This week: Let’s talk fermenting, recipes, cookbook giveaways, and previews

What is fermentation? Fermentation is a process that produces chemical changes in the natural environment in which an organism lives through the action of enzymes (proteins that accelerate chemical reactions). In the context of food, it may refer to any process in which the activity of microorganisms – specifically bacteria, yeast, and mold – brings about a desirable change to a food product or beverage. Buttermilk, beer, gochujang, kimchi, sour pickles, and sauerkraut are all common examples of fermented foods. The origins of fermentation are hard to pinpoint but historians believe fermentation in food and beverage preparation dates as far back as 7000 BC.

Fermentation brings the funk that some of us love and crave and is key in preserving vegetables and other foodstuffs from spoilage. A key figure in fermentation, “Louis Pasteur, a nineteenth-century French biologist, is known as the “father of microbiology” for his pioneering work uncovering the role microbes play in fermentation as well as less desired outcomes like sickness and food spoilage. His invention, pasteurization, is still used today to kill microbes that could cause sickness or cause food and drink to spoil.” From: Fermentation: A History.

Someone recently asked in my cookbook group about fermentation cookbooks. We have over 250 books in the EYB Library on this subject. One of the most popular with our members is Sandor Ellix Katz’s The Art of Fermentation: An In-Depth Exploration of Essential Concepts and Processes from Around the World. While this title only shares 23 recipes, this James Beard Award winning cookbook is a comprehensive guide to do-it-yourself home fermentation that many cooks use as a resource. To learn more about Sandor and his passion for his craft, please visit his website. In October, Fermentation as Metaphor will be released to broaden and redefine our relationship with food and fermentation.

Koji Alchemy: Rediscovering the Magic of Mold-Based Fermentation by Jeremy Umansky and Rich Shih is an in-depth study of Aspergillus oryzae also known as kōji mold. This filamentous fungus is used in Japan to saccharify (breaking down a complex carb into simple sugars) rice, sweet potato, and barley in the making of alcoholic beverages such as sake and shōchū, and also to ferment soybeans for making soy sauce and miso. Katz provides the foreword in this title and we are working on bringing you an EYBD Preview. This book is an extremely interesting read. I have begun reading the electronic copy and I am waiting for the hard copy to really dive into it.

Mold (mould) is an imposing topic and one that was in the media recently with the moldy jam incident at Sqirl (which has nothing to do with mold fermentation). When most people hear the word mold or mould fear ensues. but Top chefs from Noma chefs René Redzepi and David Zilber to David Chang and Sean Brock have championed koji and the incredible flavors this preservation method provides. I, for one, love miso!

For more beginner tomes on fermentation see: Ferment Your Vegetables: A Fun and Flavorful Guide to Making Your Own Pickles, Kimchi, Kraut, and More by Amanda Feifer and the books by  Christopher and Kirsten K. Shockey. While I haven’t reviewed The Essential Book of Fermentation, I gleaned from the Amazon reviews that it appears to be a great beginner book and is $4.99 for the Kindle version.

Special thanks to two of my friends who are fermentation experts who assisted with this piece.

Other titles and articles of interest:

• The Noma Guide to Fermentation: Foundations of Flavor by René Redzepi and David Zilber
• Ferment: A Practical Guide to the Ancient Art of Making Cultured Foods by Holly Davis
• Fermentation: How To Make Your Own Sauerkraut, Kimchi, Brine Pickles, Kefir, Kombucha, Vegan Dairy, And More by Asa Simonsson (Winner: Best Fermentation Book (UK) in the Gourmand Cookbook Award) (giveaway soon)
• In a pickle: a guide to resources for fermenting and pickling
• Breaking the mold
• What is Koji?
• A highly rated crock (hoping to do a review and giveaway soon)

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This Week on our Blog

Since our last roundup, Darcie has written articles entitled: Cookbooks can be life-changing, Don’t throw away these valuable liquids, When it’s time to spice things up, Hats off to grocery workers, the case for having a bread box, and the art and logic of ice cream cake. Darcie’s weekly food news antipasto is shared every Sunday #foodnews brings up these information-packed posts from the most current to the first one.

This week, I shared my obsession with all things culinary in Cookbook Shelf and Kitchen Detective for Hire and Perspective is everything – an open letter to the Great British Bake Off – the things we think of when spending more time than normal at home. I also shared a giveaway for Everyday Barbecue open to US/CA/UK/AU/NZ members.

The looking forward to 2020 cookbook preview post and the Kindle cookbook deals are being continually updated. For new members, our post on ideas on how to make EYB work better for you may be helpful.

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Featured Recently Indexed Titles

• Winner! Winner! Chicken Dinner: 50 Winning Ways to Cook It Up! by Stacie Billis
• Citrus: Sweet and Savory Sun-Kissed Recipes by Valerie Aikman-Smith and Victoria Pearson
• Sweet Vegan: 50 Creative Recipes + Your Guide to Transforming Any Recipe for Dairy-Free, Gluten-Free, Plant-Based Treats by Nicole Maree
• EatingWell Vegetables: The Essential Reference by EatingWell Magazine
• Food from the Fire: The Scandinavian Flavours of Open-Fire Cooking by Niklas Ekstedt
• The Happy Pear: Vegan Cooking for Everyone: Essential Tips and Techniques for Delicious Plant-Based Cooking by David and Stephen Flynn
• Help Yourself: A Guide to Gut Health for People Who Love Delicious Food by Lindsay Maitland Hunt
• Cheeky Treats: 70 Brilliant Bakes and Cakes by Liam Charles
• Classic: Delicious, No-Fuss Recipes from Mary’s New BBC Series by Mary Berry
• From Freezer to Cooker: Delicious Whole-Foods Meals for the Slow Cooker, Pressure Cooker, and Instant Pot by Polly Conner and Rachel Tiemeyer

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Member Photo of the Week

Upside-down orange and fennel cornmeal cake from Season: Big Flavors, Beautiful Food by Nik Sharma submitted by member raybun.

Nik’s second cookbook will be released on October 27th, 2020, The Flavor Equation: The Science of Great Cooking Explained: More Than 100 Essential Recipes. I’ve had a chance to review the electronic version and it is a gem that shares the same brilliance of Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat: Mastering the Elements of Good Cooking.

Have you uploaded any of your own photos yet? Learn more! Please remember to update your profile with your Instagram name if you would like to be tagged in any photos that we share!

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Featured Online Recipe

Spicy chicken burgers with special sauce from Diana Henry at The Sunday Telegraph by Diana Henry

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EYBDigital Previews

Recently we uploaded our 714th EYBDigital Preview where a selection of full sample pages is available for the following cookbooks.

Learn more about EYBDigital Previews.

Note: To learn why you cannot add all EYBDigital Preview recipes to your Bookshelf, please read this Help page.

• 3 recipes from Soupology: The Art of Soup From Six Simple Broths by Drew Smith Pub date 9/8/2020
• 3 recipes from The Wicked Baker: Cakes and Treats to Die For by Helena Garcia (GBBO contestant) Pub date 9/1/2020
• 3 recipes from Home Cookery Year: Four Seasons, Over 200 Recipes for All Possible Occasions by Claire Thomson Pub date 9/2/2020
• A selection of pages from Due North: An Expedition Through Australia from Tasmania to the Gulf by James Viles

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Cookbook Giveaways
Click on the Bold Blue Link Below to Enter

• Enter our US/CA/UK/AU giveaway to win one of two copies of The Vegetarian Silver Spoon: Classic and Contemporary Italian Recipes. Please remember Eat Your Book members receive 30% off Phaidon titles when using the link provided. Expires August 23rd, 2020.
• Enter our US giveaway to win a copy of Meals, Music, and Muses: Recipes from My African American Kitchen with Eat Your Books providing one copy of Between Harlem and Heaven as well. Expires August 24th, 2020.

*Please note due to the pandemic, promotions are extended until publishers are back in their offices, and warehouses are available to resume the shipment of books. Publishers ask that we be patient awaiting the arrival of prizes. The cookbook giveaway roundup shares all current giveaways.

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