7. Fermenting Cilantro and Other Garden Herbs

Say goodbye to drying herbs and hello to fermenting them. Discover the magic of fermentation for nutrition, flavor, and preservation through your garden’s herbs. Fermentation is easy and safe. In this class, learn why this is the best way to preserve tender herbs for superior flavor, and how to do it.

VIDEO TRANSCRIPT

Kirsten Shockey: Hi there. My name is Kirsten Shockey, and today I’m gonna be teaching you about fermenting cilantro. Skills that you can use for fermenting other tender herbs. And I am the author, co-author of four books now. We’ve got Fermented Vegetables, Fiery Ferments, Miso, Tempeh, Natto and Other Tasty Things, which includes Koji, and our brand-new cider making book.

[00:00:39] If we were gonna be live this year, this is what we’d be talking about at the Mother Earth News fairs. We’re gonna miss seeing you all in live and the wonderful staff at Mother Earth News. But we’re delighted to be part of this. And yeah, if you wanna learn more, please check out our books or go to our new online fermentation school at [00:01:00] fermentationschool.com.

[00:01:01] And now let’s go into the garden and pick some cilantro

[00:01:14] Hi. So if we were at a regular Mother Earth News Fair, I would be flying in from somewhere, and I would be going to the local market and trying to find something to give you guys a demonstration. But instead what I get to do is pick from my own garden this morning, and we are gonna ferment cilantro today because as you can see, I have got a ton of cilantro here that is wanting to bolt.

[00:01:44] And so I’m gonna trim it up and take it in. I’m gonna pull some plants too, because I don’t know if you can tell, but we’ve got a lot of successions going on in this box. We’ve got a little delicata squash plant here that is gonna need some room [00:02:00] soon. So this part of the cilantro is going, and we’ll see you up at the kitchen.

[00:02:06] Hi there. Today, I’m gonna show you how to ferment these tender herbs from our garden. I don’t know about you, but when I dry cilantro, for example, or basil or Thai basil, one of the things that happens is that all those volatile oils seem to escape with the drying process. And when I go to use them, they just don’t have that punch and beautiful flavor that they once did.

[00:02:32] And so a number of years ago, we started fermenting our herbs and found that this was a wonderful strategy for flavor to keep that vibrance and that kind of life that they have when they’re f- freshly harvested from the garden. So this is how we preserve our herbs now. The other thing, the other advantage to this is that I really like to work with seasonal produce and when it’s [00:03:00] on.

[00:03:00] In the garden right now, our tomatoes aren’t ready yet, our peppers aren’t ready yet, our tomatillos aren’t ready yet. But the cilantro is full on ready. So when I go to make salsa later in the summer and my s- cilantro has bolted and become coriander, I will still have this fermented paste to add to those recipes and, so I’m gonna show you a couple of ways to do that today. Here’s a bunch. If you bought a bunch also, you would have the stems. If the stems don’t feel too stemmy you can go ahead and chop those.

[00:03:43] And the stems have a lot of flavor in them. This is the batch that I’m going to use for, future salsas. I’m also gonna use it maybe in the wintertime if I’m gonna make a guacamole or something like that where I want a little bit of that fresh cilantro and I [00:04:00] don’t have it

[00:04:03] I’m gonna put that in the food processor

[00:04:11] I’m gonna add salt

[00:04:17] So for this amount and this garlic here, I’ve calculated a 3% salt. It’s gonna give me a sort of a- Not a scant teaspoon is about what I’m looking for here. Now, I could ferment this as it is. The cilantro, I’ve done this for years, just plain cilantro, and you’re welcome to do that as well. But I like to add some garlic because the garlic does two things.

[00:04:50] One is it gives me more flavor to work with later, and the other thing is that cilantro leaves on their own don’t [00:05:00] have a whole lot of carbohydrate in them, and it’s that carbohydrate that turns to acid. So to make sure that I also get that acid below 4.0, if I add something like a root, in this case, the garlic that’s nice and sugary, I’m gonna get a little more acid development.

[00:05:19] So let’s grind this up.

[00:05:35] ‘Cause I have those stems in there, I want to make sure that I get a really nice grind. Let’s do a little more and then I’ll show you guys

[00:05:59] Okay. [00:06:00] So now we’re gonna set it up for the fermentation

[00:06:20] This smells good Now, I know some of you out there don’t love cilantro. In fact, it doesn’t taste good to you at all. But this same technique will work with basil or shiso or tulsi or any kind of tender annual herb

[00:06:58] Press that in there. So [00:07:00] it’s really important. Isn’t that crazy how small that is? It’s really important you press that down. Now you’re not gonna see a whole lot of brine, but there’s enough. All you need is an anaerobic situation. So once you press that in, it’s gonna be nice and anaerobic, and you’re gonna set this up to ferment So what I like to do to fill up this space here, we don’t want that, that large air space here, is first I’m gonna take a towel and I’m gonna clean off the edges.

[00:07:41] Because if there are some microbes that want to grow on something, that will be the place they find are those little bits. And then I’m going to put this baggie in here. Now, any- anything, anything works. Remember, humans have been [00:08:00] fermenting for thousands and thousands of years. They haven’t used plastic bags.

[00:08:04] I use this because if you’re a brand-new fermenter, this is a really successful me- method because that bag will get in there and it will cover that whole top and also weigh it down. And what this does is it keeps the situation in here anaerobic, and the reason you want it to stay anaerobic is you want m- the lactobacillus to have the upper hand.

[00:08:35] And where the oxygen hits is where things like yeasts or m- molds or things like that can get to growing So what this does is these wrinkles in the bag, you can see now that they are filling up with a little bit of that brine, and these wrinkles in the bag will let the CO2 that’s created out, but won’t [00:09:00] let new oxygen in.

[00:09:01] Now, how will you know when that’s fermented? See this bright, vibrant color, especially in the brine? It’s really bright, really green, really fresh out of the garden. As it starts to ferment, that’s gonna look cloudy. It’s gonna look maybe a little more kind of orange-ish brown color. The green will become a much duller, darker color in some cases.

[00:09:25] With some herbs, it will become actually a little bit lighter, more olive-y. But either way, they… it will look dull. And you will start to smell just a slight pickley flavor. Because there’s not a lot of carbohydrates in here, sugar it won’t be, a really obvious acidity like cabbage for example.

[00:09:43] So what you’re gonna wanna do is, if you don’t, if you’re not sure, you can put a pH strip in there and test it. Otherwise, like I said, once you see those color changes, once you taste the acidity it it’s done. And then you can put it in your [00:10:00] refrigerator, and I would move this to a smaller jar because, again, you’d want as little air space as possible.

[00:10:07] And you can even cut a little piece of wax paper or something to put that on top to help keep that safe because there’s not a whole lot of brine in here. And I found these herbal ferments, they keep that flavor, and they last and last. In an anaerobic environment in the fridge, this can last you for years or more.

[00:10:27] There’s no reason to keep it that long, but it’s a very good way to preserve these vegetables. All right. So this will sit on my counter. In summertime temperatures, it will probably ferment in two to three weeks. These herbs sometimes take a little longer. Again, this is all about that lactobacillus eating the sugar.

[00:10:52] All right. I’ve got another pile of cilantro that I’ve taken the time to take all the [00:11:00] stems off. It was really stemmy and I want this to be a much smoother consistency. I’m gonna actually make a vinegar out of this, a scrap vinegar, because this is a lot of stem. It’s a lot of flavor locked up in here that I’m going to capture that way.

[00:11:18] So for these, I could throw this in a bowl, put the salt in there and squish it, and then, like I said, you’d have cilantro to use in whatever you want it to use. But one of the things that I really like is to use cilantro to make kind of a green goddess cilantro dressing, and for that I use green onions.

[00:11:43] And we have in the garden right now also some huge green onions. And so I’m going to show you how to put those together[00:12:00]

[00:12:03] I’m gonna rough chop these

[00:12:45] I’m gonna put Garlic’s in there, not as much this time. The garlic and the onion will f- perform that same task of adding just a little bit more carbohydrate to the mix. Again, not [00:13:00] necessary, but I want the flavor anyway So we’re gonna rough chop this a little bit

[00:13:24] Add a l- this a little at a time. And this is gonna get a scant tablespoon. We’ve got about three times as much cilantro here. And feel free to taste for saltiness. You want it to taste salty. You want to know the salt’s there. You do not want it to be, briny or over- overly salty. The nice thing about these ferments is that you will also use this as flavor anyway, so if you feel like it is too salty, just use less salt in your recipe.[00:14:00] [00:15:00] [00:16:00]

[00:16:22] All right. Without the stems or at least as many of the stems, you can see it’s a finer consistency. And wow, those onions are making my eyes water From here on out, it’s the same idea. We’re going to

[00:16:42] press this into

[00:16:55] I don’t know if you can tell, but because the onion is [00:17:00] quite moist, the whole ferment here is quite a bit moister

[00:17:47] I’ve never had a green onion take me away All right. I am going to actually use this for some salad dressing currently, [00:18:00] ’cause I want to leave a little bit of space here in this jar Again, I’m gonna wipe off those edges. And this time I’m gonna put some weights in place. There are lots of little stones, little ceramic or glass pebbles that go into place.

[00:18:19] And I’m gonna also put a follower, so that can be a leaf. Grape leaves are on right now. That would be great. It can be a piece of wax paper. I’m gonna use this piece of gauze or cheesecloth. And I’ve got these little weights here, and I’m just gonna put those in place. You can use marbles, just cleaned, washed off pebbles, just something to help keep that CO2 moving up and out and [00:19:00] through the ferment

[00:19:03] I’m gonna put the lid on tightly, and I’m gonna age or ferment this one just a little bit differently than that. And when I feel this bulging, I’m gonna give it a quick burp like that and then close it back up. This will let any CO2 out, but no new oxygen in. So it’s another great way to ferment, and the instructions for when it’s done are pretty much the same.

[00:19:32] You will see a difference. You will see the color changes. As you’re burping it, you will start to smell the changes. Again, watch that brine. When it starts getting cloudy and looking very different, not this vibrant green that’s at the beginning of the process. And yeah, just like this one, you’ll keep it in your fridge.

[00:19:54] Thank you so much for joining me today and looking at how you can preserve [00:20:00] herbs in, from your garden. And yeah, go forth and ferment.

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