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