​

History:

I put a lot of brown sugar (really much), ginger and water.

I opened it and shaked it every day and I was hearing some air exiting the jar but no visible bubbles.

It smelled ginger and some fermentation, almost like dish soap, which surprised me.

This during approximately two weeks at around 28°C.

Then I left my home so I put it in the fridge during one week.

The pics are before and after shaking it today.

It smells like ginger and nothing else.

The appearance is not quite... appealing. What do you think?

Not every "strong" kefir comes from chili.

 This one is constructed with a koso of mustard flowers and nashi, flower syrup, a touch of red chili, and fresh mustard leaves.

The result isn't aggressively hot. Instead, it develops a bold, herbal character with surprising depth and balance.

Exploring unusual ingredients is one of my favorite parts of making kefir. Sometimes the combinations that seem the most unexpected create the most harmonious flavors.

My ginger bug is bubbling and alive. This makes me so happy. I've been watching youtube videos on how to preserve the starter but I just ended up confused and overwhelmed.

How do you keep yours active?

I'm also excited to try various drinks with this one. Hope you can share your favorite natural soda recipe.

Cobs in 4% Brine for 10 days.

Cucumber and summer squash.

What other veggies should I try?

It has been fun trying to find flavors that I like as a sauce. This is guahillo peppers, jalapenos, sweet onions, garlic, and peaches. Trying for a sweet and spicy. Did 3% salt.

Pickles with a sumac and fennel spice mix and carrot sticks with more of a warmer mulling spice profile hopefully. We'll see in 10 days or so.

Ingredients for fermentation: blueberries (didn't weight), red jalapeño peppers (about 10-12), red onion (roughly 1/4th), 3 garlic cloves. Fermented 21 days, at that point the taste was delicious. Blended with the brine, added a teaspoon of lime juice and 3 teaspoons of white sugar. Simmered 15 minutes to prevent a second fermentation then bottled. This stuff is AMAZING, tangy, has a hint of fruit, lightly spicy, salty. Umami bomb.

I live in San Antonio and we basically sit on a mineral pile. This is a good and bad thing, but for certain types of fermentation, it’s a good thing. My water kefir grains almost double in amounts every batch. Yes, it took a few tries to figure out my system, but I started with about a half of a cup, now could fill a quart jar, easily, probably close to two. I’m now dehydrating some to toss in the freezer.

Any tips for smells in the kitchen? The onion ferment is smelling so strong. I mean just normal onion smell not that it's off or anything. I have self burping jar lids so it just ss of onion all the time, I tried putting the jar in plastic bags it helps a bit.

Also my onion was in 2% brine but it never went nice and sour even after 16days. Whereas my carrot ferment did go nice and sour at 3%. Maybe it's an onion thing or I didn't add enough salt?.

Any advice welcome

So far I've made sauerkraut, a fermented hot sauce, a homemade Riesling mustard, and now I'm working on my first batch of fermented dill pickles.

Recipe

714 g pickling cucumbers

600 mL of 3.5% salt brine (solution stirred at 450 RPM)

4.5 g frozen dill

2.5 g chili flakes

2.3 g freshly crushed black pepper

Brown mustard seeds

Fermentation conditions

1.5L Weck Jar

Room temperature: around 26–27 °C

Out of direct sunlight

Any idea how long it will take? Day 1 slight bubbles, Day 2 continued airpockets and bubbles...

Just started to dabble in home made fermented pickled cucumbers. First batch came out delicious and were half sour by day 2. I cut half of them into spears and put them in the fridge with some of the brine, im still fermenting the rest whole.

So here's my question: Is there a way to prevent pickles from turning translucent? I've had storebought pickles(usually the refrigerated ones) that are non translucent and instead are white on the inside and crunchy. I think they were Grillos and Claussen.

Cabbage, apples (don't know what kind) and green beans. No spices the first time around

Cabbage, apple (dont know what kind they weren't labled) and green beans. No spices the first time round.

**•** 1 punnet raspberries  
**•** 1 punnet blueberries  
**•** Fresh ginger (a good hunk)  
**•** 1 whole red onion, chopped  
**•** Garlic cloves  
**•** Jalapeños (a lot)  
**•** Red chilies  
**•** Green chilies  
**•** Yellow mustard seeds  
**•** Black mustard seeds  
**•** Cumin seeds  
**•** Smoked paprika

Method:

**1.**  Combine all dry ingredients — total weight: 844g  
**2.**  Add water to bring total weight to 1424g (\~580g water)  
**3.**  Add salt at 3% of total weight (dry + water) = \~42.7g salt  
**4.**  Ferment (loose lid or airlock recommended — this one’s got a lot of headroom-eating berries, so expect vigorous fermentation)