TURN ORDINARY VEGETABLES INTO IMMUNITY BOOSTERS Adapted and taken from www.foodmatterstv.com and http://nourishedkitchen.com Your digestive tract is probably the most underappreciated system of your body, often ignored until its screams of discontent become loud enough to grab your attention. By the time your gut reaches this degree of disgruntlement, the problems have usually been developing for months or years and are challenging to resolve. Instead of waiting for obvious signs of a problem, why not perform some regular gut maintenance that will lessen your chances of developing a problem in the first place? Your gut is much more than a food processing tube it houses about 85 percent of your immune system. This is in large part due to the 100 trillion bacteria that live there, both good and bad that can stimulate secretory IgA (your antibodies found in the gut) to nourish your immune response. When your GI tract is not working well, a wide range of health problems can appear, including allergies and autoimmune diseases. If you suffer from any major illness, you simply will NOT be able to fully recuperate without healing and sealing your gut. The best way to reverse to dampen inflammation in your gut and rebalance your immune system is to add more friendly, beneficial bacteria from naturally fermented foods into your diet Cultured Vegetables Are the Ultimate Superfood Just ¼ to ½ cup of fermented vegetables with 1-3 meals can dramatically beneficial impact on your health. Introduce them gradually, beginning with 1 tsp with a meal. Observe your reactions for a couple of days before proceeding with another small portion, and increase your dose gradually, as tolerated.
Equipment Checklist: Making Cultured Veggies at Home Culturing your own vegetables is not difficult, but as with anything, having the right tools makes the job much easier and more fun. Food Processor: You ll be cutting up large quantities of raw vegetables, which is very labor intensive without a food processor. Make sure yours has a shredding disc, as a typical S-blade will result in too fine a chop, which makes for a pulpier, mushier end product. Canning Jars: Basic wide-mouthed 32-ounce Mason jars are all that is necessary for both fermenting and storing the vegetables. These are inexpensive and easy to find at your local hardware or livestyle shop. sure they are wide-mouthed, as you ll need to get your hand or a tool down into the jar for tightly packing the veggies. Juicer: My own experimentation has resulted in selecting celery juice as the basic brine for my cultured veggies, making a juicer necessary. If you don t have this, try making it in a basic brine. Also needed: a large sharp knife, a large chopping board and a very large bowl (large enough to hold the entire batch of shredded veggies) and rolling pin or Krautpounder (a solid wood tool that looks like a small baseball bat used to tightly pack the shredded vegetables into your jars and eliminating air pockets. Making Cultured Veggies at Home in Six Easy Steps The following are the basic steps to making wonderful cultured vegetables at home. Vegetable and Herb Selection: The first step is gathering up your veggies. Make sure they are all organic. Cabbage (red or green) should be the backbone of your blend, comprising about 80 percent (I use green). Choose dense, tightly packed heads. Five or six medium-sized cabbages will yield 10-14 1L jars of fermented vegetables. Remember to reserve some cabbage leaves for the jar tops (see Step 3). Add in hard root vegetables of your liking, such as carrots, golden beets, radishes and turnips. Peel your veggies as the skins can impart a bitter flavour. I also enjoy adding red bell pepper, Granny Smith apples, and even a hot pepper. One
pepper for the entire batch is plenty. Tasty additions include peeled garlic, peeled ginger, and herbs such as basil, sage, rosemary, thyme, or oregano. Add in small quantities a little goes a long way, as fermenting concentrates the pungent flavours. Onions tend to overpower the mix, no matter how little are used, so I avoid them. Finally, you can add sea vegetables or seaweed to increase the mineral, vitamin, and fiber content. You can add pieces of whole dulse, or use flakes. Wakame and sea palm do not have any kind of fishy flavour but need to be presoaked and diced into the desired size. Arame and hijaki DO have a fishy flavour. Culture and Brine: For your brine, I recommend using a starter culture dissolved in celery juice. 1L of celery juice is adequate for 10 to 14 L of fermented veggies. You can ferment organically (allowing whatever bacteria is naturally on the vegetable to take hold), this method is more time consuming, and the end product is less certain. Inoculating the food with a starter culture speeds up the fermentation process. Make sure you choose a high quality brand, which you should easily find at a reputable health food store. I suggest Body Ecology. Packing the Jars: Once you have your shredded veggies and brine mixture combined in your large bowl, tightly pack the mixture into each Mason jar, and compress using a masher to remove any air pockets. Top with a cabbage leaf, tucking it down the sides. Make sure the veggies are completely covered with brine and that the brine is all the way to the top of the jar, to eliminate trapped air. Put the lids on the jars loosely, as they will expand due to the gases produced in fermentation. Fermentation: Allow the jars to sit in a relatively warm place for several days, ideally around 22 C. During the summer, veggies are typically done in 3-4 days. In the winter, they may need 7 days. The only way to tell when they re done is to open up a jar and have a taste. Once you're happy with the flavour and consistency, move the jars into your refrigerator. Storage: Refrigerating your vegetables drastically slows down the fermentation. They will keep for many months this way, continuing to mature very slowly over time. Enjoy! Always use a clean spoon to take out what you re eating. Never eat out of the jar, as you will contaminate the entire batch with bacteria from your mouth.
Make sure the remaining veggies are covered with the brine solution before replacing the lid. An Easy Beginner's Recipe Ingredients: 3 heads green cabbage, shredded in a food processor Several cabbage leaves 6 carrots, large shredded in a food processor 3-inch piece ginger, peeled and chopped 6 cloves garlic, peeled and chopped 1 packet of Body Ecology Veggie Culture Starter ½ cup warm (90 ) water Instructions: 1. Dissolve Veggie Culture Starter with warm water. Add some form of sugar to feed the starter (try honey or Agave). Let the starter/sugar mixture sit for about 20 minutes or longer while the L. Plantarum and other bacteria wake up and begin enjoying the sugar. Put aside. 2. Combine shredded cabbage, carrots, ginger, and garlic in a large bowl. 3. Remove several cups of this mixture and put into a blender. 4. Add enough filtered water to make a brine the consistency of thick juice. Add culture starter mixture from step 1. Blend well and then add brine back into first mixture. Stir well. 5. Pack mixture down into a glass or stainless steel container. Use your fist, a wooden dowel, or a potato masher to pack veggies tightly. 6. Fill container almost full, but leave about 2 inches of room at the top for veggies to expand. 7. Roll up several cabbage leaves into a tight log and place them on top to fill the remaining 2-inch space. Clamp jar closed. 8. Let veggies sit at about a 70 room temperature for at least 3 days. A week is even better. Refrigerate to slow down fermentation. Enjoy! Probiotic Apple & Beetroot Relish Yield: Approximately, 24 2oz portions Prep: 10 to 20 mins
Cook: 3 4 days (minimum fermentation time) mins Ready In: 13 mins This recipe yields approximately 24 2oz portions. Don t let the high yield of the recipe deter you; this apple and beetroot relish is rich in beneficial, lactic-acidproducing bacteria, which naturally preserve the dish, ensuring that it will keep for approximately six weeks or longer when refrigerated. Ingredients: 3 large large apples (about 1 ½ pounds, cored but not peeled) 3 large beets (about 1 ½ pounds, peeled) 2 star anise pods 1 tbsp whole cloves 1 tbsp unrefined sea salt fermented vegetable starter culture (if desired) Instructions: 1. Shred apples and beets by hand, or in a food processor. 2. Toss the shredded apples and beets together until well-combined and mixed together. 3. Add the star anise and whole cloves to the apples and beetroot, and continue to toss until the spices are evenly distributed among the shredded fruit and vegetables. 4. In a mason jar or, preferably, a vegetable fermenter (see sources), layer the apple and beetroot. 5. Periodically sprinkle unrefined sea salt or vegetable starter culture over the layers of apple and beetroot and mash with a wooden spoon or mallet to encourage the fruit and vegetables to release their juices, creating a luscious brine to encourage the proliferation of beneficial bacteria. 6. Ferment in a mason jar or vegetable fermenter for a minimum of three to four days, or longer, depending on the level of warmth in your kitchen. 7. After your apple and beetroot relish has sufficiently cultured, remove it from the vegetable fermenter and gently pick out the star anise pods and whole cloves. 8. Place the apple and beetroot relish into a blender or food processor and process until smooth.
Cultured Veggies for Flu Prevention Yield: 2 quarts (64 Servings) Prep: 5 mins These are a little spicy, and a little sweet and sour. They are wonderful for digesting your food, building up your immune system, and helping your adrenals feel nourished. It is the flavor I love the best. I'm a foodie and it has to taste good! You can find Vegetable Starter Culture online or in well-stocked health food stores. Ingredients: 1 medium jicama 1/2 head cabbage 2 handfuls fresh spinach 1 medium apple 1 small onion 1 clove garlic (minced) 1 1/2 teaspoons unrefined sea salt 1 large orange (zested and juiced) 1 package vegetable starter culture (or 1/4 cup fresh whey) Instructions: 9. Shred or chop the first six ingredients and place in a bowl and sprinkle with salt. You can also layer it in the jar instead of mixing. 10. Firmly pack the mixture into 2 quart glass canning jars or a half gallon vessel, leaving an inch or two for the cabbage to expand when it ferments. 11. Then add the orange zest juice, and culture, and cover with water, leaving an inch or two at the top. Seal jar tightly and let sit on the counter for 6 days and then place in the refrigerator.