Re: [CH] Fermented Mash Sauce Questions
Kristofer Blennow (kristofer@blennow.se)
Fri, 8 Jan 1999 06:40:40 +0100
On 5 Jan 99, Steve wrote:
> I have a hale gallon jar of hab mash (freminting?) which had grown some
> white stuff on top surface only after about a week. I scraped it all off,
> added more salt and heated it to kill any bad guys. The salt contration is
> more than 20%. I added no water to the mash just salt. The white stuff
> came back in a few days. There has been no noticable fizzing of bubbles
> gererated science August when I started it. Should'nt there be noticable
> gas release during the fermation process?
White stuff growing after only a week is most probably mold. This
should be treated with respect, say carefully scraping it off with
about one inch of the mash. It may return anyway, in which case the
whole batch should be discarded. The risk for getting mycotoxins is
not very high, but if you get it, it will be most dangerous to
consume.
If you heat the mash up, you would surely kill any microorganisms
that could ferment the mash, and nothing will happen, except for more
mold maybe. The only way to start fermentation after a heat treatment
is to add some starter culture, and at 20% salt concentration I have
yet to find out what that would be.
In lactic acid bacteria (LAB) fermentation (which is done at 2-3%
salt), you normally get bubbling in the beginning from the so called
"heterofermentive" LABs (e.g. Leuconostoc Mesenteroides) that produce
both lactic acid and CO2. This goes on for a week or two. Then the
"homofermentive" LABs take over, that produce only lactic acid, no
gas. The latter is usually Lactobacillus Plantarum, naturally present
in many vegetables, cabbages most notably.
As said earlier, though, 20% salt gives no LAB fermentation. Will get
back to you as soon as I find anything out.
Just be careful with what you have in that jar. Don't feed it to your
friends... well, maybe to your enemies... ;)
I thought I repost this, that originally came from Jim Weller:
Title: Tabasco Sauce
Categories: Info, Spice, Condiments
Yield: 1 info file
Original McIlheny method -> Grind peppers. Add 1/2 cup kosher salt
per gallon of ground peppers and allow to age 1 month in glass or
crockery jars. Add white wine vinegar to taste and bottle. Age before
using to blend the flavors together.
Note that 1/2 cup salt to one gallon grinded peppers would give you
something between 2-5% salt concentration (my guess, since that would
depend on the grain size of the salt, and how finely the peppers were
chopped).
All the best,
Kristofer "Fiery Fermenter" Blennow
(I am supposed to have a CH middle name, right? ;)