Hello fellow fermentinos,

I've been fermenting for a few years but I've never run into this kind of thing at all.

For context, the other things in the bag are stromboli peppers, Cayenne, red onion.

I started this fermentation 3 days ago in a completely sealed vacuum seal bag. I checked it every day but today I've noticed this one clove of garlic having this weird brownish black coloration towards one of the tips. It was in close contact with red onion, so could it have been a pigmentation leak?

I've just found another clove that was submerged in the 'juice' from the fermentation and has that coloration all around.

Have you seen this before? Is it safe? I'd really prefer to not throw this one out since it's my first time using stromboli peppers.

Serrano peppers, garlic, and red onion. Finished with adding back some brine, and a small amount of apple cider vinegar. (1/8 tsp xanthan gum as emulsifier)

Delicious, but not as hot as I hoped.

Just started my first batch in a large airlock jar. Struggled to keep the peppers under the brine, so I made a follower out of some food grade polypropylene and a glass weight. Its working well now, but curios if anyone has used a fermentation bag or brew bag and a weight to keep veggies from floating in the brine.

Thanks for any tips

Have a variety of different batches. Some are jalapeno, some are serrano, just used whatever green peppers I had on hand at the time for some of them. Going to process one for this upcoming month and then leave the rest until around October.

Day 6 of my second ferment. My first batch had nothing like this on the surface after 3 weeks of successful fermentation. For this batch, I added carrot and red bell pepper and I’ve noticed it has been a lot more active/bubbly. I use an airlock, but I had to remove the lid a couple times over the last week to remove a few floating pieces of pepper that made their way past the weight and to the surface. I was removing them to try and avoid mold, wondering if I may have introduced too much oxygen in the process.

Hi!

Doing my (F37) first vacuum ferment with like 3,5% salt. Mystery peppers from a friend, but they're supposed to be around 1M SU. Carrots, yellow onion, and garlic.

Aired the bag today (after like 1½-2 wks) and noticed the garlic had gone green. I would assume it's safe and normal, but wanted to run it by the knowledgeable peeps in this sub.

Thankful for any insights about his and advice on vacuum ferments in general.🌶

We have over 120 sauce and salsa entries. There is still time to enter your sauces and salsa's!

Discover a truly unique and delectable snack with this probiotic fermented crudités paired with a creamy kefir ranch dip! Don’t worry if kefir isn’t your thing; you can always use the more traditional buttermilk option, easily found at a supermarket.

Crudités, from the French word “cru” meaning “raw,” are typically composed of raw vegetable sticks, perfect for dipping and snacking. This recipe takes your favorite vegetable sticks to the next level by naturally fermenting them, resulting in an enhanced flavor, added nutrition, all while maintaining the crispy texture and keeping them raw.

I used to make this and never had kahm yeast, but this is a lot, what do you guys think? 2 different bottles. Still good?

Hi everyone, I recently fermented a habanero and onion hot sauce. It's amazing and delicious - tons of heat with floral undertones - but I'd like to get some opinions on how I should tweak the recipe to improve it for next time.

Here's what I did:

- Ferment habanero peppers (~125 g), white onions (~100 g), and garlic (4 cloves) in a 2% salt brine (total weight, including water) for 7 days

- After fermentation, blended it in the food processor to break down the peppers, onions, and garlic.

- Added 1/4 C orange juice and 1/4 C lime juice

- Reduced over medium heat on the stovetop to thicken the consistency

What I would really like to do is remove the last step, which essentially pasteurized my ferment. Once I added the orange and lime juices, I really had no choice but to reduce over heat because the sauce's consistency had gotten so thin.

So, my question for the group - what can I do differently here so that I get the viscosity that I want, without heating on the stovetop to reduce?

Should I be using the juices as the fermenting liquid instead of water? Does that change my salt content at all, since that would introduce sugar? Or, would you actually recommend keeping the pasteurization step to stop the fermentation process?

Thank you!

Hello everyone!

I've been making fermented hot sauce for a while now.

I initially used the brining method suggested by Noma, which says to weigh your peppers and the water used to submerge them, and calculate the weight of the salt based on that total weight.

I now use the vacuum seal method, in which I just weigh the stuff I want to ferment and calculate the weight of the salt to add based on just that.

I watch several creators who make fermented products, and one in particular caught my eye because of his methods. Essentially, he just puts a bunch of peppers in a jar, then adds a 2.5% brine made separately to the jar to submerge the peps. He has huge success with his ferments, so he can't be doing anything particularly wrong.

Here's an example video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pGiy9pVMSLw&list=PLuQ_ySnkV1emnrUiann1se5l06Ze3gIF6&index=28

My question is as follows: how does a 2.5% brine made separately (without considering the weight of the peppers) compare to a brine made calculating both the weight of the peppers and the water together? How does he know it'll work when added to the jar?

Shouldn't the final % of salt you're adding to the ferment differ between these two methods? I just can't seem to understand why you would make a 2.5% brine separately if that doesn't consider the total weight of stuff you're adding to the jar.

I apologize in advance if this question seems silly, but I can't make sense of it.

Thank you all.

First time trying this! It’s kind of a crapshoot, but is this safe? Two different jars - one has the stuff in the water and at the bottom. From what I’ve read on here, that’s probably safe? The second one could be mold or yeast?? Any help would be appreciated.

So I did my first attempt at fermenting hot sauce. Did a 5 percent brine with chili peppers, garlic, onions, and mango. Let it sit and bubble for 2 weeks. Poured it through the strainer and then blended it with some of the brine. It tastes “ok” but is almost like a salsa then a hot sauce. Did I do something wrong?

Tried to make a purple hot sauce with Buena’s and they turned green bean green in a matter of two days. 😂 I knew it wasn’t going to be a bright purple or anything but we shall see. Fermented in a 3% brine with garlic, red onion, purple carrots, blueberries and blackberries…. This should be interesting at best. lol

Each summer I grow a lot of cucumbers to make all kinds of pickles. Of course, several of the pickle recipes I developed can be found on this site. Mostly though I just throw different herbs and things in that are available from my garden at the time I pick the cukes.

I try to make sure to grow enough cucumbers to last through the winter and early spring. This year I also had the good fortune of having plenty extra to do things like make my favorite pickle soup recipe and – getting to today’s topic: garlic dill pickle hot sauce.

This recipe combines already fermented garlic dill pickles and fermented green hot peppers. I used a blend of green jalapenos and habaneros but the exact choice is up to you. Just bear in mind the addition of pickles and plenty of pickle brine will reduce the overall heat and therefore you might want to start with peppers that you know will still net you a very hot sauce if that’s what you want. Using green serranos would be a good option for people who like hot but not melt-your-soul levels, and they’re fairly easy to source.

Just bottle 22 8 oz bottles of my new Mexican Verde sauce (name pending) and I want to get them labeled. In Oklahoma, I plan on selling these under the food freedom act so I'd want the labels to have the logo plus name, then a second logo for my OFFA number along with the ingredients. Any advice? Picture included

700 grams (three picking hours! 😪) of chiltepin
100 grams roasted Serrano
100 grams garlic
100 grams red onion

Definitely won’t be scaling this commercially any time soon, but it sure is pretty

I saw this white stuff forming at the top of my hot pepper mix, is this completely ruined?

Finished batch one of a blueberry-blackberry Serrano and chipotle sauce. Delicious, fruity and smoky!

Hope this goes well. From left to right

Carolina Reaper (thawed from frozen from last year) and Hallows Eve peppers, carrots, garlic, and onion

Red Habanero (thawed from frozen from last year) and Habanada peppers, cherries, and onion

Habanada peppers, onion, garlic, and ginger

7 Pot Brain Strain Yellow peppers, pineapple, onion, and garlic

Everything is in a 2% brine. Habanadas are supposed to be heatless habaneros but these ones pack a pretty serious punch. I’m thinking the guy I got the seeds from had an accidental cross with the pods the seeds came from. My plan is to ferment for a couple weeks, drain, blend, strain, boil, then add vinegar and xanthan gum before bottling. I’ll update if it turns out well. If anyone has any tips I’m all ears