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- Welcome to Spoiled to Perfection.
The show that unlocks the magic
behind food techniques such as
pickling, fermenting, curing, spicing,
salting and curdlng, just to name a few.
Together, we'll explore
how culinary alchemy
enhances the raw flavors of foods
in amazing and unexpected ways.
Today, I'm meeting up with Jennifer Harris
at Brix Farm and Vineyard
in Healdsburg, California.
Jennifer is a local fermentation teacher
and founder of the Farm
to Fermentation Festival.
And we're going to find
out why she's so passionate
about pickling and fermenting foods.
And we might just get to
pickle something ourselves.
Alright, let's go.
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Hey, Jennifer!
- Hey, Garrett!
- How's it going?
- [Jennifer] Good.
Great to see you.
- Good to see you again.
- Isn't this a perfect
day in Dry Creek Valley?
- Oh, it's gorgeous.
- Do you wanna check out the greenhouse
and see what fresh produce they have?
- Yeah, for sure. Let's do it.
Hey, did you notice budbreak's happening
a couple weeks earlier this year?
- [Jennifer] I did!
- Man, harvest is quick!
(funky music)
- So I know that people
usually think of cucumbers
when they think about pickles.
- Definitely.
- But in early spring, these fresh carrots
are gonna be perfect for
a recipe I have in mind.
- Well, they're gorgeous.
So we're gonna pickle these carrots?
- Absolutely.
- Alright!
- Let's get going.
- [Garrett] Yeah, let's do it.
(funky jazz music)
Alright so, Jennifer, here we are
at Relish Culinary
Adventures in Healdsburg.
This seems like such a cool place.
Have you been here before?
- I have.
I've gotten to teach.
- [Garrett] Hm-hm.
- Also, had the opportunity to work
as a kitchen assistant.
- [Garrett] Hm-hm.
- And of course, I've
taken classes here too.
- So, Jennifer, tell me a little bit about
your background, your family.
Do you come from, like,
a family of foodies?
I mean, it seems like,
you're very much bred up in it.
- I come from people that love food.
I was very fortunate to have
two sets of grandparents
that loved making their own food.
- [Garrett] Yeah.
- And parents that grew
up making their own food.
I was able to grow up
canning in the summer
with my mom and preserving.
I love teaching fermentation.
- [Garrett] Yeah.
I love teaching pickling.
Just in the last five or 10 years,
I've decided that it's my call in life
to teach others to make pickles.
- Nice, that's great.
So we have a couple of
examples of pickling
and fermentation out here.
Can you talk about these
carrots a little bit?
- Absolutely.
So we do, we have a
vinegar-pickled carrot here.
And then we have a traditional
fermented pickled carrot.
- A fermented pickled carrot.
- So if you'll notice,
actually the difference in these carrots,
I don't know if you can tell.
- [Garrett] Yeah.
- These are quite, the brine
is quite clear on these.
- Yeah.
- And I can see the carrots, you know,
in all their glory.
- Pretty clearly, yeah.
- It's looking a little
different over here.
- Yeah, it looks a
little murky and bubbly.
- We have a live fermentation process
actually happening over here.
- That's great.
- This traditional fermented pickle,
I didn't use any vinegar in.
- No vinegar.
So what pickles it then?
Or what ferments it?
What's going on?
- So the process of fermentation,
which I like to remind people,
is a living process.
- [Garrett] Oh yeah.
- It's a living exchange
of microorganisms.
One organism is consuming another.
Here, the organism is
chewing through sugar
and producing more lactic acid bacteria.
- Ah, in the vinegar-y flavor
- Resulting--
Resulting in that very sour,
vinegar flavor that we know.
- Ah, so you're kind of like
making your vinegar inside this jar?
- I couldn't have said it better.
- Well, what did you put inside here?
- Actually what we utilized
were the organic carrots
that we picked earlier this morning.
When carrots are first
pulled out of the ground,
they have really great bacteria on them.
- Mmm, so can we make one
of these, do you think?
- Absolutely.
Do you wanna make some?
- Yeah, let's make some fermented carrots.
Can we do it?
- [Jennifer] Let's do it.
- Let's do it.
(funky jazz music)
Hey so, Jennifer,
what do you think about these aprons?
- I think they're pretty phenomenal.
- I think they're pretty cool, huh?
- Nice apron.
- [Garrett] Thank you.
- I feel great in mine.
- [Garrett] Thank you.
- We're ready to get
started on making some
delicious pickled carrots.
So one of the ways that we're doing them
is with vinegar.
- [Garrett] Hm-mm.
- So in this pot, we've
got a cup of vinegar,
two cups of water.
- [Garrett] Right.
- And I'm gonna have you turn that on.
- Okay.
- [Jennifer] And then
we're gonna add two teaspoons
of our kosher salt.
- Great. Alright and then stir it in?
- Absolutely.
- [Garrett] Great.
- And then I'm also gonna
add one tablespoon of sugar.
And then the other carrot
that we'll be making,
the other pickled carrot,
is a fermented pickled carrot.
- [Garrett] Okay.
- So for that, I'm gonna have you add
one tablespoon plus one
teaspoon of the salt.
- Alright.
- [Jennifer] And go ahead
and stir to dissolve.
This is gonna be our salt brine.
- Alright, I'll do that right here.
- I'm gonna get started on these carrots.
- Okay.
- So one of the great things about
using fresh organic produce,
is that we just had to
give these a quick rinse,
but I'm not gonna peel them.
We value, as we already talked about,
the natural bacteria that's on them.
I'm gonna start on some
of these bigger carrots,
just to bring them down to a half size,
so that they match these real beautiful
delicate smaller ones.
We're just gonna do
about three to four coins
of both our ginger and tumeric.
I'll add two teaspons of
whole black peppercorns
to both of these.
Although we're making
two separate recipes,
we're gonna be including the same spices
and ingredients in both of them.
- Ah.
- [Jennifer] They work
really nicely with both of these recipes.
- And we can compare later.
- Exactly.
- Alright.
Awesome.
- Why don't you clean that up,
- [Garrett] Sure.
and I'll give our ginger and tumeric
a nice slice.
So we're just looking for coins
that are about a quarter inch,
an eighth of an inch to a
quarter inch in thickness.
We'll do three to four coins in this jar.
- I'm gonna reach around you
and put this in the compost.
- Perfect.
So I'm gonna go ahead and
start packing into our jars.
- Okay.
- And if you'll notice, all of my carrots
were lying one way when
I was chopping them.
- Right.
- What I do is I sort of
find about half of them,
- Hm-hm.
- [Jennifer] and move them
the opposite way.
- [Garrett] Ah.
- That'll help them pack down into the jar
a little bit better.
- [Garrett] Right. Okay.
- So let's see how I did on size.
We still have a couple
that wanna poke out a little bit.
- [Garrett] Uh-huh.
- So I'm just gonna take
anything that looks like
it's above my water level
and give it one more,
- [Garrett] Little snip.
- Half inch off.
- Hey, that's perfect to eat.
- Hey, they are delicious fresh
and pickled.
- Super fresh.
- Isn't that yum?
- That's awesome.
- Alright, let's go for this next bunch.
Let's see, I can tell a couple of ends
are gonna be a little bit thick.
Great, those are fitting perfectly.
So I've got our salt brine.
You're got our vinegar brine.
- [Garrett] Got it going.
- Why don't we share our canning funnel?
- Yeah.
- Go ahead and add it to one of the jars.
- Sure.
- This is warm enough, we can turn--
- [Garrett] Mm-hm.
- go ahead and turn that off.
We've just reached a boil
and that's come back down,
it looks like to a little slow simmer.
- Yep.
- [Jennifer] That's perfect.
You can pour over either.
Go ahead for that one.
- Pour it right in?
- What we're looking
for here is to pour it
so it comes, covers the carrots,
and it comes just about a quarter inch
below the rim of the jar.
- So, right there?
- [Jennifer] Perfect.
That looks great.
- [Garrett] Perfect.
- I'll move this guy over
and I'll take our salt water brine.
And we'll add this over
our fermented carrots.
Again, we just wanna make sure
that we're covering them.
That looks perfect.
So I'm just gonna go ahead
and add these ceramic weights to our jar.
- Okay.
- [Jennifer] And essentially,
all we're doing with these
is wedging them down in
so they will keep our
vegetables down under
that lovely acidic brine
that we talked about,
which is what's gonna enable that bacteria
to really proliferate and be delicious.
- Got it.
- So our work here is done.
Once the vinegar jar cools,
we'll put it in a fridge and
then after about 24 hours,
we can enjoy them.
- Great.
- So these are gonna be
having that delicious
sour flavor real early on.
- [Garrett] Really fast.
- We'll get into those,
it'll be delicious tomorrow.
- [Garrett] Okay.
- These, however, we're gonna allow it
to ferment for a little while.
- [Garrett] Yeah.
- So we'll put them on our
counter for about 10 days,
up to three weeks.
- [Garrett] Hm-mm.
- And depending on the
temperature of your home,
I don't know, I like to keep my house
a little warmer than some people.
I keep my house at about 70, 72.
- Oh, okay.
- Mine go real quickly.
- [Garrett] Got it.
- For the best flavor, we recommend
between 65 and 85 degrees,
- [Garrett] Hm-mm.
about 10 days to 21 days
of fermentation time.
- Sounds good.
- So we're just gonna--
- Do you put the caps on?
- [Jennifer] Exactly.
We're gonna add a loose cap
to the fermenting one.
All that CO2 that will be escaping
will need somewhere to escape to,
so this loose lid will keep
- [Garrett] Okay.
- some other, anything else out.
- Yeah.
- And it'll allow natural
CO2 to still escape.
- Right.
- [Jennifer] So we'll
just leave that.
- Here, I'll take it.
- Perfect.
And with this jar, we can go ahead
and add it completely and tight.
So once this cools, we'll
put it in the fridge,
and then wait 24 hours.
- [Garrett] Hmm-mm.
- But you know what?
I actually have some that
I made a couple weeks ago,
if you wanna try.
- [Garrett] Yeah.
Yeah, absolutely.
Is that what's right here?
- Bring it over.
Wanna split one with me?
- [Garrett] Yeah, let's do it.
Need a fork?
- [Jennifer] Yes, please.
- Here ya go.
- So I'm just gonna halve this guy.
- Alright.
- [Jennifer] For you.
- [Both] (crunching) Mmm.
- I really get the, that
acidity just sort of,
right up front, and on the sides,
as it goes, you know, the back palate.
- A little sweet up front.
- [Garrett] Hmm-mm.
- Nice and sharp vinegar.
- What a great crunch, very fresh.
I get, just that tiny
little heat of ginger.
Just, just an edge of it.
Very pleasant. Very, good job.
Very well done.
Mmm, I just heard it go
psst!
- Letting out a little bit more CO2.
- Hm-mm, hm-mm.
- [Jennifer] Because it is
still fermenting.
Still got my weights in here.
- Yeah, you can really see it fermenting.
Wow.
- [Jennifer] A lot of bubbles
coming up now.
- [Garrett] Wow.
It's gotten a little warmer.
So the fermentation is really starting
to take off here.
- [Garrett] Alright.
- Let's take out one of these guys.
- Okay.
You can hear it too.
It's talking to ya.
Psst!
- A little snap, crackle.
- [Garrett] Yeah, right.
- Crackle bunch.
- [Garrett] Snap crackle pop.
Okay, fermented carrot.
(crunching)
A little bit more raw feeling
in the texture, right?
Maybe it's not quite as
cooked almost?
- [Jennifer] Okay.
- As the other one.
There's no much going on in there.
Almost earthy, has a great spiciness.
- I get a real developed
sourness around the sides
and the back of my mouth.
- [Garrett] Hm-mm.
- instead of right up front
like the vinegar one was.
- Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's like,
it's like a harmony rather
than like a single note.
Do you know what I mean?
There's just like a lot of stuff going on,
it all is good together.
It just works together.
Whereas the other one was very much like
a one or two note sort of, sort of thing.
- I like that analogy.
- It's like a whole guitar chord.
- I love that analogy.
- [Garrett] Right? Yeah.
- So you know, I make a lot of
other fermented foods too.
- [Garrett] Yeah?
- Would you like to come try some?
- Please, yes.
- I'm having a little
gathering at my house tomorrow.
Maybe you could bring the wine?
- Sounds good.
- Awesome.
- [Garrett] Cool.
- I'll see you then.
- [Garrett] Alright.
I'll see you tomorrow. Great.
(funky jazz music)
Well, cheers, guys!
2014 Sav Blanc. Alright!
(clinking glass)
- I am so glad we were able to make it
and get together today.
I have some really yummy
stuff to share with--
- Are those the carrots that we made?
- They are!
- [Garrett] Yes!
- We have the traditional
fermented carrot pickle
and we also have the
vinegar pickled carrot.
- Hmm, yum.
I think you guys are gonna
love these fermented carrots.
Oh man, I'm super excited about 'em.
Fermented carrots?
- [Jennifer] So in addition to
- the carrot pickles,
- [Garrett] Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- we also have a variety of sauerkrauts,
and here, we have blue cheese,
some gouda and some aged cheddar,
and then there's a coppa
and some prosciutto,
and we also have salami.
Let's dig in!
- [Garrett] Alright.
Let's do it, guys. Great.
(funky jazz music)
Wow, what an amazing 24 hours it's been
with Jennifer Harris,
learning about the difference between
a traditional fermented carrot pickle,
and a vinegar carrot pickle.
And about how the naturally
occurring bacteria
from the ground, is
actually part of what makes
these foods so amazing.
And who knew there were so many
fermented foods to pick from.
Kombucha, kimchi, meats, cheeses,
even chocolate?
There's a lot to learn.
So I hope you join us next time
as we continue to explore culinary alchemy
and unlock the magic of transforming
raw ingredients into something
that's spoiled to perfection.
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Spoiled to Perfection is
brought to you by Bubbies.
See us online at bubbies.com
and remember to eat my pickles,
wear clean underwear,
and marry a doctor.
(funky music)
