa

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Like everyone else these days, I have tomatoes getting ripe one after the other. So let’s make salsa!

But not just any salsa. Fermented salsa.

This makes about 1 quart jar,, which we will be fermenting in as well. I like this size because I only usually have one or two tomato plants and get 5-6 or so tomatoes ripe at a time. Tomorrow I’ll probably have another 5-6 ready…

This quart is:

  • 5-6 medium tomatoes
  • 1/2 small onion
  • 3-4-5 garlic cloves
  • Cilatro depending your taste
  • Hot pepper depending on you again
  • Kosher or your kraut salt

Chop everything up into Salsa sized bits

Now the fermenting part. You need to use between 3-5% salt. So just weigh what you just chopped up. (It easier in grams.)

This batch I had 750g and I want 3% salt so.. 750x.03=22.5. So I mix in 22.5g of my salt. (23g really just round up)

If you let it sit a few minutes it will start to pull water out of the tomatoes. That’s good! Then just fill your jar up to the neck. The either use your weights or a hunk of onion or pepper to wedge in there to keep everything under the liquid.

Then just loosely put lid on and leave sit out on the cupboard for a few days to ferment.

You will start to see bubbles like this. And a bit more liquid. It’s probably good after 3 days of this. But better after a week! Refrigerate when it’s where you want it.

Lids

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Picked up a few of those silicon fermentation lids. Gonna get a test run in before stuff starts growing around here. (Though with 4 feet of snow yet, it may be a while yet)

A pound of beans fits a quart jar just about perfectly.

Used a 3.5% brine here, and added 1 TBS dill seed and 1/2 tsp each mustard seed and black pepper.

Have my ferment box set to 70F. Will keep tabs on this through the comments for the next week or two.

Pickles!

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Its that time of year when the cukes start overtaking the farmers markets. Still a lot of the smaller ones, so lets make some pickles.

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About all the equipment you need to make a batch of pickles is a bucket and some jars. Not much for ingredients either, especially if you ferment them like I am for this first batch of the year. If you are looking for Vinegar based pickles, here are my IPA Pickles

All I’m using today is:

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  •  Small pickle cukes. (As little or as many as you want)
  • Kosher or pickling salt, (don’t use iodized salt)
  • garlic cloves
  • dill seed, mustard seed, black pepper corns
  • a bayleaf
  • fresh dill flowers (this optional as the dill seed is just fine)

First thing you wanna do is clean the cukes of course. Then let them cold in some cold ice water for an hour or so. This help to keep them crisper.

After the soak go ahead and cut of the tips of the cukes.

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Next get put all your other things in your fermentation crock or bucket. Here I used 5 cut up garlic cloves, some fresh dill sprigs, one bay leaf, and 1 tsp each of the mustard seed, dill seed and peppercorns. 20180712_202033.jpg

Mix up your brine. 1 gallon of filtered water and 3/4 of the kosher salt. 20180712_202933.jpg

Put your cukes the bucket and add enough of your brine to completely cover them.20180712_203157.jpg

Use a plate to keep the cukes under the brine.20180712_203142.jpg

And that’s it. Either cover the bucket with a towel or put a airlock on like I did and put it in a warm place to let it ferment.20180712_203529.jpg

After a week or so, take a test taste to see if they are sour enough. If not then let them go another day or so. Once they get where you want them pack them up in jars with the brine and put them in the fridge. (Unless you can them, they gotta stay in the fridge)

That’s its it! Start your pickles now and will be ready just in time to get your crocks back for Kraut!

 

PS: for those wanting to can these for storage this is easy too.

get your jars ready for normal canning. drain, strain and keep the liquid. pack your jars tight with the pickles. boil the liquid for a minute or two and pour into the jars leaving a 1/2 headspace. waterbath for 10 min pints, 15 quarts.