Lacto fermentation

I must have been living under a rock....never even heard of this. And fermented hot sauce? Sign me up!
 
FontinalisFin said:
It's between 72-78 night and day in here. Good, I was a bit concerned about the cloudiness. The batch I put up today I weighed out the extra 3% weight of the cukes in salt and added that(I still had brine left over that was 4% so I'll have something in between that). I'm planting cabbage starts now, sauerkraut this fall.
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The cloudiness is just the lactobacillus bacteria, a lot of it will settle to the bottom when you refrigerate the pickles. I like to put mine in the fridge when they are 90% as fermented as I want. They still ferment in the fridge, my guess is 1 week in the fridge is about 1 day at 70 degrees.
 
Most hotsauce is fermented hotsauce, Tabasco (fermented and aged tobasco peppers) and Frank's Red Hot (Cayanne peppers) being 2 famous examples. They are fermented, aged then cut with vinegar. So it's not a super rare thing, but homemade of course is always better.
 
Gary Knowels said:
I'm going to try a fermented cayenne hot sauce this year. First time growing peppers and I'm looking forward to them ripening so I can get started!
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Unfortunately my pepper crop sucks this year, they got pushed to the end of my "triage" things to do list before I got them in ground. I sell at farmers markets, so I have connections :cool: I'll still get a bunch of peppers.
 
FontinalisFin said:
Unfortunately my pepper crop sucks this year, they got pushed to the end of my "triage" things to do list before I got them in ground. I sell at farmers markets, so I have connections :cool: I'll still get a bunch of peppers.
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I'll probably end up buying some from my local farmers market too. I'm thinking garlic-fresno and a serrano-tomatillo, maybe even a habenero-carrot joint.
 
I usually make up a few fermented hot sauces every year. Sometimes I follow a theme (like green: jales and pablanos). Other times it's a mix of whatever is coming out of the garden. I'm not a big vinegar person so I don't add any afterwards. I've fermented for as long as 6 or 7 weeks, but I think something less is probably the sweet spot (3-4 weeks?) for some tang but not too much funk.

Gary Knowels said:
I'll probably end up buying some from my local farmers market too. I'm thinking garlic-fresno and a serrano-tomatillo, maybe even a habenero-carrot joint.
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That is one of my goals this year--incorporating non-pepper stuff in it. Tomatillos sound like a great idea. I've been wanting to try fruit and something potent like a hab.

Have you fermented garlic before? My experience in a jar of peppers is that it really, really takes over. (And I'm talking one glove in 2/3s full quart jar.) I felt like it became more a garlic sauce than hot sauce (which wasn't really what I was going for).

I'm realizing I could also add some pressed garlic at the end (i.e., before it goes in the fridge) so I get some of the flavor but not the fermented version.
 
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tkww said:
I usually make up a few fermented hot sauces every year. Sometimes I follow a theme (like green: jales and pablanos). Other times it's a mix of whatever is coming out of the garden. I'm not a big vinegar person so I don't add any afterwards. I've fermented for as long as 6 or 7 weeks, but I think something less is probably the sweet spot (3-4 weeks?) for some tang but not too much funk.


That is one of my goals this year--incorporating non-pepper stuff in it. Tomatillos sound like a great idea. I've been wanting to try fruit and something potent like a hab.

Have you fermented garlic before? My experience in a jar of peppers is that it really, really takes over. (And I'm talking one glove in 2/3s full quart jar.) I felt like it became more a garlic sauce than hot sauce (which wasn't really what I was going for).

I'm realizing I could also add some pressed garlic at the end (i.e., before it goes in the fridge) so I get some of the flavor but not the fermented version.
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We like big punchy garlic flavor, we'll do 3-4 cloves in a half gallon cucumber pickle ferment. I haven't done sauces yet so I can't speak to that, but I'll keep it in mind!
 
Gary Knowels said:
We like big punchy garlic flavor, we'll do 3-4 cloves in a half gallon cucumber pickle ferment. I haven't done sauces yet so I can't speak to that, but I'll keep it in mind!
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I did a bit more reading today. I think some of my garlic results may have been from an overly-long ferment.
 
Soo, day 8 now, I tested one yesterday and it was OK, definitely a pickle, stayed nice and crisp, but not as sour as I thought, there's actually little to no sourness at all. I get a nice mellow funk, almost like the clovey esters from a German style heffeweizen. I may have used too much dill as I get an almost menthol aftertaste. Anyways I dumped those batches out and mixed them up then re-jarred them in 1/2 gallon masons with fermentation airlocks I just got. We're going to call this the secondary ferment.
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Got a white mass/glob of something forming under the surface.
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67 VW Beetle said:
The white glob forming in the bottom pic. Normal part of the fermentation process?
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I wouldn't call it a glob, more of a feathery precipitate. I had a scoby start to form on the surface of one jar when I skimmed and re-bottled them, also a bit of mold got skimmed off. Waiting for the experts to chime in.
 
Yeah I have been thinking to grab a few more big ones. I'm gonna need them. Thanks for the tip! I was going to be checking BiMart as well.
 
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