The book ‘Fermenting’ by Fern Green immediately took me back to my childhood and reminded me of the good old days, when I’d spend Saturday mornings with my Grandparents at the local Fruit and Veggie Market.
My Grandparents would fill the boot of their car to the brim with boxes upon boxes of carefully and freshly selected produce.
It’s funny how everyone seems to become expert fruit pickers when they are at the market! Knowing when something is “just right” for the picking by simply giving it a squeeze and a bit of a sniff! So with a boot full of produce, we would all come home and cook up something exciting to eat for the week. If plums were in season, then we would make jam, if we bought tomatoes, then we would make pasta sauce, and so on….
This is the kind of lifestyle this book promotes. It is not about adding sugar or carbohydrates to a meal to make it tasty. It is about getting out all those jars you have stored and letting your tastes buds go crazy with healthy food.
My family is from the North of Italy, therefore we ate Sauerkraut often. Just thinking of my Grandmothers recipe makes me salivate! But of course, we added lots of oil. This book teaches you how to make it raw. Not only is it delicious, but it’s all about improving your digestion. “Fermenting” also teaches you how to prepare spinach and beetroot in ways you never thought possible. If you are looking for a new healthy kick start or a way to change your cooking style. This book is for you.
Try this picked tomato recipe, here.
I think that introducing your own homemade accompaniments are a great idea to make your dishes extra special. My Grandparents always had a pantry filled with jars of their own unique, homemade accompaniments, e.g. sauces and pickles, which when added to their standard dishes made them extra special, and also impossible to ever duplicate!! Believe me I’ve tried!! This added a wow factor and you knew it was made from the heart, whilst also totally reinventing the flavour. This book explores that same concept.
With some creative time, fun and preparation you too can have these extras in your pantry. Maybe I could stop harassing my Aunty to make me more of those jars of fermented Chilli and start to do it myself? Hhmmmmmm…yes, that’s food for thought!
Now that it’s Summer, I am definitely going to start to make my own natural cordials. Made from lemons, ginger, strawberries, pineapple and really any extra sweet fruits I can find. Now that is a real treat! Sitting in the sun, feet up, reading a good book with your own natural drink in hand, ice cubes clinking away…yep I can almost taste it now! The healthy minerals and vitamins are just an added bonus! Maybe it might even help to cure a hangover after all those summer late nights and get togethers.
Well after all of that …. I’m off to the market. I’m going to buy a heap of produce and prepare a big jar of mouth-watering Capsicums, perfect to drizzle on my fresh sour dough bread for lunch on those lazy Sunday afternoons.
The Carousel would like to thank Sacha Kaluri for her book review. Sacha jointly runs The Australian Teenage Expo – for more information click, here.
