Ferments for Preservation

A book club discussion on what it means to preserve and live seasonally

This is the second installment of the Our Fermented Lives book club for paid subscribers.

Our book club includes weekly discussions through the month of January, plus a live author Q&A session and over 60 pages of never-before-shared material from early drafts of the book, footnotes and rambling historical asides intact.

If you don’t have a copy of Our Fermented Lives yet, you can snag one from your favorite local bookseller or from Bookshop.

Vinegar infusions from my book workshop at Archestratus

Ferments for Preservation

The second chapter of my book deals with fermentation as a method of preservation: Because we tend to think of this attribute of fermentation first when considering its history. But I wanted to encourage readers to think beyond preservation as just an act of lengthening shelf life and supporting food security, but also to think about the concept of preservation generally. What are we preserving when we preserve food, beyond the food itself?

At the beginning of this chapter, I classify ferments into categories based on Steinkraus' 1997 research. I would be curious to know: Do you classify ferments the same way? What might you add or change?

Since publishing Our Fermented Lives, James Read has also published a paper classifying fermented foods and beverages. What do you think of his classifications? Is there one system or another you like better? Anything you’d add?