Making Fermented Vegetables + Perception

Hello :) I've been selling fermented vegetables at Eveleigh markets since the start of the year now and it's been a really interesting, rewarding job to have. Firstly, as a nutrition student (graduating in just over a week!) it obviously helps me to apply my nutrition knowledge to a practical job - having conversations with people about gut health, probiotics and recipe ideas for their kimchi! What has also been interesting is learning and thinking about the idea of perception when it comes to cooking and how some things that seem hard to make aren't really!

At the markets we sell a DIY fermenter kit, which is basically a 5L bucket that comes with a tap, out gasser, muslin cloth and depending on what you want to make (i.e. sauerkraut, kimchi or beetroot/apple) we also give you the right instructions and recipe (i.e. the weight of the vegetables to buy etc) and a packet with the correct ratio of salt, spices and a probiotic sachet. Well for weeks I'd been encouraging people to buy one (so economical! so easy!) without really considering it myself (so difficult! not enough time!) - when really it was the perception of it all that stopped me.

So about 6 weeks ago I decided to finally give it a go myself - I bought a bucket and packet for sauerkraut making, which is a good one to start off with because all you literally need to buy is a cabbage (though I added purple kale and garlic too). Essentially all you do is wash the equipment, mix the salt and spices with the shredded vegetables, wait an hour, wrap in a muslin cloth, pop in the bucket, mix in some water with the probiotics, add a weight, fill the water lock halfway and voila! Well, then you just need to wait 3-4 weeks - the not so fun part. There are of course different ways to make fermented vegetables, and you don't necessarily need a probiotic sachet (it just adds more lactobacillus bacteria).

fermenter bucket, cabbage, purple kale - ready for sauerkraut!

sauerkraut mixture ready to ferment 

I suppose what I’m trying to say is in the end what I perceived to be too complicated (making sauerkraut) was actually really quite easy and for the past two weeks I’ve been eating the finished sauerkraut most days now for breakfast and dinner. I added some extra chopped garlic and it really is quite delicious!

sprouted toast, boiled eggs, pesto and sauerkraut

Last Saturday I bought another cabbage and some carrots and decided to make kimchi. Exciting times ahead!

Cabbage for kimchi!

Kimchi mixture - I added extra fresh turmeric and ginger, yum!!

So learn to make bread, whip cream to make butter – and maybe even ferment your own vegetables … you can do it! 

Hannah x

Oh hi blog!

Hello :) Long time no blog! I will get into more regular blogging but in the meantime here's a summary of what I've been up to inspired by this post ...

• Thinking ... about what to do after I graduate with a Bachelor of Science (nutrition) degree at the end of the month! I'm still not entirely sure what I want to pursue yet ... but in the meantime am happy working at a few jobs and still having time to do a few yoga classes, bake a bit more, opshop and fun things like that!

(recipe from here, it was so good!!!)

• Planning ... a little holiday to Melbourne soon and hopefully Japan at the end of the year!
• Eating ... a lot of slow cooked soups and stews using homemade chicken broth, homemade sauerkraut, and porridge with cacao, homemade almond milk and toasted sunflower seeds 

• Listening ... to sufjan stevens, tiny ruins, first aid kit + abc jazz 
• Drinking ... aeropress coffee, white tea, rooibos with lemon 
• Buying ... dark chocolate coffee beans (obsessed!), containers from Muji and polish pottery 
• Wearing ... peach blush, berry lipstick and a lot of collared shirts - the shirt in the picture is a lover find from vinnies!

• Reading ... far from the madding crowd (cause I want to see the film with carey mulligan)

• Watching ... a lot of makeup videos on youtube from Sali Hughes, who I read about in the latest dumbo feather magazine

Hannah x