It began in the cold wet spring of 2011 on a sixth of an acre made available by a very generous family here in town. Everything eventually grew and by Thanksgiving I had produced about three hundred quarts of pickles, and two hundred pints of sauerkraut and kimchi. “Wow! With all that you could feed an army!” Yeah like an army of seven. So this year we’re trying to produce a lot more. And accord
ing to the spreadsheets and crop plans I’m drawing up, I’m not just saying “a lot” and only meaning “some.” I mean freaking “a lot.”
Right now, you can acquire pints of sauerkraut and kimchi at Blue Valley Meats. The regionally-renowned French restaurant, Brasserie Four, serves our sauerkraut on their choucroute dish. Which I’m sure I would say was extraordinarily delicious even if while serving it my eyeballs didn’t look like slot machines spinning dollar signs. I work at said restaurant as well. Stay tuned for more information as hare-brained schemes actually turn into physical reality that you can interact with. The rest of the writing here is just some information about these pickles I wrote back in March 2k11. All of my pickled products are fermented, not canned. Fermentation and canning are the two basic ways to preserve food by acidification. The acid inhibits the growth of bacterias and yeasts that, left unchecked, would create off-flavors, poisons, or would soften the product past palatability. Canned products are shelf-stable because they are sterile. If it is a low-acid food—like peaches—then it has to be pressure-canned in order to achieve a sterile environment. If it’s an acidified food like pickles or sauerkraut—with a pH below 4.6—then it just has to be boiled to be sterile; the acid weakens the unwanted micro-organisms (like botulism). None of my products are striving for this sterility. So, whereas the acid in canned foods is vinegar (acetic acid), the acid in fermented products is lactic acid—this is what spontaneous fermentation makes. My products ferment for a week to six weeks in ceramic crocks in a clean, cool room in the basement of the Walla Walla Elks Lodge. They are then brought back up into the kitchen—via elevator—put in jars—not canned—and placed in a walk-in cooler. The fermentation creates the acid that gives it that good briny flavor and, together with the salt, will preserve the pickles or whatever for months in a cool environment, the cooler the longer. They have to be kept cool in order to slow the activity of the bacterias and yeasts. If they were just left in the basement they would become soft, and sooner or later downright disgusting. Canning has been around since 1809. A Frenchman named Nicolas Appert developed the process to feed Napoleon’s armies. Louis Pasteur of pasteurization-fame would figure out how canning worked fifty years later. (I am grafting from Wikipedia.) Controlled fermentation has been around for nearly forever. Nearly everything delicious is fermented: cheese, bread, soy sauce, hot sauce, yoghurt, any cured meat, any alcohol, and I think coffee and chocolate at some point in their processing. (I need an ill-paid fact-checker.) Fresh mangoes and pie are the only exceptions to the dictum that delicious equals fermentation. So, whereas canning requires sterility, fermented foods strive for a subdued vitality. These foods are “probiotic.” The other day I heard an ad on top-40 radio for probiotic chews. I have no idea what that means except that “living food” has hit the big time. So, basically, I make probiotic crunches that taste great on hot dogs. I am not going to try and here summarize the research about the health benefits of fermented foods, but I’ve accepted that the studies are numerous and well-founded, and their results amazing. I prefer to find simple reasons to do things, and the simplest explanation for why to eat fermented foods, for me, is that they have accompanied us through every stage of human development across the entire globe for the last 12,000 years, and a lot of grand things have happened during that time, like civilization. I'm not going to say that everything traditional is good, but I can’t imagine anything negative will come of inviting the cultured foods that our grandparents grew up with—and then fazed out—back into our lives. It helps that they are delicious. And that they cure cancer and every other ailment known to humankind except loneliness. I think that’s the news. I hope this all works out and I get to make pickles until I die at a ripe old age two-hundred years from now. Come down and try a pickle to help make this possible.
