fermenting Opinions on Suspicious Growth in Ferment

[HeatMiser]

"When in doubt throw it out", or so they say.
 
Well, I have what I'm pretty sure is some mold growing here. Other than this, everything seems fine, and the ferment passes the sniff test with flying colors.

 
This ferment has been going on for a little over 2 weeks. I use glass weights to keep the peppers submerged under the brine, but some seeds still manage to float to the top - and that's where I think the growth started.

 
What are people's thoughts on this? Scrape it and use the peppers, or just toss and be safe?

 

[The_NorthEast_ChileMan]

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"When in doubt throw it out", or so they say.
 
Well, I have what I'm pretty sure is some mold growing here. Other than this, everything seems fine, and the ferment passes the sniff test with flying colors.

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At this thread ( Why Your Ferment Grew Mold, What to Do,and How to Prevent It ) it  reads:
 
If you’ve been fermenting vegetables for a while then you’ve probably faced a shock discovery. You’ve cut or shredded your vegetables, added salt or brine, submerged them in said brine, and then left them to ferment.

Then a day or more later you opened your jar to find, much to your horror, a white film of mold. Or, worse yet, a big hairy mold patch.

So I'd read through that topic & see if it offers any help?

 

[HeatMiser]

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At this thread ( Why Your Ferment Grew Mold, What to Do,and How to Prevent It ) it  reads:
 
If you’ve been fermenting vegetables for a while then you’ve probably faced a shock discovery. You’ve cut or shredded your vegetables, added salt or brine, submerged them in said brine, and then left them to ferment.

Then a day or more later you opened your jar to find, much to your horror, a white film of mold. Or, worse yet, a big hairy mold patch.

So I'd read through that topic & see if it offers any help?

 
Thanks NECM, I had already gone through that thread, and many more on the site. The typical post/question around this shows either a layer of kham, or a science experiment gone very, very wrong  . I think I'm going to toss it just to be safe - it's not worth it to get sick over a few peppers, but I still wanted to see what people here think, or what they would do.

 

[Siv]

I would just scrape and see if it comes back.
 
I remember watching youtube videos - I think it was Chillichump - where there was a small bit of mold on the top of one of his ferments and he folded it back in and carried on and another where he just removed the mold from the top.
 
So I did a little dig and found one of them:
https://youtu.be/IT4MguyfTG4?t=58

 

[CaneDog]

I'm on the same page with Siv.  I'd fish it out and get a good look (and smell) at it to see if it's yeast or mold.  I tend to error on the side of caution - so if it smelled bad/off, I'd probably just be safe and toss it - but that looks pretty innocuous and doesn't seem to be contacting any of the goods.

 

[HeatMiser]

Thanks guys, the batch was already gone before I saw the posts here, but I started another one already.
 
The growth on Chillichump's ferment was nasty! I would never have scraped it off if I had that much growth. I had already seen his video on how to tell if a fermentation is healthy or not, and I found the video that Siv posted to be more helpful.
 
Either way, I acknowledge I need to educate myself better on this in order to make a more informed decision next time, so I'll be looking into books/literature that go into a bit more depth than what I've been able to find online. There's so much conflicting information that I thought it'd be better to be safe than sorry. Well, now I'm both safe and sorry!

 

[noway2]

Pardon the resurrection of an older post, but this is relevant. A couple of weeks ago, we started fermenting some peppers in jars, daily burping. One started to firm a white film. It’s likely Kahm, yeast, thanks to this forum. Still, it got skimmed off and it’s now doing a final ferment in the fridge.

This site is a wealth of knowledge.

 

[ColdSmoke]

But this isn't a consistent film like the kahm yeast usually shows...

That said. I'd not worry and just scoop it out of there with a sterilized tool of some sort

 

[CaneDog]

Looking forward to hearing how your ferment turns out @noway2 Hopefully smooth sailing the rest of the way!

 

[noway2]

Looking forward to hearing how your ferment turns out @noway2 Hopefully smooth sailing the rest of the way!

We scooped it off and put the rest in the fridge. It will likely get cooked down Into hab sauce.

 

[mcbob]

In the future you might try just removing the offending mold/yeast and poring a small amount of vinegar on the top without stirring it in.
It will help stop and prevent further mold/yeast growth. This has worked for me in when I had doubts.

 

[The Hot Pepper]

Good tip!

 

[Downriver]

In the future you might try just removing the offending mold/yeast and poring a small amount of vinegar on the top without stirring it in.
It will help stop and prevent further mold/yeast growth. This has worked for me in when I had doubts.

I agree. In fact, I use a spray bottle and mist everything inside, including the lid. Fairly effective control. You can also do this at the start, to help prevent/retard early mold and yeast development.

 

[The Hot Pepper]

And make sure your spray bottles are food safe, especially with an acid inside that could promote chemical leeching.