Why We Ferment
Why We Ferment
Apart from fermenting being a simple and natural way of preserving foods and it’s rise in popularity in recent times, fermenting also does something special to food and combined with time it can produce some pretty amazing results.
It’s a pretty old tradition that’s become a bit of a funky item for people who are conscious about eating for well being and it has been spreading to people that just enjoy a good range of edible things. For us it is an essential way of preserving seasonal produce to make it last beyond the season and give a bit of variety to what we eat.
Lacto-fermentation is the primary method we use for fermenting most of the products that have been preserved this way. This responds to every ingredient in a slightly different way, while still producing a pretty consistent outcome: flavourful, vibrant, funky and preserved produce. It really transforms flavour and keeps colour and texture in the most part. Sometimes it does other interesting things which can be unexpected, but mostly put to good use!
Other ways we preserve are with pickling, using vinegar or brine and also with smoke and drying. By also combining these techniques the range of possibilities to create all sorts of different sensory experiences becomes much greater.
Are you going to make Sauerkraut and Kimchi?
At first the response was “Not really, there are a few other things we are going to create first”. This is because there are a lot of really good krauts and kimchis around already and there is a lot of other space in the world of fermentation. Then we got a small harvest of some really nice sugar loaf and some red cabbage and thought, well if we’re doing it, we’re doing to do it different. So we made a product called Lost in the Kraut, it was totally grown here and had music played to it…
What else can you ferment?
Just about anything and so many items that people consume are fermented items and we don’t even really consider it. When we talk about fermented products we are mostly talking about creating with fresh seasonal produce either sourced locally or grown on the farm. We try to keep things pretty simple and get the most out of each ingredient and in combination, focusing on each step producing a high quality result for the next.
Something to also understand about fermented products is that in the most part they are still alive when you receive them. Converting fresh produce into a fermented product keeps a lot of the life that’s in the produce in the jar and introduces heaps of beneficial microorganisms that are so good for you. If you open the lid and there is a little fizz that’s the life saying “Hello, I look forward to you tasting me!”.
We hope you enjoy the fermented products we make and if you haven’t eaten many ferments before, head to the shop and check out our range.
