North African-style Fermented Lemons

A tajine just wouldn’t be a tajine without the signature flavor of preserved lemons. The tang and bite of this lovely fermented citrus perks up a lentil soup, and brings fabulous bright notes to a salad dressing, a sauce for earthy root vegetables, or add some olive oil and whiz it up with with a hand blender as a drizzle for fish… anywhere you want a lemonysaltyfunky zing. And it’s ridiculously easy to make. You could also use limes for a more South Asian approach to the ferment. Ensure you are using organic fruit, because the rind is an important part of the ferment - no pesticides please. When you are ready to eat them, quickly remove the pulp, rinse the rind and chop it up into whatever recipe you are using. The flavor will be retained the best when added at the end of cooking.

Ingredients:

5-6 organic lemons, washed and dried, room temperature. Thinner skinned lemons are recommended, but you may not have much of a choice - it shouldn’t matter too much.

Optional spices; whole black peppercorns, crushed red pepper, cinnamon stick, cloves, bay leaf, coriander seeds

salt, coarse or fine

Materials:

a small (pint) mason jar with a lid

cutting board, sharp knife

Technique:

Cut 4 of the lemons in half equatorially, then quarter the halves almost all the way through. Try to extricate all the seeds without losing the juice (I do this over the jar).

Put a layer of salt at the bottom of the jar and scatter some peppercorns and any other spices on top. Smash a quartered half-lemon on top expelling as much juice as possible. Repeat with another half lemon. Add more salt, spices and another 2 lemon-halves. Continue, pushing the fruit under the expressed juice until you reach close to the top of the jar. Ideally, you’ll want an inch of head room at the top. Smash it all down firmly, but if the fruit is not covered, juice a remaining lemon and pour the juice on top.

Close the jar with a lid and put it in a room temperature cupboard out of the light. The next day, smash it all down under the liquid again. Repeat for a week or two until it stays under the liquid and happily ferments. It can stay at room temperature for a month up to a year, but once you are happy with the flavor, you can put it in the fridge to slow it down.

This version is a variation from Alex Lewin’s book Real Food Fermentation. Here’s another version of the recipe.

Lacto-fermented Vegetables

This is an easy and basic technique you can apply to almost any vegetable. Lacto-fermenting the vegetables turns them into a live probiotic food, preserves them so they don’t require refrigeration, and boosts their safety and nutritional value. The microbes add vitamin B12 and K, and pre-digests some of the fiber. The ‘lacto-’ part means that a lot of the fermentation is performed by the microbe species Lactobacillus, among many thousands of other species. The microbes in the ferment metabolize the plant sugars to release lactic acid and other delicious byproducts, resulting in a tangy funky umami-rich flavor profile.

Ingredients:

Choose one or some of the following to equal a pound of vegetables (more is fine, you’ll just be chopping for longer).

Radishes (any color - the black ones are very metal), Daikon radishes (the purple ones are are trippy), carrots (any color, so rich!), red peppers, turnips, rutabaga, onions (red, yellow, green), garlic cloves, ginger coins, Brussels sprouts, fennel, Kohlrabi, broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage (red or green), celery root, baby bok choi, green beans, cauliflower chunks, even leaves like kale, collards, spicy mustard can go in. Herbs and spices are delicious and fun to add, so collect any or all of the following: cumin, coriander, black peppercorns, red pepper flakes, fennel, rosemary, lemon or other citrus zest. You’ll make your own signature flavor ferment.

Materials and equipment:

Regular salt*, water, jars with lids (any size - I use mason or ball jars with plastic lids), a measuring cup and measuring spoons, maybe a kitchen scale, chopping board, big and small knife.

Technique:

1) Chop the vegetables. Get creative and make shapes (hearts, flowers, triangles, squares…) and pack the veggies into the jars. Either tumble them in or arrange them artfully. You can layer them with slices of onion, or throw in handfuls of whole spices. Leave at least 2 inches of headroom at the top of the jar.

2) Make 2% brine (1 T salt/cup water = approximately 2%*) and pour it in to cover the vegetables, or you can get fancy and use an online brine calculator. Optional; you can pour in a dollop of liquid from a previous fermentation - sauerkraut, fermented pickles, yogurt whey - if you wish to give your ferment a boost. Not necessary though, You’ll create an environment for the correct microbe populations to thrive, boom and bust setting the stage for the next wave of microbes.

3) Put a lid loosely on the veggies and put them in a cupboard at room temperature. Wait 4-5 days, resubmerging the veggies every morning - keep them underwater, the microbes need an anaerobic environment. Taste them - when they are tangy enough to your palate, tighten the lid and put them in the fridge. They will continue to ferment, but at a much slower rate than at room temperature.

Some of my favorite combinations:

• white daikon spears with black peppercorns and red pepper flakes - put a spicy fermented spear into a martini (gin, of course) as a savory addition replacing an olive!

• coins of variously colored winter radishes pack beautifully into a jar

• purple-topped turnip rounds with red onion slices, black peppercorns, coriander and green onion lengths - amazing on a salad or with a grilled entrée

• green cabbage sauerkraut with outrageous pink watermelon radish hearts or triangles along the sides make a lovely gift

• halved dark green Brussels sprouts with whole cumin, coriander and black peppercorn

There are so many possibilities! Let me know what you discover!

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* Salt caveat: Salt (NaCl) is part of the environment you create to nurture the desired microbes and discourage the wrong ones (for example Clostridium Botulinum or E. Coli). If you are creating a ferment for a low-salt-person, you can decrease the brine concentration to 1% and add some sour/acidic cloudy liquid from a previous ferment - called “backslopping”. This immediately decreases the PH (increases acidity) and gives the desired microbe populations an advantage to out-compete undesirable competitors. Be assiduous about keeping the vegetables underwater, and monitor the ferment vigilantly. Your nose will tell you if anything is wrong.

In terms of food safety, fermented food is very safe. C. Botulinum and E. coli cannot survive in the low PH (acidic) environment rapidly created during the first phases of fermentation, such that the beneficials rapidly out-compete any competition.

turnips, celeriac and rutabagas from an overexuberant CSA share

Fermented Apple/Pear Chutney

I love the sweet-sour-funky bite of chutney. It’s great mixed into things, blending it onto sauces or dips, topping savory fish or grilled things, and generally adding an interesting flavor note. Upon exploration, I found; 1) cooked chutneys, 2) raw ones that need to be eaten more or less immediately, and then 3) fermented ones which introduce an even more interesting and complex flavor. To ferment a chutney, one must inoculate the fruit mixture with some sort of culture. I tried it with a fizzing and active kombucha. You can also use yogurt whey (the liquid expressed from the yogurt the day after you’ve taken a few spoonfuls out). My favorite way to eat this right now is to pile some chutney it on a piece of delicious homemade bread, top it with some sharp cheese and put the whole thing under the broiler for a couple of minutes until the cheese is toasty and the fruity spices fragrant.

This recipe uses apples and pears, but you could vary the fruit mixture to your liking. My friend Alex uses peaches and plums, and more of a cinnamon/clove/peppercorn spice blend. You can truly make this your own combination. Because of the high sugar content of the ingredients, this ferment will move fast - keep an eye on it, and don’t tighten the lid until you put it in the fridge.

Chutney with kombucha as source of culture, and curry spices added for fun

Ingredients:

• 1 Granny Smith apple, diced small

• 1 ripe-but-not-overly-so Bartlett Pear, diced small

• 1 D’Anjou pear diced small

• 1/2 preserved lemon or lime, minced (optional, but amazing - I’m teaching a class on how to do this delicious thing)

• 3 tablespoons’ish of golden raisins or 6 chopped dates

Put into a bowl and toss to mix.

Add curry-inspired spices (all, most, or your favorite blend) , and culture

• Toast 1 teaspoon each of cumin seeds, mustard seeds, fennel seeds until fragrant and put them with the fruit. Add 1 teaspoon each of ground cinnamon, turmeric and 1/2 teaspoon of asafetida and ginger powder (or 1 inch of grated fresh ginger), a few grinds or more of black pepper, and the crushed contents of 3 green cardamom pods.

• Add 1/4 cup of active kombucha and mix everything together well.

Technique:

Mix it all up in a big bowl, and then smash and crush into a jar. You want expressed liquid to push up over the fruit. If it doesn’t quite cover, add a bit more kombucha. Date the jar, put a loose lid on it so CO2 can escape, and put the jar in a dark cupboard for 2-3 days. It should get a little fizzy. Smell and taste-test until it is tangy-sweet to your liking and then tighten the lid and put it in the fridge. Apparently you could even freeze it at this point (I would do that in plastic containers or zip-lock bags.)

This ferment that doesn't include salt, so if you are a low-salt person, or are cooking for someone with high blood pressure, this ferment will work well for you.

Some other combinations to try with this tecnique:

Mango/papaya/pineapple + ginger + red pepper + red onion + cilantro + lime juice

cranberries + honey + walnuts + orange zest

Strawberry + jalapeño +black peppercorns+ lemon juice

https://food52.com/recipes/2168-spicy-lacto-fermented-pear-chutney - I want to try this one!

Yogurt

Yogurt is a simple dairy ferment that requires a constant temperature for 100F/45C. Once that part is managed, the rest is dead easy.

Ingredients:

1 Q dairy milk (cow, goat, etc.)

2 T starter culture (yogurt from a previous batch, preferably local organic - the CoOp or farmers market are great sources)

Equipment:

thermometer

saucepan

yogurt maker/ environment that will hold 110F/45C for over 4 hrs, and up to 8.

Method:

• Heat milk in the saucepan to 180F for 20 min. This sterilizes the milk so the culture you add has a head start.

• Cool the milk to 110F, stir in the starter culture and whisk to incorporate

• pour the cultured milk into the yogurt maker and set for 6-8 hours. Do not jiggle or disturb.

• refrigerate until chilled

Tzatziki (Greek Yogurt garlic cucumber mint sauce)

YIELDMakes about 2 cups

INGREDIENTS

3 Persian cucumbers or 1/2 English cucumbers, or 1 regular smooth skinned cuke. I scrape out the seeds unless its unnecessary. Cut the cuke into 1/4-inch or smaller pieces

Kosher salt

1 cup plain whole-milk yogurt (Greek style will make it thicker if you wish)

3 tablespoons tasty cold-pressed olive oil

2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice

1 garlic clove, lightly crushed

1/4 cup chopped mint

PREPARATION

Toss cucumbers with a few generous pinches of salt in a small bowl; firmly squeeze several times with your hands to release excess water. Drain.
Mix cucumbers, yogurt, oil, lemon juice, and garlic in a medium bowl; season with salt. Let sit at room temperature until tzatziki tastes garlicky, 15–20 minutes; discard garlic (or crush it in there for a bigger garlic presence). Stir in mint just before serving.

Tzatziki (without mint) can be made 3 days ahead. Cover and chill.

https://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/tzatziki-greek-cucumber-yogurt-sauce

Cashew Cream -Savory or Sweet

Courtesy of Carie Bernard - Licensed Acupuncturist in Portland, and Global Dance Party dancer!

• Great dairy substitute, and I bet it would be great as a frozen treat too! Keeps up to a week refrigerated , use 1:1 for a cream substitute.

In a small bow combine 1 cup of cashews and enough boiling water to cover. Let stand, covered, 15 minutes; drain. Rinse and drain again. (You could also let them sit in the water overnight).
In a blender or food processor combine cashews, ½ cup water and salt. Cover; blend 5 minutes or until creamy. (Carie used a VitaMix and it only took 30-60 seconds to blend to desired creaminess.) Store in the fridge up to 1 week. Makes 16 servings (1 Tbsp. each).

SWEET CASHEW CREAM Stir in 1 Tbsp. pure maple syrup or honey an d ½ tsp vanilla.
SAVORY CASHEW CREAM Stir in ½ tsp. lime or lemon zest, 1 tsp. lime or lemon juice, 1 clove garlic minced; and if desired, ¼ tsp. ground chipotle chile pepper. (Carie added ground rosemary.)

Some more ideas here