Fermented Vegetables

We have been loosely following a paleo diet for the past couple of years and when I say loosely I mean that we have cut back on sugar, eat good quality grass feed meat and plenty of fruit and vegetables from our garden.  Its all pretty basic stuff really and it was the way that our forefathers ate without putting a fancy name to it and actually it is the way that most people in the bush eat.  There are no fast food outlets on cattle stations!

The one thing that we had not tried until recently was fermented vegetables.  It just sounded terrible. But then I wandered into a health food store in Cairns and picked up a bottle of Kimchi.  It looked okay, and I do eat with the eye, so I decided to be brave and purchase a bottle.  It was expensive at almost $20 but I kept thinking of all the good things that it would do for our bodies.  You can read about fermenting benefits HERE

The next morning I cooked up our standard bacon and eggs and decided to have the Kimchi on the side.  I went to open the bottle and it said "open with care"!  Goodness me......so I did the brave thing and asked Philip to open it.  I don't know why they had the warning as it was fine and the Kimchi was really tasty with just the right amount of heat.  

We have now finished the bottle and I started googling the fermenting process and decided that I could do it.  We have a beautiful supply of fresh vegetables growing in our garden....all organic, so it was just a matter of purchasing a fermenting kit.  I settled on Pete Evans kit as it seemed to be the only one that had everything included.

So I have been waiting for the kit to arrive and finally this week it came.  It didn't take long to read the instructions and put together my first bottle of fermented vegetable.  It has been sitting on the bench for the past three days and I tasted it this morning and I think it is close to being ready.

The best part about fermenting your own vegetables is that you can use the products that you like the best.  We had cabbage, daikon radish, carrots, ginger, coriander, garlic, chilli and turmeric growing in our garden so that is what went into our bottle.