Wow, what a week. If you follow my Instagram (gerard.riley.52) or my twitter feed (@Gedda007) you may have noticed that I have been preserving almost everyday. Last Saturday I went to my local fruit and veg shop and grabbed anything that they had on special and from there I picked up the ball and ran with it.
What did I get? Pickling onions, at least that's what the label in the shop said. I would have preferred them to be a little smaller. They will do. Asparagus was 3 bunches for $5 so they got the Lacto Fermentation treatment. A half kilo of mushrooms after some searching the net for a recipe received a similar lacto ferment after boiling (yes I was sceptical too). They look great in the jars. Now what else did I do. That's right, They had strawberries and blueberries on special so I used my new preserving kit to preserve them with a little sugar. Turns out I needed a fair bit more sugar. Obviously the amount of sugar you need to add is based somewhat on the sweetness of the fruit. If you are lucky enough to be picking them yourself you may be able to allow them to ripen on the plant and get extra sweetness but those who need to transport them to markets don't have that luxury. We live and learn. You learn so much more by doing.
Green chillies are about to become Green Sriracha sauce. This time around I wanted to find out how hot the sauce would be if I left all the seeds in the chillies and then processed it. Should have an answer soon. After a week of stirring daily to prevent the oxygen from over working on the surface it is almost time for the final run through the blender. Could be some side effects for the next person to make a cocktail in that blender.
So we have preserved berries, Green Sriracha sauce, Pickled onions. Did I explain them? Is that a real sentence? Maybe not be lets push on. I added after searching a few shops for pickling spices a mix of appropriate spices in Woolworths and added them to a jar of smallish onions and some malt vinegar. The recipe says they will be good in 6 weeks. The aroma from that jar is just fantastic. Can I really be expected to wait six weeks?
Okay, I lost my way again. Preserved berries, Green Sriracha, Pickled onions, Dill cucumbers (they're almost gone), Lacto Fermented Asparagus, Lacto Mushrooms and last but not least, wait that's not the last, there's two more. Mustard with yellow mustard seeds, brown mustard seeds and some beer. Beer in food is good. And yesterday I used the yoghurt making function on my microwave to make a kilo of yoghurt. Brekky this week will be berries yoghurt and few oats thrown in for good measure.
As you can see I got my food geek on this week and loved every minute of it. The only problem was that the writing of blog posts suffered and now it is time to record the fun.
Where to start? These aren't going to be exact recipes but really just an idea of methods that hopefully you can follow loosely and add your own spin. Get creative and have some fun with it.
Hmmm. Start at the beginning (I've heard that it is a very good place to start).
Lets go with the preserved Strawberries and blueberries. I kept it simple. Fill jars. Top with water and add some sugar for extra sweetness and to turn the water into a syrup. Place jars into canning device for 1 hour. Remove using canning tongs and leave to sit and cool overnight. A couple of lessons learnt here as a first timer. 1. Pack fruit in tightly otherwise you end up with half full jars which is just a waste. Take the time it will be worth it in the long run. I added about a teaspoon of sugar to each half pint jar. I would say that a tablespoon might be closer to the mark. Live and learn. Also I am not sure I used the best fruits for preserving. As we head into the warmer months there will be plenty of other larger stone fruits to give a try.
Dill cucumbers. These went into the canner, not even sure that is the correct terminology, with the berries for 1 hour. These were from a flavour view point a success but texturally could have been better. The cucumbers were a little too large so I had to cut them before placing in the jars with some yellow mustard seeds, dill and I think a little garlic for good measure. I sliced them longways for one jar and across for the rest. In fact the third jar was only half full so I roughly chopped a capsicum and topped up the jar with it. I started eating these after only a week, I figure that you would need to leave them longer if you leave them whole. I found that the longer pickles had a crisper texture but from a flavour viewpoint all were good. There are plenty of recipes online for these and they usually revolve around using some vinegar, some water and some salt.
Mushrooms and Asparagus, eating a few whilst I type this. Pro-Home Cooks (formally Brothers Green) YouTube channel has a lacto Ferment post and he mentions using a ratio of between 2 and 3% salt to weight of water and vegetables that you are preserving. On this batch of mushrooms and the asparagus I used a 3% salt ratio and I was just going to say that they tasted a little too salty. But as I write this some time has passed and I think that the saltiness has mellowed somewhat and they seem to have improved in flavour. I used 3% salt for this batch but may cut back to 2.5 or even 2% for future batches. For the asparagus I used a little sliced garlic and some preserved lemon. Quite good. For the Mushrooms, it took a little while to find a recipe but then I found a Russian Lacto Fermented mushroom recipe and that has turned out well. I forgot to mention that I blanched the asparagus for about 1 to 2 minutes before refreshing in cold water and simmered the mushrooms for 15 minutes before preserving them.
It's been a busy week or so since I started typing. I have used up my strawberries and most of my blueberries as well. Whilst the preserved strawberries were in the no rush to repeat category, the blueberries, probably due to their natural sweetness and the outer seal provided by the skin, were much sweeter and generally yummier.
The pickled onions are sitting tight for another few weeks in their malt vinegar and pickling spices. Right from day 1 the aroma from that jar has been fantastic. Can not wait. I'm sure that someone said 4 to 6 weeks waiting time. Maybe it would be rude not to give them a try at 4 weeks.
As for the green Sriracha sauce, it looks like it will be the 2 week ferment ( provided I get to finishing it off after I stop typing here). I have been stirring the chillies daily and judging by the nose on those chillies they have really mellowed over the second week. Just need to dump them into my trusty blender, add some rice vinegar and celebrate the joys of green chilli sauce. I have found that the green chilli sauce has a thicker texture, is a little less pourable. Could put it through a sieve but that adds a heap of time which if I scale the recipe in future could be problematic.
The yoghurt, feels bad to even mention it. So little effort involved in making it. We bought a new microwave oven earlier this year and one of the cheaper ones had a yoghurt making function on it. I have given it a try earlier and this time was a success again. All that is required is mixing a litre of milk with around 50 grams of yoghurt and 50 grams of sugar together in a microwave safe bowl. Place in centre of microwave and turn on the yoghurt function. 5 hours later we have a winner. A kilo of yoghurt ready to add some berries, oats and trail mix. Breakfast for the week. It was a good way to start the day.
Mustard. Not a lot of information on mustard. Not 100% happy with my results at this stage. The results are a little hot (not really a problem) but more troubling, a little bitter. Maybe honey needs to be added. Or is it vinegar. Acid balances bitterness. That's why lemon goes well in tea. I haven't explained what I do. Basically mix mustard seeds with a little mustard powder and beer, malt vinegar, and brown sugar. Leave to sit for 3 days and then whizz in a food processor until it is thickened to the correct consistency. Maybe double the vinegar and sugar for next time, and halve the beer, or substitute with white wine or red wine. Learn by doing. That's become my personal motto of late. That and you don't learn much sitting on the lounge at home.
There is one other project I have had on the go since mid to late September. That is making vinegar. I have a small batch (couple of smallish jars) of apple cider vinegar and one jar of raisin vinegar aging on my preserves shelf. My understanding of the process is a little weak but in short you add fruit to water and cover with a lid. For the first period of time (about a week in this trial) to trap in the oxygen. After a couple of days bubbles will form. Each day I had to open the jars and make sure all fruits were submerged and release the gas build up to prevent the creation of a bomb which would over time destroy my jar. This first step will create alcohol from the sugars in the fruits. Then the second stage is to cover the jar with a cloth or coffee filter to stop fruit flies or other nasties (isn't it good how when typing you get to use words that you would never use in real life) getting in but still allow the natural yeasts from the air to react with the alcohol and turn it into vinegar. After about 20 days of this second stage I then added a couple of tablespoons of shop bought apple cider vinegar with mother which will hopefully give a bit of a boost to the process and then in another 20 days strain the vinegar and sit the liquid without the fruit for another 10 to 20 days and you have hopefully an excellently acidic vinegar. Fingers crossed. Getting to the end of the process I feel as though next time around I can make some larger batches and then the real fun begins.
Well, it has taken me a little longer than I hoped to get this post completed but I am finally there. Apart from adding some pretty pictures.
