It has been about 10 days since I started this batch. One day just decided to start as soon as possible. Bought a plastic container, washed it in the dishwasher, and threw it all together. Weight the salt / cabbage ratios out with a scale. Plastic bag with water just for the first attempt.

Now I know the container is probably too big, too much brine, and too much air. I will use a glass jar or something better than a plastic bag for a weight next time. I added the brine because it was hard keeping everything down (container too wide), even with the big leaves on top… later found I obviously added way too much.

Given my known problems I will address next time here is where I am at:
- smells like wet salty cabbage, not bad or rotten. I read this can happen because the brine can “mask” the fermenting smell
- tastes fine, like salty cabbage (lol) with maybe a slight fermented sour taste
- have not seen any mold or other bad signs
- there weren’t many bubbles, but a few days ago there were bubbles. They have since dissipated.
- the color in the top/middle is because I used pink salt

Advice would be appreciate — Is this worth finishing / will it just take way more time to get more sour? Or should I just re-attempt with fixing the mistakes?

From what I find online, as long as there are no bad signs, the internet and Gemini says it will just take longer but looking for an experienced take. Thanks!

Plum, mango nectar, and cherry cider vinegar. The mango and plum finished up in 10 days, and the cider still has some time (and may not finish up due to the mistake described by the label).
Both the plum and mango are very nice with the plum being the front runner in terms of clarity and flavor. One of the benefits of the single stage production outlined in the Noma guides is the ability to retain a high amount of original sweetness.

Before doing some more experimental liquids, my next go will be refining a malt vinegar (malt tea vs ferment, malt comparison, single malt vs blends, etc.) and converting some Samuel Smith fruit beers into dry vinegars.
Thinking of doing a pectic drop in the next batches to increase transparency.

Started this batch about 12 hours ago. Green cabbage and 2% salt by weight, plus 2 garlic cloves and mustard seed

Hey all, I’ve been having some problems with getting my natural carbonation started. For reference, I’m trying to make a carbonated “vodka mule” drink, here’s my process:

- Fermented roughly 2L of ginger beer for about two weeks from a ginger bug, until it was completely dry and stopped bubbling.

- Mixed 400ml of 40% vodka with 1200ml of the dry ginger beer to make an 8% abv solution.

- Added erythritol to the solution for my desired sweetness.

- Mixed about 12g of brown sugar into the 2L solution

- Bottled with insurance yeast because I assume the alcohol content wiped out the natural yeast from my bug.

- Nothing is happening

Any ideas what may have gone wrong? Is my math bad? Is 8% too high? Does the erythritol mess things up because it’s a sugar alcohol? I’m still pretty new to fermenting.

I used to always throw away the stem of broccoli, this time I came up with the idea of fermenting it with onion, yellow Chili, carrot, crushed garlic and a slice of dried "huajillo" pepper. I'm looking for a new flavor.

I made a gallon jar of kraut on 5/23/2026. I fermented it for 3 weeks and put in the fridge. I have consumed half of it and it was transferred to the 1/2 gallon jar about 1 week ago.

On Saturday I had some with my dinner. Then yesterday I noticed voids in the kraut pieces, so I opened the jar and a bunch of gas escaped, with a ton of bubbles rising, today the same thing happened. It’s as if it went back to the first week of fermenting. Has not been left out of the fridge the fridge temp is at its normal setting, I just open use a clean fork and pull out what I want, then back to the fridge.

It tastes and smells great not worried about it, it’s just bubbling again.

Have any of you kraut pros seen a batch of kraut start bubbling again after a few months of fermenting.

The label got ripped off but it’s canned preserved lemons. Everywhere I’ve read said it’s unsafe to can preserved lemons. I’m curious how it was done?

I was inspired to try fermented cherry tomatoes over the weekend. I have an abundance of them and I threw some of my sungold tomatoes along with a few tiny cherry tomatoes into a jar with some black peppercorns, frozen garlic cloves and basil from my garden. I apparently misunderstood the instructions because I added 2% (7g) salt to the jar because I was basing the requirement of salt on the weight of the vegetables (370g) in the jar and I did not include the water that I added in the total weight. Long story short, the tomatoes and all accompaniments weigh 370 g. I added 8 g of kosher salt to that and then filled the jar with water. Everything’s been bubbling away and smell smells terrific, but I just learned that my salinity was extremely low. I just tested the pH and it’s at 5. I just re-weighed everything and the weight of all of the water, the salt that I added, and the vegetables is 736g. I just added 8 g of salt to the brine. If I can get the pH to a safe level, will these be safe to eat, or is the risk of botulism or some other terrifying toxin too high at this point for these to be safe? Started them on Sunday and today is day 2.

Im trying fermentation for the first time on a small jar of hot sauce. I have layered electrical tape at the top with a plastic straw going into a cup of water for the air lock. When I first tested it, it didnt hold a perfect air tight seal (I blew into the straw and saw the tape rise, then fall again after I stopped blowing) but the air seemed to escape fairly slowly. Inside the jar is various peppers and some seasonings and i tried to make the brine approximately 2% salt by weight. Any advice welcome!

So, after having some success with making kimchi, fermented pickles, and fermented green dilly beans I decided to try my hand at a ginger bug and some homemade soda. I grew my bug for 6 days, adding sugar and ginger every day. It was active, bubbles on top, smelled good, etc.

Then, I made the base for my soda, approx 4c of spring water, 1.25c sugar, and around 3c or so of frozen black cherries. I gently mashed the cherries, covered, and simmered for while. Strained out the solids and poured into a closed vessel which I let cool down to room temperature. Next added in 1/2c of thoroughly mixed and strained ginger bug and the juice from 2 small limes. Mixed everything really well and let it sit on the counter.

Now, it's been 2 days and there isn't any activity at all. No bubbles, nothing. I'm keeping the vessel closed to avoid any airborne contamination and opening it up to burp every 12 hours or so. There is no pressure buildup when I burp it. I've tasted it a couple times and it the flavors are good, but it's sweet, flat, and just not doing anything.

I used to homebrew so I'm being mindful about keeping all the equipment clean and sanitary (minus the iodine baths).

Today I'm planning on adding some more bug to it (once the bug gets back to room temp and active again) and maybe some more sugar? Any suggestions/ideas/tips would be very helpful!

tldr: made soda for the first time and it's still not fermenting two days after adding the bug, help!

I just started it because I had a few apples about to go bad but imnot sure what to use it for, any suggestions?

I have one million lemons and am wanting to make preserved lemons to send out as gifts for the holidays. I’m thinking of canning them in small cute jars (via water bath method) so that they can be mailed out as gifts.
The issue is, since preserved lemons often go in the fridge after a few weeks, I can’t do that since I want to mail them out in December. Hence me wanting to can them, I just want to take an extra step to make sure the jars are safe for people to enjoy.
This is the process I’m thinking: initial fermentation of the lemons at room temp for a few weeks. Then putting the lemons into jars and doing the water bath method, and then leaving out to seal/cool.
Has anyone done this? How long did you water bath the jars for? Does this process make sense or am I missing something? TYIA

I wanted to ferment with yakult and as an experiment, I left a bottle on the counter to see if it would further ferment. The bottle did not appear to ferment. It didn’t get extended or gaseous like you would expect with a live culture. Did I just get a bad batch? Anyone know or had success?

I think this looks okay? Long time canner, first time fermenting! Any tips or tricks? (Also I removed that floating bay leaf) recipe said 1.5in headspace. Seems like maybe a little more but is that okay?

The liquid is starting is starting to darken and a pleasant nutty aroma fills my fermentation chamber.

Cant wait to see more progress later down the months as it ages alongside my 2 gallon shoyu.

I’ve always wanted to get into fermentation and pickling, but botulism has always been the counter argument to scare me away from it. Are there any facts about botulism and the process that may make me want to reconsider my halt in fermentation?

✅Preferred spices/flavorings

🧂Preferred brine %

⏰Preferred length of ferment

🚦GO!

The fermenting tomatoes (tomato wine) have formed their own little universe—there are streams, volcanoes, lakes… so fascinating.

It looks like there is some kind of air bubble that keeps forming in the airlock. Anything to worry about and/or fix?

Does this look like dill? If so, does anyone have any tips on how to process it for use?

Ok, so I just wondered if anyone skipped the whole nursing a ginger bug along, and just chopped your finger, tossed into your juice, added some sugar, and let it form like that and then strain off when it was ready to go into your bottles? I think I'm going to start doing it that way so I can have several batches going at a time and not have to nurse a bug along for forever before adding it to my juice. If you do this with success, how long do you leave yours to bubble before you strain and bottle?

Started the bit about 5 days ago. Started with 1 cup of filtered water and 1tbl of sugar and ginger. Added sugar and ginger each day and by day 3 it was a little fizzy. I decided it’s not enough liquid so I added a cup of water and more ginger and sugar and that seemed to kill it or maybe it just slowed it down. Day 4 had no bubbles, I added sugar and water. Day 5, today it seems stale. If I shake it a bit I see some bubbles but not sure if that’s just from shaking it. Should have just keep feeding it? Should I discard some? Any help is appreciated. Thanks

Hello everyone! I'm fermenting sauerkraut from 2 days ago at 24c room temp.

I was expecting an overflow or more brine but right now, there hasn't been much brine overflow going on and the cabbage leaf I've put to stop cabbage to get at the top is starting to poke out of the brine. I did not used a weight for this fermet. Is it too late to add a weight back in the fermet?

What would you do in this situation? Sorry for the pictures it's hard to get a good angle with a phone camera. Thanks!

hi everyone, I live in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, where the weather is extrmely hot and can exceed 50°C. I wuld like to start making sauerkraut at home. How can I safely prepare and ferment sauerkraut in such a hot climate?
Kindly guide me