<html>
<head>
<meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=ISO-8859-1">
</head>
<body bgcolor="#FFFFFF" text="#000000">
Recently, I read <i>Cooked </i>by Michael Pollan. In that book,
Pollan talks about four methods of cooking: fire (grilling), water
(braising), air (baking) and earth (fermenting). It was the last
method that was something new to me, and I decided to try it.<br>
<br>
The first thing I tried was making kim chi (Korean fermented
cabbage). That is still in progress. I tasted it after a week, and
it still needs more time, but I liked it and my wife did not. BTW,
kim chi makes quite an odor for the first two or three days of
fermentation.<br>
<br>
The next thing I tried was mead, the "nectar of the gods." Mead is
an alcoholic drink obtained by mixing raw honey with water and
letting it ferment. My first try used some honey that had
crystallized, and I mixed it with water and let it sit for a week
getting yeast out of the air. Then, I corked the bottle it was in.
It did ferment, and it has a kick to it (the alcohol). But I prefer
what I got next.<br>
<br>
My second attempt, which is much tastier, was to take raw honey that
had not crystallized (available from Woolsey Farm at the farmers'
market) and to mix it with water and a tiny amount of instant
yeast. Specifically, I took a pound of honey and mixed it with
enough filtered water (you can also let the water sit overnight --
you need to get rid of the chlorine) to make almost two quarts
total, plus 1/8 teaspoon of instant yeast (the same as I use when
baking bread -- I would guess that other yeast would also work). I
let it sit in the bottle uncapped for about 3 days, then capped the
bottle, opening the bottle twice a day to release the pressure
building up from the carbon dioxide developed by the yeast and the
sugar in the honey. After two or three more days (taste it), I had
a superb tasting drink which gave me a bit of a buzz. Now, the
bottle is in the refrigerator.<br>
<br>
The bottle I used is a stainless steel growler, i.e. a reusable
bottle made to be filled and refilled with beer from a
microbrewery. I believe that it has just become legal in Maryland
for some establishments that sell beer to fill growlers, but I have
not tried getting a growler filled. The growlers I got came from
Williams Sonoma.<br>
<br>
I have not yet tried it, but you can also add blueberries or other
fruit to the mead to give it more flavor as it ferments.<br>
<br>
Steve<br>
</body>
</html>