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fermenting My first Ferment

HillBilly Jeff

HillBilly Jeff

Here goes nothing.
 
 
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HillBilly Jeff said:
 
 
I capped it and I used whey for my ferment starter.  Not sure if I used enough though.
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Many of the fermented vegetable recipes that Ive read use approximately 4 TBS of whey per quart. But I've used less and more at times, depending on the ingredients (or how much whey I had on hand) and the amount of salt I included in the ferment..
 Your "virgin" batch looks good..... nice setup,airspace and airlock.....my guess is it'll do fine.  And just like Randyp posted....soon you'll have ferments located all around the house.
 
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Used two ounces of whey as someone mentioned to me.  The rest of the whey I have will be split evenly into my other two ferments today.  No sense keeping it any longer as three ferments is enough for me to "give it a go"
 
Don't have a cap holding stuff down, but that's the breaks.  I will deal with skimming the top if need be.
 
Thanks to everyone who has helped me "pop this cherry".
 
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HillBilly Jeff said:
Don't have a cap holding stuff down, but that's the breaks.  I will deal with skimming the top if need be.
 
Thanks to everyone who has helped me "pop this cherry".
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HB Jeff - you can easily cut a circle of coffee filter and rubber band it around the top of the air lock as a workaround.  Cap's got holes in it anyway, but the idea is to keep dust or whatever out of the lock.  
 
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HillBilly Jeff said:
Used two ounces of whey as someone mentioned to me.  The rest of the whey I have will be split evenly into my other two ferments today.  No sense keeping it any longer as three ferments is enough for me to "give it a go"
 
Don't have a cap holding stuff down, but that's the breaks.  I will deal with skimming the top if need be.
 
Thanks to everyone who has helped me "pop this cherry".
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 An issue you may have to confront, is when the bubbling action gets hot and heavy, the solids will be pushed upwards, along with some of the brine, and can easily foul your airlock. Then you will be forced to remove the lid, clean and re-fill the airlock.
Its sorta an either "now or later" thing I'm afraid.
CM
CM
 
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Chili Monsta said:
 An issue you may have to confront, is when the bubbling action gets hot and heavy, the solids will be pushed upwards, along with some of the brine, and can easily foul your airlock. Then you will be forced to remove the lid, clean and re-fill the airlock.
Its sorta an either "now or later" thing I'm afraid.
CM
CM
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So a now thing would be to do what?
 
 
SmokenFire said:
 
HB Jeff - you can easily cut a circle of coffee filter and rubber band it around the top of the air lock as a workaround.  Cap's got holes in it anyway, but the idea is to keep dust or whatever out of the lock.  
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I have the caps for the airlock, I was talking about holding peppers below the surface as a cap.
Round Two
 
MoA
 
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Last one is 7 Pot Burgundy
 
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    Jeff if the mix works up put your finger at the bottom of the air lock.Remove airlock but keep finger over hole.Give it a shake to get the mix back down and put airlock back in.Make sure you get a sniff while putting airlock back.You will smell the sweetness and know what is good or going bad. ;)
 
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I noticed on my first ferment all the peppers have floated and the pepper free liquid is on the bottom.  Thinking about getting some mesh and glass beads or what not to weigh it all down.  What kinds of each are out there and where should I look.

ultravista said:
Where do you get the whey or other 'starter' yeast for the ferment?
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I got greek yogurt and let it drip through a cheesecloth.
 
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Chili Monsta said:
 An issue you may have to confront, is when the bubbling action gets hot and heavy, the solids will be pushed upwards, along with some of the brine, and can easily foul your airlock. Then you will be forced to remove the lid, clean and re-fill the airlock.
Its sorta an either "now or later" thing I'm afraid.
CM
CM
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I've never seen a pepper ferment be that aggressively fermenting that it can get to the air lock with as much headspace as Jeff has. I can get away with putting on a sealed lid and just burping it once every day or two.
 
No expert for sure, but I have done a bit of fermenting and that has never happened.
 
 
HillBilly Jeff said:
I noticed on my first ferment all the peppers have floated and the pepper free liquid is on the bottom.  Thinking about getting some mesh and glass beads or what not to weigh it all down.  What kinds of each are out there and where should I look.

 
 
I got greek yogurt and let it drip through a cheesecloth.
Click to expand...
 
Jeff, that separation is normal. Just swirl the jar around a bit to mix them back together if it bothers you. Eventually they won't separate as you transition from fermenting to aging.
 
I've done the same thing for a starter, but more recently  have discovered fermented sauerkraut at the farmers market. I use the brine as a starter and then use the brine of one of my ferments to start the next. Kind of like keeping that sourdough starter in the fridge for the next recipe.
 
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Thanks Jeff.  My first ferment is bubbling today so I am a happy man there.  I was looking at the glad discs in the above link and I am not sure how they would work better than using a 4 ounce jelly jar.  It too just fits inside the neck of a 1/2 gallon, but there is a lot of space around it to float stuff up.  A mess bag filled with like marbles (pure glass) would seem to work better at getting a solid surface coverage.
 
Any way, not going to pop it open now that I got some action going.  What does it do, ferment for about a week and then age?  I don't have to stick it in the fridge after it is done fermenting right?
 
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