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fermenting Fermented Hot Sauce made from Red Jalapeño Powder

Sandt

Sandt

Hey Guys!
 
I have been lurking here for quite some time ( I actually thought I needed to pay for a year subscription to sign up and put it off for a long time) and this is my first post!
 
YAY!
 
I need some advice. 
 
I had a lot of red jalapenos last year that I dehydrated and froze. My dehydrator never gets above 120 degrees so I assume the bacteria survives it. 
 
Yesterday I couldn't wait any longer on this year's peppers, and I got started on making a hot sauce. 
 
I added 1 cup of red jalapeno powder that I made in my herb grinder, and then added 2.5 cups of brine. 
 
Here is where the problems begin. I did math incorrectly when making my brine and ended up with a 25% solution instead of 2.5% O_O
 
I let it sit over night and there was (obviously) no sign of fermentation. The pepper powder had rehydrated and filled the jar with almost no additional liquid. 

I realized my brine was too salty and that my bacteria was probably dead now, so I split my jar into 3 jars, and added fresh (boiled then cooled) water to each jar to fill them up. I topped each one off with whey I gathered from yogurt, and closed them loosely (until my air-locks and plastic lids and grommets come tomorrow)

I checked my Ph and it is above 4.4 (but idk how much higher since my strips only go to 4.4).

Here is a photo of what the 3 jars look like tonight.
 
N5me7Y5.jpg

 
the sediment on the bottom is the reconstituted red jalapeno powder. 
 
Do I have any hope?
 
Thanks guys (and gals?)!
 
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Sandt,
 
Welcome to THP!  We're glad to have you.  Regarding your dried jala powder efforts, sadly I have had no luck fermenting with dried peppers or making hot sauce with powder.  Here is a link to a previous thread about it where it was attempted without luck as well.  I think it might be possible if a starter is used - something like Caldwell's could work or hooch from kimchi.  Still even with starter I would add some carrot and onion and garlic to round out the flavor and give the lacto more available sugars to ferment with.
 
Adding vinegar a bit at a time to your existing jars might approach an approximation of a louisiana type hot sauce.  I've found powder addition to sauces can be gritty though. All is not lost though Sandt - you can still use the resulting brew as a marinade for all kinds of things (chicken wings or pork roast for carnitas comes to mind) or as a stir in to soups/stews/chili.  
 
Any pods that I dry end up getting rehydrated for hot sauce (non fermented) or ground into spice blends.  I ferment only fresh ingredients.  
 
edit: spelling
 
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Sandt, :welcome:
 
Based on your story you, I believe that there are ways to complete this and get a great hot sauce out of it. I have never attempted powder in my ferments but have had great success with using dried pods. From what I see I dont think as it sits now you will have success in your efforts. There is just not enough sugars in there to get the ferment going, or to get your ferment down to acceptable ph levels. Besides that, break it down.....you have water, powder and salt. Now this may work if you were not fermenting, I.E, just add some vinegar, let it age a bit and be done. Might taste ok, but probably not great.
 
If I were faced with what you have currently I would go back to the drawing board one more time.  Like SF said add some fruit/veg to it and lets get that thing to bubblin. You can use fresh or canned...up to you, though canned fruit has no lacto present it can offer ALOT of sugars.
 
If your wanting to keep this a simple sauce and Jalapeno flavors dominate, I would suggest picking up about 5-6 fresh red bell peppers and maybe about 4-5 Jalapenos, deseed and dice them up, boil your brew as you did before, cool, then add fresh stuffs to entire brew. Place in jars as you did and either let sit on counter for 24 hrs or add your whey again and cap. I may even consider adding just a tad bit of honey. This will give you plenty of sugars to get the ferment going, and I dont believe the bell will take over the Jalapenos, this will also give the powder some pulp to adhere to so you dont end up with a gritty sauce at the end. After ferment and aging is complete, blender, boil to desired consistancy and add white vinegar if needed till your happy. 
 
Without an airlock, (how I ferment too) be sure to "burp" the jars everyday for the first week to release pressure. I generally shake them, and burp them again. By shaking them you are preventing anything from setting up on the surface. 
 
Fermenting will be done in 1-2 weeks and then it will start aging. How long it ages is up to you. I'm not very patent so I ususally let mine go for a month or so.
 
Thanks for the pics, keep them coming and let us know what you decide and end result. Good Luck and have fun!!
 
P.S. If you see yourself doing alot of fermenting or canning in the future replace your "guess strips" with one of these more accurate do-hickey's
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00FJFEB2O?psc=1
 
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Wow thanks for the replies guys!
 
I have made non-fermented hot sauces in the past from powders (and they have turned out great!)

But I was hoping to try my hand at fermentation. 
 
I have some fresh bell and jalapenos in my garden I could grab and throw in, and I have some cherry tomatoes, if those would help. 
 
I see people add carrots a lot, is that for any reason other than color/flavor? does it help to stabilize it?

I believe I will put all 3 of these jars back into a single crock, add some sugars, and re-seal it with my new airlock lids that should arrive in the mail today! 
 
I do want to keep the jalapeno flavor dominant because it smells and tastes great currently (albeit salty. 

would fresh onion or garlic work? do they have lactobacillus on them?

would I just be better-off blending up a jalapeno or two?
 
I will definitely buy that ph tester! I didn't know they existed!

Thanks a ton for your help, guys. I will definitely keep the photos coming. I will not accept defeat!
 
 
 
-edit-
 
I also have palm sugar, would adding that to the mash be a bad idea? Can I add that instead of other fruits/veggies?
 
is there a cheap and efficient salinity meter you guys can recommend?
 
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Alot of people use carrots to add fermentable sugars.
All fresh/raw veggies and fruit have benificial bateria present. 
You can use bells from your garden if you want, I just suggested reds to keep your color consistant as possible
Onion is another go to ing, alot of people use. Garlic, I never personally used, but have seen others use with success. Theres a few threads on here somewhere where someone did an all garlic ferment.
You can actually blender all fresh ing now if you want to up front, thats up to you. It will speed up your ferment and give the lacto ALOT of sugars up front to consume. I usually go with rough chopped or dice and make the Lacto "work" a bit for their food this allows for a more consistant fermenting process. IMO
 
One important thing I see I left out is your jars are way too full. Leave at least 1.5-2" head room. Good rule of thumb is about 3/4 full. If not, once the ferment gets going there is no room to expand and when you go to burp your jars you will have an overflow. Or in your case up throgh your airlock. Messy
 
For all new to the fermenting game I suggest this free ebook. Good info in there
http://www.culturesforhealth.com/lacto-fermentation-free-ebook
 
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Yeah, I feared my jars were too filled. I suppose I am lucky no fermentation happened. 
 
I will blend up a spanish onion, some carrots, and some garlic and add that to the mash, might need to go to a 4th jar!
 
I will post more photos soon! 
 
I downloaded the e-book, I am excited to flip through it. I actually had that website open for their fermented ketchup recipe. I have a lot of dehydrated tomatoes I may be able to use to make that sometime haha
 
Thanks for the help!
 
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Alright, so here I am updating with the advice given to me. I put in an entire head of garlic, chopped in my processor, and an entire spanish onion, which was medium-large sized. I also added two medium-large carrots for good measure. 
 
Before I get ahead of myself, here is a photo of what it looks like now. 

http://i.imgur.com/EPa3gqB.jpg
 
The small tupperware is my control sauce. I put it immediately into the fridge after filling all the containers. That way it will act as a control group for the flavor as well as the Ph. The Ph is currently unreadable (above 4.4) but I will know more accurately when my Ph meter arrives on Thursday. 
 
The bottom 3 jars are sealed with traditional lids because I need more air locks (I didn't want to use my brewing air locks).
 
This will allow me to compare an airlock fermentation to a sealed (and occasionally burped) fermentation. 
 
This is all assuming that my salinity is in a good area. I am hoping it is under 10% with the addition of everything. 

Here is a close up image of the tall jar (which serves as volume contrast to the other jars, to see if it makes any differences (I had too much mash to fill a small jar, but not enough to fill two of them -- thus the large jar and the tupperware)
 
gHM5cON.jpg

 
I did not add any whey or any honey/agave nectar/palm sugar. Should I have?
 
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Sandt said:
I did not add any whey or any honey/agave nectar/palm sugar. Should I have?
Click to expand...
 
I do not usually add any honey or agave or sugar to my ferments, trusting that the sugars in the mash will be enough.  Here's a link to my last ferment that I posted here on THP, which has about 3 more weeks to go before processing.  The additions you made will certainly help the taste of the final product.  Hell I'd likely place 2 of the small lidded (not locked) jars in the fridge to age a month or so and then process like normal hot sauce! 
 
IF there was enough lacto on the garlic/onion/carrots and the salt % is down you should have a proper ferment going in no time Sandt - it should bubble and ingredients should rise/fall within a few days.  If not no biggie - I think we've all lost or screwed up a few ferments along the way :)     
 
@ BB - you've had success fermenting dried pods?  Did you use a starter?  Feel free to post a recipe/step by step in another thread if so - don't want to hijack Sandt thread. I've got lots of dried pods and it would be nice to have the option of fermenting at a later date.  
 
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sandt
 
You work FAST!. Nice job and nice additions to the ferment, It will definatly help. Looking at your additions though, I am skeptical as to whether or not enough fermentable sugars were added to get your ph low enough after the ferment is complete. You are dealling with a little over a gallon if my math is correct. Lets see...1 onion, 1 garlic, and two carrots per gallon?? Hmm, not sure if its enough but I'd leave it alone and see how it goes. Worse case you can add vinegar add the end to adjust your PH and get within shelf stable limits.   
 
As to your question of adding more whey....I cant tell if you brought the sauce back up to a boil before adding your additions.  Did you? If you did then you will need to add more whey or you can do a wild ferment and leave caps off and let it sit on your counter for a day. I do wild ferments when making saurkraut. If you didnt boil, the whey is still present from the first introduction but now there is a possible risk that that bad bacteria was introduced when containers were opened.
 
SF---many times, and have another one coming up with strawberries. I will post.
here is link to last...I used white labs for this one. My thinking was if you have something for the lacto to munch on upfront, the peppers will hydrate in a day or so and they will start working on them. Problem was keeping everything submerged, these hydrated at room temp in about a half a day. You can rehydrate on stove, dump peppers and water from saucepan into ferment and your off!
http://thehotpepper.com/topic/44925-another-fermented-hot-sauce/
These were dried pods from pepperlover. I dehydrated the mash left in the food mill on the ghost peppers and was left with some pretty good powder too....thats getting the most out of your peppers!
This ferment is still sittin in my basement, one day I will reduce this down.
 
Cheers!
 
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an off the wall end-run might be to add some cabbage wedges to the mix.  Not that you would keep it in there for the final blend, but that the cabbage will help kickstart the fermentation process.  Leaves/wedges can be removed after the ferment and before the processing.   
 
Definitely add some fresh produce of choice to give the critters food to munch on. 
 
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hmm, my brussels sprouts are starting to be ready to pick. Maybe I will throw one in each jar. 
 
How long should I let my current set up go before adding to it? 
 
I mean, there is a chance a fermentation will kick up, right?
 
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Greetings sandt,
I just finished reading your thread. Let me begin by extending a warm welcome to fermenting.
I'd also like to say that any info or suggestion I offer is a reflection of what "I" would do if presented with the circumstances you describe. Each of us can still choose to do what ever we wish with a ferment project and assume risks we decide are acceptable.
 
Personally, based on the elapsed time since you first started the ferment, the initial ingredients, the known/unknown questionable pH test results, the possibility of minimal if any lacto bacteria (LAB)early on......I would never feel comfortable consuming any of the resulting product.   In the interest of and concern for "My" health and well being I would dispose of the contents and start anew.
 
Botulism is nothing to fool around with or take lightly. A little bit of toxin goes a long way. And the spore can survive at room temps and multiply even after something is pressure canned. (They "might" be killed when subjected to 250 degrees for 45-60 minutes)
Even if it were pressure canned for that length of time and temp, and safe result was possibly achieved, the flavor has very possibly already been impacted.
 
If some (LAB) at the outset(whey or cabbage) had been introduced early on, along with some of the carbs that have been mentioned and suggested, I might feel differently.  The first hours are absolutely crucial for the (LAB) to establish and get the lactic acid process underway.
 
If the first stage doesn't occur properly, the second stage is directly impacted, and specific micro organisms(which cause a bitter flavor) that should have been consumed, aren't.... and the ripple effect continues.  Unfortunately,  there was some significant time for your ferment to get established in the wrong direction and harmful bacteria had ample time to prosper before actions were taken to attempt a salvage....even if it could have been.
 
Anyone who has ever fermented anything.... has had to ultimately face a decision about if to scrap it and start over.
When someone begins learning about the fermenting process refining practices and trying recipes , mistakes and failures are inevitable.     But they are valuable learning experiences....and such failures can be reduced greatly.
 
I have and "always" will make such decisions clearly on the side of safety and caution. And if I err on the side of caution, so be it. But the cost of what ever ingredients were lost in the process, is in no way even remotely comparable to the cost of subjecting my liver, kidneys, nervous system etc., to deadly toxins and harmful bacteria....
Regards
CM
 
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Hey Chili, 
 
Thanks for the insight. 

I have been noticing small amounts of bubbles today. 
 
Normally I may have scrapped this batch and started a new one, but I feel fairly confident that there is still hope.
 
My reasoning:

1. My first brine was way way salty, probably around 30% saturation or higher. This alone has preservative qualities that would usually result in salt-cured chilies had I been using fresh instead of dried/powdered. 
 
2. I sterilized everything I worked with with boiling water, and introduced the lactobacillus via whey to ensure it was present.

3. I believe the reason a successful fermentation hadn't happened was due to the lacking fermentable sugars, I assumed the reconstituted pepper powder was going to be sufficient, but it wasn't or the fermentation wasn't overly obvious when using powder. 
 
Either way, I am treating this like an experiment, and I will be careful not to consume it if it smells odd, or looks odd, or anything else seems off.
 
I do hope luck is on my side and I can get some good sauce, but if not, I won't be too overly upset. It is just jalapenos, after all -- last year's dried, frozen batch at that. 

 
 
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Another Update:
 
I got my ph meter in the mail today. I tested every one of my jars, they are all around 4.0-4.2 ph. 
 
so that is good, right?
 
WELL...

I realized I was making a rookie mistake by not putting my jars in a dark cupboard during the day. They have been fully exposed to ambient sunlight the whole time. They are stored away now.

With a safe ph below 4.6, they should be fine, right?

...anyone?

...guys?
 
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I'll be honest:
 
Shelf stable at 3.8 or below AFTER fermentation.  Not after you added x and y and waited and tried to salvage the half cup of jala powder you started with.  Bubbles should not be at the surface, they should be in the middle of your mash.  See my happy new ferment thread.  After a bit of time and love the solids and liquids separate.  
 
You started with powder under heavy salt.  Added other ingredients later on and hoped for the best.  If you've not got mold in a couple days I advise processing into sauce like you've done with non fermented prior.  No sense letting this one (that you know to be thrown together) go bad - make it into sauce that's usable and great!
 
Then restart your ferment itch with a proper scratch.  And post pics.  Cause we love that shit.
 
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