Ferment Nerds Reboot

In which, Kirsten redefines the newsletter and we start exploring vegetables A to Z. A is for Avocado.

Happy New Year! Here’s to hope, health, joy, and lots of fermenting bubbles in 2023.

Last month we left you with a teaser of coming attractions—a Ferment Nerds reboot. On this third day of the new year, let’s go.

Kirsten writes: When I was growing up we moved a lot—not just down the road but across continents. As a kid who wanted to keep in touch long distance calls were expensive and out of reach and often staticky besides. There is no need to point out that communicating with one’s people on a screen was something out of The Jetson’s reruns. At first, I wanted to communicate with my grandmothers who lived 5,966 miles apart and we didn’t live near either of them. As I got older, it was the string of friends I left behind. I wrote letters and anticipated the mail’s arrival—in Holland, this was the sound of the metal slot opening and slap of the envelops landing on the floor, in rural Arizona, this was convincing my mother to drive 5 miles to the post office where the general store also carried Tiger Beat. The dopamine hit was intoxicating when there was mail for me. Letter opened, read, and replied immediately—so I could begin the wait anew.

A few months ago, when we started to imagine a Ferment Nerds reboot, I remembered how much I used to enjoy handwriting letters on stationery. Picking the stationery (if we are going to be honest) was the best part—raise your hand if you had scratch and sniff fruit-scented stationery or Precious Moments.  For those of you that are wondering, I saved all the letters I received for years in a box, then one New Year’s Eve, in a moment of mid-30s out-with-the-old-release I tossed them into a bonfire. Mostly, I am still comfortable with that moment though I didn’t know at the time that they represented a dying form of communication. I didn’t know I would reconnect with many of those friends on social media and what a gift it would have been to send their own childhood missives back to them.

I miss writing letters. I miss the intimacy of sharing thoughts as they are fresh. I feel like highly curated content and branded messaging are things that dampen my inspiration. In the last while, I have noticed that inspiration flows when I am happily creating without stopping to set up a photo shoot or more recently a video for some jaunty reel. As soon as I grab the phone to publicly document and prove myself my muse flitters off and the energy is sucked right out. As such, I want this space to be one in which I take you on an authentic journey with me and you feel inspired to share as well, in so building a community-based and supported newsletter.

I am caught between explaining all my ideas for this space and letting them unfold. There will be fermentation, there will be recipes, we (you and I) will be nerding out in the kitchen, I will take you outside to the forest and garden, I will share successes and fails, and there will also be musings and thoughts. Christopher will make guest appearances to take us down the nerdy science rabbit holes…but let’s let it unfold together.

This week we begin with the letter A. A is for Avocado.

Can you ferment an avocado? Good question. I wanted to know, as one of 2022’s projects was to do several trials to answer this question from my own experience. The answer is you can!

Fermented avocados can be a little funkier than the average bear might be used to; they are decidedly different than fresh but are not particularly yeasty or sour, which would be our usual definition of fermentation funk. They are quite soft which can be off-putting for some, but on toast, in guacamole, they are creamy.

Is it worth it? We personally mostly eat our fresh avocados fresh. Still, we have found when there is a particularly good sale, or we want to preserve the abundance of seasonal avocados it is a worthwhile endeavor. In the refrigerator in brine, they do last, much longer than I would have expected.  

The next thing I ask myself is what I think of as the “why we ferment” questions:

• Is there a tradition of fermenting with this ingredient?

• Does fermentation add (tasty) flavor?

• Does fermentation preserve the ingredient?

• Does fermentation add remarkable nutritional benefits?

Let’s start with flavor because let’s be frank, that is what our id is ultimately most interested in. It definitely does, as described above. It is unique but not unpleasant. Does fermentation preserve the avocado? Yes again, and in a way that will preserve some for later consumption. Does fermentation add remarkable nutritional benefits? I luckily found that (okay I admit I also scour the nerdy science papers at times) some scientists had also asked this question and the simple answer is yes.

The study wanted to know if lactic acid bacteria fermentation would enrich the bioactive compounds (the good and healthy parts) of the avocado fruit. Interestingly, they were looking to put all this goodness in a pill, but I admit I am always more interested in the whole food approach. They learned that fermentation resulted in high levels of total free amino acids, strongly increased antioxidant activity, and the bacteria feeding themselves (metabolizing) is thought to result in oleic and linoleic acids becoming high levels of mono, di-, and tri-hydroxy-octadecenoic acids.

One final note, keep your eye on the seed, turns out it is the most nutrient-dense part of an avocado, 70 percent of the avocado’s antioxidants are locked up in it, it’s edible, and mostly gets tossed out. In our explorations we found that scientists are also looking to fermented avocado seeds for flour and to fungus-based fermentation. With fermentation they can turn a current waste product into something that can increase nutrition. At this point, I don’t think their focus is culinary, but who else immediately started imagining an avocado pit miso?

On Thursday’s In the kitchen letter for paid subscribers, we will continue looking into the avocado, my experiment process and notes, and recipes to try yourself. I look forward to creating content for you all, a community of folx interested in fermentation without all the strings attached to social media. Along with extra dispatches paid subscribers will be invited to an online open kitchen, like an open house, but we will meet in my kitchen and see what I am up to, chat about your interests or answer questions.  The first one will be on Jan. 28, 2023, and I would also love to discuss your interest in the possibility of a fermentation-based book club.

Until next time,  happy fermenting!