Thirteen months ago I made my first ferment, lacto-fermented tomatoes. My interest in fermentation predated the first covid lockdown, but something about sanitizing every surface made me wonder how I could keep my food a bit “dirty.” This took me down a rabbit hole and gave me a hobby that has expanded in a way I never would have predicted. During a year where time has at once stood still and moved at warp speed, the periodic punctuation of time that a finished ferment marks was very stabilizing. As I think about the food that has taken me months and many attempts to make, I have wondered what gripped me about trying to domesticate the damn microbes in my kitchen in the first place. Fermentation is, by its very nature, an investment in the future, and a belief that there will be a future to prepare for. The ferment will only work if you give it time and when one starts a ferment they are acknowledging that the sun will rise tomorrow, and the day after. The continued learning that fermented food gifts us is that time will pass, things will change so slowly you won’t notice, but the finished product will be nothing like its original state.
Even though I should be used to these transformations by now, or even have come to expect them, there are still some ferments that surprise me so much I find it hard to believe I am not a sorceress. The roasted koji mole I made this week was definitely one of those ferments. I made the roasted koji “mole” by roasting koji (my moldy barley) in the oven, and then blending it with milk and cream. It made for a delicious sauce for potatoes as recommended by the Noma Fermentation book. It was a bit sweet but mostly hearty. The true place where this ferment shined, though, was when used as a hot chocolate substitute. The mole mixed with milk and a bit of sugar made a very convincing hot chocolate that contained no chocolate. The only ingredients in the faux hot chocolate were barley, milk cream and sugar and I could have sworn it was a fancy hot chocolate.
This week I also started the yeast garum because I was a bit bored and it uses the yellow pea miso, which I have been trying to use in order to free up fridge space. I roasted fresh yeast and mixed it with koji, water, salt, peaso and nutritional yeast. The smell of all that yeast made me feel a little unwell, but it is already starting to mellow as it sits at 140 degrees for 30 days.
I also started another (relatively) short-term ferment, the pumpkin seed miso. This miso, predictably is made with pumpkin seeds, and is fermented for only 30 days because the fats in the pumpkin seed miso will start to taste rancid after that. The fun part about this ferment was that when I roasted the pumpkin seeds they made a very satisfying popping sound. I decided to make a bit less of this miso because pumpkin seeds are expensive and I have learned from my fridge full of yellow pea miso that a little goes a long way.
This upcoming week I have another miso switch. My bread miso will be done tomorrow, and I will then make danish rye miso to take its place. I went into San Francisco this week to a danish bakery to buy some fresh danish rye bread. One loaf was 4 lbs, so the bread is unbelievably dense, and if you’ve had it you know its packed full of flavor. In the meantime, I am very excited to see how the sourdough miso turned out. The tamari which has pooled on the top is top-notch delicious. I started the bread miso back in January, and can’t wait to see how different it is now. I have a sneaking suspicion it won’t taste anything like sourdough.
Ferments Completed: 60
Ferments in Progress: 8
Ferments to go: 106
Spoonful Suppers 
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