Home fermentation and fermented foods from around the world
Practical guides to fermenting at home – sauerkraut, kimchi, pickles, kefir, kombucha – and to fermented foods from around the world. Updated articles list their sources and say plainly when a ferment isn't safe to make at home. About Figaro Shakes →
Kombucha, water kefir, ginger beer and kvass all contain some alcohol. In an Australian survey of 239 shop-bought fermented drinks, 22.9% of kombuchas and 36.7% of water kefirs…
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136 traditional fermented foods and drinks from 12 regions, compared in one table: how each is fermented, its main microbes, whether it still has live microbes when eaten,…
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Fermented noni juice is the sour, dark brown juice that drips from ripe noni fruit left in a closed vessel for two months or longer, a method used…
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Alcaparrones are caper berries, the green fruits of the caper bush, fermented in Spain and around the Mediterranean. In a study of traditional production in Jaén, berries fermented…
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Ferment in glass, food-grade plastic, stainless steel or a stoneware crock with a lead-free glaze, and allow about 1 gallon of container for every 5 pounds of vegetables.…
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Suan cai is Northeast China's sour cabbage: napa cabbage, usually blanched in boiling water, weighed down with a stone in salted water and fermented for about a month.…
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Kiviaq is an Inughuit food from northwest Greenland: a few hundred little auks packed whole, feathers and all, into a sealskin, sewn shut with the air pressed out…
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Ting is a fermented sorghum porridge from Botswana, also eaten in South Africa, where it is called ting ya mabele: sorghum meal is mixed with water and a…
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Most home ferments want an ordinary warm room: sauerkraut and fermented pickles 70–75°F (21–24°C) for 3–4 weeks, kombucha 68–77°F (20–25°C) for 7–10 days and milk kefir 68–77°F (20–25°C)…
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Brine-cured olives are made Greek-style: ripe olives go straight into salt brine and ferment for months while the bitterness leaches out. University of California extension uses a brine…
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Kiseli kupus is Balkan sour cabbage: whole cored heads of white cabbage fermented in brine and used leaf by leaf, above all for sarma. Use salt equal to…
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Fesikh (feseekh, faseikh) is whole fish, usually grey mullet, salted without gutting and left to ferment for 15 days to 3 months, eaten in Egypt at Sham el-Nessim…
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Kinema is a sticky, umami fermented soybean food from eastern Nepal, first made by the Limboo people and now eaten across the Darjeeling Hills, Sikkim and southern Bhutan,…
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Pacific Islanders traditionally fermented breadfruit in pits, turning it into a sour, pungent paste that was cooked and eaten – in the Marquesas and Chuuk mixed with fresh…
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Maheu (mahewu, amahewu) is a Southern African non-alcoholic drink made by fermenting thin cooked maize porridge. Cook maize meal with water for 15–20 minutes, cool it, stir in…
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Figaro Shakes started in 2016 as a visual journal of shakes and smoothies. Those recipes are still here.
