Look, Mom — No Cavities! April 8, 2008

I went to the dentist today. And guess what? No cavities!

This is the first time I’ve had no cavities in years. And you would think that I would be more prone to dental decay — considering the stress I’ve had on my body over the past year (childbirth, breast feeding).

Here’s the interesting thing… For the past six months, I have not used toothpaste. No fluoride.

My whole life I was told that you’re supposed to brush with fluoride toothpaste to prevent cavities. Yet I only used Tooth Soap and baking soda for brushing. Of course, I ate a very nutrient dense diet — cod liver oil, pastured eggs, raw milk, butter, cream, and cheese, and organ meats. I avoided sugar and any grains/nuts/seeds/legumes that were not soaked and/or sprouted.

But isn’t fluoride supposed to prevent cavities?

When I asked my dentist, Dr. Raymond Silkman, what he thought of fluoride, he responded with one word, “Bad.”

He’s probably the only dentist in Los Angeles who gives prescriptions like this: “Drink beet kvass and freshly juiced green vegetables and carrots — daily”. And he told me to get tested for heavy metals. He thinks I may have heavy metal toxicity. (Beet kvass and freshly juiced vegetables chelate heavy metals.)

But back to the fluoride… This Crest ad says that “Crest stops soft spots from turning into cavities.” Lies! Crest doesn’t do any such thing.

Here’s another lie:

Coke’s slogan proclaims it is the opposite of what it really is — a fake. For centuries, people have been producing naturally fermented soft drinks like kombucha, naturally fermented root beer, and ginger ale. These naturally fermented soft drinks are very high in B vitamins and probiotics — they are health tonics. Conversely, Coca Cola is artificially carbonated sugar water. Not only is it devoid of nutrition, but the sugar in it actually blocks the absorption of vitamins and minerals in the body.

Of course, nowadays Coke doesn’t even have sugar — it’s made with high fructose corn syrup. Which is genetically modified corn soaked in battery acid. YUM!

Here’s an ad for sugar from the ’60s:

I love how transparent it is. Looking at it today, it’s so obvious. You can see the lies.

This is how you have to look at ads. Ads are made to convince you to buy. That is their sole purpose. They don’t care about you. And they don’t care about truth. They are often saying the very opposite of what is true.

Ads also prey on your fears and insecurities.

Here’s a Heinz baby food ad:

The message is based on the idea that real food is not safe, and only food in jars is safe for babies. See what I mean? It’s the opposite of the truth.

Of course, not all ads are bad… here’s a neutral one for iodized salt (iodized salt is not good for you — sea salt is best — but the iodine is something we need):

In the 1920s, with the depletion of the soil in America, people in the midwest started getting goiters due to iodine depletion. This prompted a campaign for iodized salt. Many Americans today are cutting down on salt — but there is a bigger problem today. Soy.

Soy is a goitrogen, which blocks the absorption of minerals, including iodine. Most Americans are deficient in iodine today — due to widespread consumption of soy foods.

Think you’re not eating soy? If you eat in restaurants, you are eating soy. If you eat processed or packaged foods, you are eating soy. Restaurants cook with soybean oil or vegetable oil — which is almost always cut with soybean oil. Most processed and packaged foods contain soybean oil and/or soy lecithin. All baby formulas (not just the soy formulas) contain soybean oil.

Here’s one I like — a French advertisement for cod liver oil:

This next one is not a real ad — it’s a spoof — but it’s great:

Too bad lard is so maligned today. It is such a healthy fat!

Lastly, here is my favorite — calling for a boycott of Kraft genetically modified foods:

Boycott Kraft Foods! Krafted: Genetically Krafted Foods

Happy Ishtar! March 24, 2008

Yesterday morning Kate and I got dressed and headed over to the local farmer’s market early. We got a big flat of strawberries from our local organic farm so I could make strawberry ice cream.

She tasted feta cheese and then we got to visit the petting zoo. They don’t always have a petting zoo — it is a special thing they do for Easter.

We saw an Easter mama sheep and her lambs:

An Easter bunny:

And some chickens. A perfect way to spend Easter! What better way than to see baby animals and visit the farmers at the farmer’s market?

As many of you know, Easter is not just a Christian holiday. It is actually a pagan holiday that goes all the way back to the Babylonians. The eggs and bunnies are symbolic of fertility. (Think about it — Playboy bunnies.)

“The egg was a sacred symbol among the Babylonians. They believed an old fable about an egg of wondrous size which was supposed to have fallen from heaven into the Euphrates River. From this marvelous egg - according to the ancient story - the Goddess Astarte (Easter) [Semiramis], was hatched. And so the egg came to symbolize the Goddess Easter.”

Source

This thing goes all the way back to the Babylonians with the goddess Ishtar (which was pronounced “Easter”).

Ishtar is a goddess of fertility, love, and war. In the Babylonian pantheon, she “was the divine personification of the planet Venus”.

Ishtar was above all associated with sexuality: her cult involved sacred prostitution; her holy city Erech was called the “town of the sacred courtesans”; and she herself was the “courtesan of the gods”. Source

Joseph Campbell, a more recent popularizer of mythology, equates Ishtar, Inanna, and Aphrodite, and he draws a parallel between the violent yet loving Hindu goddess Kali, the Egyptian goddess Isis who nurses Horus, and the Babylonian goddess Ishtar who nurses the god Tammuz. Source

I don’t personally worship the goddess Ishtar. Or any of the others. But I do like to celebrate the arrival of spring.

We bought eggs and onions and potatoes and asparagus and green beans. I really wanted to buy a blood orange tree at Guadalupe’s stall (she sold me my avocado tree two weeks ago) but I ran out of cash. Next week!

We also saw our friends (and neighbors — funny, they are our neighbors but we never see them) Jada and Walter. The bizarre thing is that I never see Jada and Walter except for at these random places. Like at the raw milk store downtown. Haha!

Jada told me all about how she’s making her kombucha and how they’ve been drinking raw milk and eating grass-fed beef, and how much better her health is. She says she has kombucha SCOBYs if anyone needs them. Me, too — need a SCOBY, let me know in the comments. We can mail it to you for the cost of postage.

Anyway, it was a fun morning. When we came home, Kate napped.

After that she and Julianna went with Yensi and Luis (Julianna’s daddy) to the park and the grocery store while Seth and I stayed home and worked.

In the afternoon, Yensi and I cooked up a storm. I made dill pickles (they’re fermenting on the counter now) and coconut water kefir. And for Easter dinner we made:

Garlic Rosemary Lamb Chops
Asparagus with Lemon and Olive Oil
Potatoes au Gratin
Homemade Strawberry Ice Cream (made with raw cream from grass-fed Jersey cows, and sweetened with maple syrup, not sugar)

Guatemalan Kefir and Cod Liver Oil March 7, 2008

I had a very interesting conversation this morning with our nanny, Yensi.

She told me that her husband asked why our daughter Kate is so much bigger than their daughter, Julianna. He had watched the videos of the two girls on YouTube.

Julianna is 15 months and Kate is only 10 months. Julianna is only 20 pounds. Kate is at least 24, maybe 25 pounds.

I told Yensi, “I think it’s all the liver and raw milk we feed her.”

She said, “I think you are right. We started giving Julianna the raw milk two weeks ago. We’re also giving her the chicken liver. In two weeks, she has gained two pounds.”

I gave Yensi the Weston A. Price brochure this morning. I printed off the Spanish version from the website. She was stunned when she read about “aceite de hígado de bacalao”. That’s Spanish for cod liver oil. She has been feeding Kate cod liver oil for weeks now. But she never knew what it was. When she saw the words “aceite de hígado de bacalao” she realized what it was. “My mother fed us this!” she said.

She bought a bottle of my cod liver oil — I always buy it in bulk to get a 15% discount. She is going to start giving it to Julianna.

She said her mother also fed them liver and egg yolks and they always drank raw milk. No wonder she has such perfect teeth! She has a very wide palette, perfectly straight white teeth. Never had a single cavity. Never had braces.

Her husband has a narrower palette. He snores, she said. She asked me how he could have a narrower palette when he was eating the same things she was as a child in Guatemala?

I asked her how old he was when he came to the US. She said he was only 4. She was 7 when she came. Makes sense — her jaw and palette were a lot more formed when she came.

It’s sad because now her younger brothers are having a lot of health problems. They all have cavities and crooked teeth. Yensi, too, started having chronic headaches only 5 years after she came to America. Her sister-in-law started having very bad digestion problems.

Meanwhile she and her parents and her grandparents never needed braces, never had a cavity. She said her ancestors all live to over 100 years old. It’s only the ones who have come here to this country who have started to experience health problems.

Coincidence? Or could it be nutritional deficiencies?

She also told me that the kombucha we drink tasted like the chicha they have in their country. We looked it up online and found that chicha is a name for a fermented beverage in South American countries. Then she told me that they make a drink like kefir. They call it bulgaros. It makes sense — the word bulgaros comes from Bulgaria or Bulgarian, and kefir comes Bulgaria. She said her sister-in-law had just gotten some bulgaros grains and they were using the raw milk to make the drink.

We were talking about the importance of soaking grains, nuts, beans and seeds before you eat them. In Sally Fallon’s “Nourishing Traditions” she says that eating grains, nuts, seeds or beans that are unsoaked or unfermented is not good for you. They are too hard to digest so your body can’t break them down, and hence, can’t absorb the nutrients. Furthermore, grains, nuts, seeds and beans have phytates or anti-nutrients. These phytates actually block absorption of the good nutrients!

So if you are going to eat any nuts, grains, beans or seeds, they need to be soaked in warm filtered water with either whey or kefir or yogurt. You can also use lemon juice or vinegar if you are allergic to dairy. They need to be soaked for a minimum of several hours and can be soaked up to several days. If you eat a diet rich in unsoaked/unfermented grains (what the USDA food pyramid currently recommends), all the vitamins and minerals you eat from other foods are being blocked and are not being absorbed.

I asked Yensi if they soak their grains in Guatemala. She said, “We never bought bread. We always made our own. And we always soaked it for two weeks.”

Today we’re going to bottle the kombucha. I’m going to give her some of my SCOBYs.

I will also ask Yensi if she will let me take a picture of her smile. You’ve got to see how gorgeous her teeth are!

Homemade Kombucha Success! February 13, 2008

My homemade kombucha came out great this time! (Last time it was not quite fermented enough and it barely made any at all.)

Five bottles! Isn’t that awesome? And it came out so fizzy and delicious. I was so happy I squealed, which made Kate squeal, which made Alla laugh.

Here are the mushrooms (or SCOBYs):

I have four SCOBYs now. This time I’m doing 4 containers instead of 2. So in a couple more weeks we will have 10 more bottles. And 8 SCOBYs.

Yay! Isn’t this fun?! We are going to have so much kombucha! I love the way it reproduces.

Maybe I will graduate from Hippie University after all!

Kombucha Cocktail February 11, 2008

I made Seth his first (and second) kombucha cocktail tonight. He LOVED it!

So much that he asked for a second.

Here’s how I made it:

2-4 oz (to taste) GT Dave’s Cranberry Kombucha (Synergy brand)
2-4 oz (to taste) Bourbon — I used Knob Creek
Dash of cranberry liqueur
Dash of Angostura bitters

Pour into shaker with ice and shake. Pour into chilled martini glass.

Some fresh lime would complete this. I didn’t have any. It was still good (I tasted it).

You could also do this with plain kombucha and a dash of cranberry juice.

UPDATE: Seth has had this a few times now… he said he thinks it might be even better with a little less Bourbon and maybe less sweet. So next time I’m going to do twice as much cranberry kombucha, half as much Bourbon (I was doing 50/50) and no liqueur. I’ll see how he likes it. If it works, it would be nice since not everyone can find Italian cranberry liqueur (I got it at Surfas, a local gourmet/restaurant supply shop).

All-Day Beef Stew February 2, 2008

I am making All-Day Beef Stew from “Nourishing Traditions” for our Sunday night dinner. I am marinating 3 pounds of stew beef (grass-fed) in a cup of red wine in the bowl of my crock pot in the fridge.

Tomorrow morning I’ll take it out and add 4 cups of beef stock, some peeled tomatoes, a bit of tomato paste, and some spices. Then I’ll let it cook all day.

I made the beef stock (my first time making beef stock) with roasted oxtails and marrow bones which simmered in the crock pot for two whole days. I can’t believe I’ve lived this long and have never made beef stock before.

After I let the beef stock cool overnight in the fridge, I scraped the fat off the top and put it in a container. We can use that later for cooking. Maybe I’ll use it to make homemade French fries.

That will make 3 dishes I can make out of one package of marrow bones:

Marrow on toast (which we ate last week with leftover Chicken and White Bean Chili)
Beef Stew (the bones made the stock)
French Fries (cooked with the fat from the stock)

It’s amazing how far food goes when you know how to cook it.

I’m so fascinated at how much I am learning from this one cookbook. Kombucha and marrow bones and kefir and chicken stock and curds and whey… so many things I have learned.

I have two nannies now (Alla and Yensi) and one housekeeper (Carla). Alla, who is Russian, who comes on Monday, Wednesday and Friday. Yensi, from Guatemala, is here Tuesdays and Thursdays. Carla, our housekeeper, comes every Monday. She is from Honduras.

All three women, on separate occasions, have expressed amazement that I cook the way their mothers and grandmothers used to cook in their native lands.

Alla was stunned when she realized that I was making kombucha — what she calls “mushroom tea”. “Oh my god!” she said. “I drank this all my life in Russia!” Same with the kefir. “We drank it every day. We used to put it in our hair.”

Yensi pointed to the kefir that I was straining into curds and whey (I use the whey for Kate’s baby formula, for homemade mayonnaise, for beet kvass, for sauerkraut, etc.). She said, “We make cheese like this in Guatemala! And we always make this soup,” she said, pointing to the beef stock.

She also said that her whole life in Guatemala, she always drank raw milk, never pasteurized. (Did I mention that she has perfect teeth?)

Carla, too, said her family always boiled bones in Honduras. “We use the chicken necks, too,” she said, smiling.

But back to tomorrow’s beef stew…

At the end of the day, you add some sliced carrots and potatoes to the stew. I might add some parsnips too, which the recipe doesn’t call for. And fresh parsley from my garden. Whatever we don’t eat, I’ll freeze. It will make a good meal on a night that I don’t feel like cooking. And great lunches for Kate.

And we might eat the last few pieces of the sourdough spelt bread I baked last week — which I froze. That will be yummy slathered with raw butter.

Time to bake another loaf…

By the way, speaking of homemade sourdough bread. Once you’ve tasted this bread, you can never go back to storebought. It’s that good.

Kombucha Status January 23, 2008

Here it is, in all its glory:

This is after 7 or 8 days of fermenting. I can’t remember exactly which day I started it.

They say it’s ready when there is a layer all across the top. Looks like there is one. Our Russian nanny, Alla, is going to taste it for me and tell me what she thinks.

Apparently, she drank kombucha her whole life when she was living in Russia. I kept talking about kombucha, asking her ifs he knew what it was and she said no.

Then one day I showed her the mushroom. She said, “Oh, my god! You’re making mushroom tea!”

In Russia, they don’t call it kombucha; they call it “mushroom tea”. She also drank kefir — and they made all these things at home. Now she is just starting to make kefir and kombucha again here in America.

UPDATE: Alla tasted it and she said it is fine — ready to drink.

I don’t know why the instructions from GEM Cultures said to only make one quart. And I can’t quite decipher their instructions re: what to do next. I’m going to see what it says in Nourishing Traditions.

Fabulous Fermented Foods January 10, 2008

I’m really excited! Yesterday I got my delivery from GEM Cultures.

Here are the cultures I got and what they are used for:

1. Kombucha - This is a symbiotic mixture of yeasts and Bacterium xylinium (a relative of the vinegar bacterium). People all over the world (Germany, Poland, Russia, Bulgaria, Japan, Indonesia, China, and Brazil) have been using this culture for centuries to make kombucha tea, known by many other names including teeschwamm, wunderpilz, hongo, and cajnif.

Kombucha is essentially fermented black tea and white sugar. The yeast and bacteria eat the sugar and breaks down all the bad stuff and turns it into something wonderful. A light, sparkling (naturally carbonated) drink comparable to a light wine or apple cider — with virtually no alcohol and no caffeine. Not only is it delicious (and a great substitute for soda pop or iced tea), it is hailed as one of the healthiest drinks on the planet.

What makes it so healthy? It’s chock full of enzymes, probiotics, a full range of B-vitamins, and glucuronic acid which the body uses to detoxify the cells and the liver. People claim that kombucha has helped them with everything from cancer to carpal tunnel to hangovers. All this for around 50 cents a gallon!

Why spend money on tons of supplements? Just throw out that nasty chemical-laden Diet Coke in your fridge and start brewing kombucha.

2. Rye Sourdough Starter - This is a truly natural bread leaven that has been around for thousands of years (since the Egyptians). Like kombucha, it’s a symbiotic collection of yeasts and friendly bacteria that digest sugars and create acids.

The starter is used to make, you guessed it, real sourdough bread (not the “faux” kind made from commercial yeast). Not only does it taste a lot better, it’s so much healthier for you, particularly if it’s made from whole grains.

Why is naturally leavened whole grain bread better for you? It’s all about absorption of minerals.

In the process of making sourdough bread, during the rising time (called proofing), bran in the flour is broken down, releasing nutrients into the dough. In particular, the phytic acid (phytin) in grain needs to be 90% neutralized in order for the minerals, concentrated in the bran, to be absorbed by the human body. According to the experiments done in Belgium, phytin can be neutralized by natural bacterial action and to a lesser extent, by baking. In naturally leavened bread, the combination eliminates all phytin, while in yeasted bread about 90% remains.

But that’s not all! Real sourdough bread is also more digestible and has more amino acids and active enzymes.

Furthermore, with sourdough bread, complex carbohydrates are broken down into more digestible simple sugars and protein is broken down into amino acids. Enzymes develop during proofing which are not lost in baking since the center of the loaf remains at a lower temperature than the crust.

Source: Facts About Naturally Leavened Sourdough Bread

3. Kefir - Kefir is a tart and tangy cultured milk drink that originated in Eastern Europe. Again, it’s a mixture of bacteria and yeasts.

You can drink kefir straight or strain it and add herbs and garlic to make it into soft cheese. You can substitute plain kefir cheese for ricotta in recipes. It contains probiotics, B vitamins, amino acids.

Similar to yogurt, kefir has many health benefits as it greatly improves digestion. I’ve also used it on my baby’s diaper rash. It’s also one of the best baby foods!

Kefir vs. Yogurt:

While both Kefir and yogurt are cultured milk products, they contain different types of beneficial bacteria. Yogurt contains transient beneficial bacteria that keep your digestive system clean and provide food for the friendly bacteria that already are present. Kefir actually helps to colonize your intestinal tract — a feat that yogurt cannot match.

Additionally, Kefir contains several major strains of friendly bacteria not commonly found in yogurt: Lactobacillus Caucasus, Leuconostoc, Acetobacter species, and Streptococcus species. It also contains beneficial yeasts, such as Saccharomyces Kefir and Torula Kefir, which help balance the intestinal flora, including promotion of beneficial yeast in the body by penetrating the mucosal lining. They form a virtual SWAT team that housecleans and helps strengthen the intestines.

Kefir’s active yeast and bacteria may provide more nutritive value than yogurt by helping digest the foods that you eat and by keeping the colon environment clean and healthy. The curd size of Kefir is smaller than yogurt, so it’s also easier to digest, making it an ideal food for babies**, the elderly, and anyone with digestive health concerns.

Source: Mercola

4. Fil Mjolk - Fil Mjolk is a Swedish cultured milk drink. Unlike kefir, it is not tart but rather clean and mild, similar to buttermilk. In Sweden, they eat it like yogurt every morning. It has all the same health benefits of the above listed foods.

You can also make salad dressing with it, vegetable dips, and other things. If you add this culture to cream, you can make your own creme fraiche, or cultured sour cream. Again, it makes a great baby food.

It should also be noted that all of the above foods and drinks improve digestion and therefore improve immunity.

Fermented foods used to be a mainstay of our diet in every culture around the world. Now they have practically disappeared because everything is pasteurized and modernized.

Long ago, food preservation was accomplished through lacto-fermentation, a process that adds a host of beneficial micro-organisms to food. This makes them easier to digest , increasing the healthy flora in our intestinal tracts.

Because fermentation is an inconsistent process, commercial food processors developed techniques like pasteurization — a method that literally destroys dozens of precious enzymes — to help standardize more consistent yields.

Sadly, I believe that modern culture has sacrificed many of the advantages of traditionally fermented healthy foods for faster and cheaper methods of mass production. In my opinion, our immunity and digestive health have been overlooked. I believe that it’s time to return to the health-promoting foods of our past.

Source: Mercola

Oh, and you know what else is great about fermented foods? They are the gift that keeps giving. These cultures actually reproduce and create more cultures. You can keep using them over and over. Talk about economical! (Another reason the food industry wants no part of them! They can’t make money on something you buy once.)

PS: If you don’t currently have access to raw milk, fermenting pasteurized milk (from a good source, preferably from an organic and grass-fed dairy) is the next best thing.

Nourishing Traditions December 14, 2007

I just got an email from a friend of mine. She’s from Turkey, but living in America. She has a baby boy — I met her in my mother’s group.

She writes:

“I’ve been reading Nourishing Traditions and smiling all the time: This lady is telling almost everything I knew from my mom and grandma!! Except some recipes it is the healthy Turkish way of good eating, waoww !! Thank you for mentioning it, there is so much about it I would like to talk with you.

I was making my own yogurt, yogurt drinks, kefir and cream cheese for some time already but this week I got inspired and started to make BOZA, a fermented drink which I was craving for… I will also order Kombucha starter and also offer it to Adam, I hope he will like it. When my aunt was pregnant with my cousin she started to drink Kombucha every day and after her son was born when he was 8-9 months old we gave it to him too. I can’t wait!!”

Funny because I knew Ebru and I shared a lot of the same opinions about food and health. Whenever I saw her, she was always feeding her baby boy fresh vegetables and fruits. And of course he is so healthy.

It’s a shame that so many of our traditions have been lost. So many mothers are serving processed foods like Kraft Macaroni & Cheese.

I am now making bone broths and homemade cream cheese and whey and sauerkraut. And I’m about to start brewing my own kombucha too. I ordered the scoby from GEM Cultures and it is due to arrive after the holiday. Seth and I have been drinking kombucha for the past couple of months. We don’t miss Diet Coke at all!

Leaf lard, turkey giblet stock, and a German meal made by a Russian November 20, 2007

Tonight, for the first time in my life, I rendered lard.

It was pretty easy!

Actually I'm not quite done yet. It's still on the stove, melting in the cast iron skillet (this is the best way to do it so I've read — because it has the added advantage of seasoning the skillet). When it's as melted as it's gonna get, I need to strain it and cool it. Not sure how long it will take to fully melt — we shall see. If it's not done before I go to bed, I'll stick it in the oven on low heat overnight.

It needs to be very cold by tomorrow night however, so I can get my pie crusts made in time. I may just strain it tonight.

I followed this recipe:

http://www.obsessionwithfood.com/2006_01_01_blog-archive.html#113709378997673043

I also made turkey giblet stock — from the lungs and heart and liver and gizzards (secondary stomachs). It is also still simmering on the stove. The stock will be going into the stuffing and the gravy.

Here's the recipe I used for the stock.

Anyway, turkey giblets are incredibly good for you. Simmering them in water (with vegetables and herbs) turns all those nutrients into a very concentrated broth. Extremely nutritious!

Alla (our nanny) stayed late to help me with the stock and the lard, not to mention the laundry. I didn't wnat her driving home yet anyway because the traffic was HIDEOUS. I guess people were out driving around to get things for Thanksgiving — or maybe they were leaving to go out of town. I don't know what they were doing but they were ALL out there, clogging up every street and highway. UGH!

After she helped me with the stock and the lard, Alla helped me with the dishes and whipped up some dinner. “You're nursing!” she implored. “You need to eat!”

So she boiled some cauliflower (from my CSA box) and then rolled it in raw egg and then cooked it in butter. I ate that with Bratwurst (also prepared by Alla) and my homemade sauerkraut, and a bottle of Sierra Nevada Celebration Ale. So delicious! And very healthy. All organic, with lots of good fat and probiotics.

I must go to bed now. I have my 6 am wake-up call from This Lady. And tomorrow I have to get everything ready for Thanksgiving: bake pies, make homemade ice cream, set the table, assemble everything mis en place in the kitchen (there are a thousand details that go into this stuffing — it's a recipe from Martha after all), and brine the turkey. Plus fifteen other things (phone calls, etc.) that I need to do for Seth.

Good night! Oh, wait, I have to go strain the lard and the stock. OK, good night in a little while!

PS: I also ordered my kombucha baby today. I can't wait to get it and start making kombucha! I also ordered some fil mjolk (Swedish culture that makes something similar to buttermilk), kefir grains, sourdough starter, and various other things like cheesecloth and lids for my mason jars.

PS2: The sauerkraut, as mentioned, has come out very well.

The pickles taste fine (well two of the jars did — one tasted off so I dumped it). They are not QUITE as crunchy as I'd like them (I couldn't get my hands on any grape leaves) however they are still good. But I'm going to give them a few more days.

The papaya chutney tastes pretty good — I think I'll refrigerate it in the next day or two (refrigeration stops the fermenting).

The orange marmalade was a miserable failure.

OK really I must go now and strain and cool my potions (that is what Seth calls them) so I can go to bed!