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fermenting Mold in my first Homemade fermented Sauce!! Help!!

N

NightHawk

Hi
 
I made my first homemade fermented hot sauce 3 days ago. I went to burp the mason jar today, and noticed what appears to be mold on the surface. I did read that it could be yeast instead of mold... Can you please help me out? Should I throw it out?
 
For your information, tHe jar did burp a bit when opened(not a lot), so it seems some gases are being generated. 
 
Here is the recepy I used:
INGREDIENTS
  • 2 pounds tomatoes, cored and chopped (about 4 cups)
  • 1 pound onion, peeled and chopped (about 2 cups)
  • 12 ounces bell peppers (green or red), seeded and chopped (1½ cups)
  • 2 jalapeño peppers, seeded and chopped
  • 2 cloves garlic, peeled and chopped
  • 1 bunch cilantro, chopped
  • ½ cup freshly squeezed lime juice
  • 2.25% of salt by weight (used pickling salt)
  • 2 tablespoons fine sea salt
  • 1 teaspoon ground cumin
 
Here is a picture of the mold:
http://imgur.com/a/LjAj4
 
Please advise!! What did I do wrong? :(
 
Cheers
Santiago
 
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Yeah, thats what I fear....  I did see in the a in a stinky there are yeast that look similar, so I am hopping someone experiences can comment
 
Also, is the recipe wrong? I mean, I can throw it out, no problem, but what really worries me is that I dont know what went wrong
 
Cheers
Santiago
 
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Generally I think you can just skim it off. I would boil it before bottling it. If you have a pressure cooker you might decided to use that after fermentation just to make sure you kill everything.
 
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Your number one go-to when identifying mold is that yeast are not fuzzy and they do not just sit there doing nothing.  The post Ducky linked above has good advice on not growing mold.  (Note the part about keeping vegetative matter submerged.)
 
You do look to have happy little mold colonies growing, though.  Mold typically spawns in perfectly round colonies via spores, spreads from the original colony in a radial fashion, and then sits around being boring/useless until the colonies all merge and look like Stephen King at the end of his segment in Creepshow.  Yeast spawn from other yeast during wild sugar orgies while farting CO2 like crazy and pooping alcohol.  (Yeast are pretty awesome.)  With a few noteworthy exceptions, dead yeast sink.  If it is floating and inactive, it is probably not yeast.  If it is floating and fuzzy, it is definitely not yeast.  The beginnings of a yeast bloom can look very similar to what you see, but that phase doesn't last long and is marked by bubbles.
 
Yeast orgies tend to form a very distinctive krausen layer while partying that mostly dissipates once the majority of the yeast start to die off.  Think lacing on a beer or foam on top of a soda pop that goes away as the carbonation degases, but leaves behind marks of its having been there.  The Kham yeast mentioned in the article Ducky linked above is very distinctive stuff.  It spreads across the surface in ropes like a translucent bacterium and eventually looks like someone with a cold sneezed all over your shit.  When there's enough of it in there, you can actually grab the whole thing and pick it up like the world's most disgusting hockey puck.  Gross as it seems, Kham is completely harmless and can just be skimmed off.  Smell tends between "kinda yeasty" and "dude...who took their shoes off?"
 
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Thanks a lot for you comments and links. They were very helpful and informative.
 
One last question.. do you know what likely went wrong? I would like to try again, but not really sure what the issue was and how to improve on this... is the recepy  the issue? I used 2.25% salt by weight, which its a bit more than the recomended 2% I found online. It tasted a bit salty when I tried it before bottling so not sure if adding more salt will make it unpalable...
 
Cheers
Santiago
 
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NightHawk said:
Thanks a lot for you comments and links. They were very helpful and informative.
 
One last question.. do you know what likely went wrong? I would like to try again, but not really sure what the issue was and how to improve on this... is the recepy  the issue? I used 2.25% salt by weight, which its a bit more than the recomended 2% I found online. It tasted a bit salty when I tried it before bottling so not sure if adding more salt will make it unpalable...
 
Cheers
Santiago
Click to expand...
i was told to use a 3.5% brine solution as they mold easily.
 
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NightHawk said:
Thanks a lot for you comments and links. They were very helpful and informative.
 
One last question.. do you know what likely went wrong? I would like to try again, but not really sure what the issue was and how to improve on this... is the recepy  the issue? I used 2.25% salt by weight, which its a bit more than the recomended 2% I found online. It tasted a bit salty when I tried it before bottling so not sure if adding more salt will make it unpalable...
 
Cheers
Santiago
Click to expand...
 
 
According to the Fermenting Peppers 101 thread on this forum, " ...normal fermenters this should be in the 6 to 8 percent by weight range" I've also read/heard that the minimum of salt should be at least 3%. I can't seem to find the source for it. Perhaps I found this out through a youtube video. Sorry for the lack of credible sources. 
 
If it tastes salty, consider adding vinegar to the solution or something acidic. In your recipe you used lime juice, so try adding more of that. Personally, I use vinegar and I add it after the fermentation process.
 
Try comparing what you did to what the experienced hot sauce makers say to do and problem solve from there. Aside from the salt content, your recipe seems fine. Where did you keep the jar when fermenting it? Did you properly sanitize the jar used in the fermentation process? How's your mold look like now?
 
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