The Wonderful World of Fermentation: Ancient Food Preservation Meets Modern Health
Fermentation is one of the oldest food preparation and preservation methods. It’s a wonderful natural phenomenon whose essence we didn’t truly understand until the development of modern natural sciences, but we learned its laws through experience and, adapting to them, turned them to our advantage.
We could say that the consumption of fermented foods and drinks is as old as humanity, but it would be more accurate to say that it’s as old as life on Earth. In nature, fermentation plays an essential role in the constant cycle of constructive and destructive processes, as well as in the energy-generating processes of various living organisms – we simply learned to tame it and turn it to our benefit.
The Etymology of Fermentation: From Latin Roots to Modern Understanding
The word fermentation itself is a term of Latin origin that has been used for thousands of years. Its root is the very telling verb fervere, meaning “to boil, to bubble.” The name presumably comes from the simple everyday observation that in our food, without refrigeration, more and more bubbles form after a few hours or days. It really looks like we’ve boiled it!
We can’t be surprised that our ancestors were fascinated by the incomparable sight of bubbling, sparkling liquids. We ourselves will feel the same way when we start: this special dance immediately captivates us.
Rediscovering Traditional Fermentation Methods
Although the modern rediscovery of fermentation started from the West, this field is not unknown to the East either: fortunately, we have the opportunity to revive numerous traditional practices. But while we could previously learn this knowledge only through experience, passed down from generation to generation, today we also have the opportunity to use the knowledge provided by science. By understanding the life cycles, needs, and factors affecting bacteria and fungi, we can shape our kitchen experiments however we want. I’m confident that we’ll elevate the art of fermented food preparation to heights we haven’t even imagined before.
The Microbiome Crisis: Why Our Gut Health is Under Threat
Modern Life’s Impact on Our Beneficial Bacteria
Scientific discoveries that enrich our lives have unfortunately also shed light on the (often seriously) health-damaging effects of our civilization. Excessive personal hygiene, the increasingly popular urban lifestyle, changes in food preparation methods (cooking, smoking, use of sweeteners and emulsifiers), the use of bottled and disinfected tap water, the decline in natural births, the marginalization of breastfeeding, the widespread use of antibiotics in healthcare, livestock farming, and crop production, as well as the exploitation and stripping of fertile soil have all contributed to a drastic reduction in the number of beneficial microorganisms living in symbiosis with us, and their diverse composition has become impoverished.
The Silent Microbiome Crisis
The situation is so serious that in 2018, Tobias Rees and Nils Gilman called what is happening to humanity today a problem even more serious than climate change, directly the era of the silent microbiome crisis.
Since the human microbiome – that is, the significance of bacteria and fungi living in mutually beneficial relationships, in symbiosis with us in various parts of the human body, and their particularly important role in maintaining our health – has been known for less than two decades, new research results are only slowly being incorporated into scientific circulation. I’ve dedicated a separate chapter at the end of the book to these fascinating connections and what we ourselves can do so much for nourishing our microscopic flower garden.
The Foundation of Health: Ancient Wisdom Meets Modern Science
Naturally, these two often-heard wisdoms that appear in many variations are still considered the most important cornerstones of healing today: “you are what you eat” (Ludwig Andreas Feuerbach) and “death dwells in the intestines” (Paracelsus). Reversed and refined: we are what our gut bacteria eat – the key to our flourishing and decline is in their hands.
Why Ferment? The Health Revolution in Your Kitchen
Reversing Microbiome Depletion Through Fermentation
Recognizing the opportunity to reverse – or at least significantly support our health against – microbiome depletion, home fermenting has also been experiencing a renaissance worldwide in recent decades. Fermented foods are not only preservative-free and extremely delicious, but also have numerous beneficial effects. Particularly the regular consumption of lactic acid fermented vegetables, yogurt, kefir, and homemade vinegars effectively supports the functioning of our digestive system.
The Science Behind Probiotic Benefits
The probiotic effect is perhaps obvious: fermented foods teem with beneficial bacteria and fungi. But from a health perspective, perhaps it’s not really the presence of microorganisms, but rather the work they perform that’s truly significant. The decreasing pH during fermentation and the resulting organic acids stimulate the secretion of digestive juices and the “restart” of the intestinal system regulated by chronic stress.
Thanks to enzymes produced by microorganisms, the digestion of fermented raw materials, the release of minerals and vitamins, and the neutralization of compounds that inhibit their utilization already occur in our fermenting vessels. This means that through consuming fermented foods, our body gets much more nutrients at much less energy cost than otherwise.
Bioactive Compounds and Gut Health
Furthermore, bacteria and fungi are also capable of producing so-called bioactive substances that directly nourish and strengthen the human intestinal wall, support optimal functioning of our nervous system, stimulate our immune system, and inhibit the reproduction of pathogenic microorganisms.
The Joy of Fermentation: More Than Just Nutrition
Culinary Adventures and Flavor Exploration
Besides having countless beneficial effects from consumption, the flavors of our fermented foods are full of surprises: they’re exciting and often captivate us the moment they first touch our palate. Not only their consumption but also their preparation can bring joy, as the repetitive, two-handed movements – preparing and chopping raw materials, kneading and placing them in jars – slow us down and calm us, smooth our body and soul, and keep us in the present moment. I’m sure that if Csíkszentmihályi Mihály, the renowned psychologist and happiness researcher, had fermented, he would have considered it a perfect flow experience.
Community Building
Fermentation, beyond individually disconnecting and recharging us, can also be a source of the best community experiences. Whether we prepare or consume these foods together, the experience brings us together and increasingly tightens the bond between us.
Types of Fermentation: Understanding the Science
Wild Fermentation vs. Controlled Cultures
If we approach from the microbiological side, fermentation is nothing more than the conscious multiplication of microorganisms useful to us.
We call it spontaneous or wild fermentation when we work with bacteria and fungi present in our immediate environment – on our raw materials, on our hands, on our tools, and even in the air around us. We shape environmental conditions so that so-called directed selection takes place: species useful for our purposes will multiply and ferment, while their companions causing spoilage or disease will gradually disappear from our foods. By the end of the process, we get a product with special flavor, naturally preserved, and usually with numerous favorable effects.
However, there are special cases when we work with special raw materials or microorganisms. In such cases, we really need even stricter supervision of the process: we sterilize our tools and raw materials, then add those bacteria and/or fungi we want to work with in liquid or powder form to the product. We’ll need this technique for preparing plant-based yogurts and cheeses.
Classification of Fermented Foods by Microorganism Type
Lactic Acid Fermentation: The Foundation of Gut Health
We can group fermentation and fermented foods according to the types of microorganisms participating in the process and the metabolic products formed.
Lactic acid fermented, or lacto-fermented foods are the responsibility of lactic acid bacteria (in Latin: lactobacilli). Their name comes from the fact that they were first successfully observed under a microscope in yogurt: they were named milk-souring, or lactic acid-producing bacteria. Chemically, they have nothing to do with milk, and they’re also suitable for fermenting numerous other raw materials: meats (sausages, salamis), vegetables (sauerkraut, pickles, olives), fruits and seeds (coffee and cocoa beans).
Most recipes in this book are made with lactic acid fermentation. Not only because the pickles and preserved products made this way are incredibly diverse, but also because these are the fermented foods that serve our health the most. The vast majority of microorganisms living in symbiosis with us, forming our gut flora, are exactly the same lactic acid bacteria to which we owe yogurt, kimchi, and sauerkraut.
Alcoholic Fermentation: The Power of Yeasts
Yeasts cause alcoholic fermentation. They convert simple carbohydrates – typically various sugars found in fruits and grains. In the presence of oxygen, they produce water and carbon dioxide from sugars and multiply, while in an oxygen-deprived environment, they “manufacture” ethanol (alcohol) and carbon dioxide from sugars.
We owe various alcoholic beverages to the activity of yeasts: ciders, beers, champagnes, wines, or mashes serving as the basis for distillates. However, due to their intensive carbon dioxide-producing ability, we also use them in symbiosis with various bacteria for so-called mixed fermentation.
Mixed Fermentation and Acetic Acid Production
Mixed fermentation occurs, for example, during leavening (both for leavened vegetables and baked goods made with sourdough), and during the preparation of kombucha, milk and water kefir, and wild-fermented soft drinks.
During acetic acid fermentation, acetic acid is formed from alcohol produced by yeasts in the presence of oxygen. The acetic acid bacteria settling from the air on the surface of aerated wine or other lower alcohol content drinks, or more precisely the enzymes they produce, are responsible for the transformation. After we’ve learned to ferment simple alcoholic beverages, we’ll only have to wait patiently for acetification.
The Historical Journey: From Mystery to Science
Pre-Microscopic Understanding
The world of bacteria and fungi was completely unknown to people until the 1600s. However, with the discovery of the microscope, the world of tiny creatures was revealed to our eyes. Even then, another hundred years had to pass before Louis Pasteur realized that it wasn’t supernatural forces working in fermented, bubbling foods, but armies of microscopic living beings.
Pasteur’s Revolutionary Discovery
Pasteur and his colleague Robert Koch also managed to decode that the fermenting process is caused by the metabolic activity of bacteria and fungi: they produce enzymes that break down various organic substances into smaller components. Microorganisms derive their energy from these transformations, essentially “feeding” on them.
The Rise and Fall of Industrial Food Preservation
Following this realization, it was also discovered how fermentation could be prevented and cooked foods and raw materials preserved in their original state: bacteria and fungi must be eliminated. Pasteurization – preservation through heat treatment – chemical preservatives and the canning industry, as well as the appearance and development of refrigerators during the 20th century, gradually displaced fermentation from households as well.
The popularity of fermentation as a food preparation and preservation method was also not increased by the fact that under the microscope, not only beneficial but also pathogenic microorganisms came to light. Recognizing their role in spreading various diseases, the “hygiene revolution” began – the manic persecution of tiny creatures and their radical elimination from humans’ immediate environment. By the end of the 20th century, most people began to view bacteria as an invisible, potential source of danger.
