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Fermentation Sous-vide

Jason_37238

Would it be dangerous to put some thinly sliced veggies with 2% salt and 4% whey in sous-vide bags and let ferment?

refrigerated or not?

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tilman

The bags might blow up.
What you are trying to do sounds a lot like Sourkraut or Kimchi preparation.
Perhaps take some inspiration from those production techniques.
We have sourkraut pots at home, they have a loose lid which sits in a water filled groove to let the CO2 bubble out but still be sealed.

My mom also had a lactic acid fermentation technique that worked in a preserving jar. I never liked the taste, but we did all sorts of vegetables that way. The process works well. No need to fuss around with plastic bags.
Just find some old recipes, it's a bit out of fashion. (Pickling just tastes a bit cleaner and leaves more of the texture intact so that is what everyone does these days.)

Anyway, not really a answer to your question. But it sounds to me like the problem has already been solved quite well.

Brendan_Lee_56950

I don't think there would be a problem with them being in unsealed bags if the plastic is what you are worried about but I agree with @tilman that the bags could potentially blow up with the gas build up.

Brandon_34695

I've made kimchi in vacuum bags that were much larger than their contents. There isn't all that much gas in a week or two. If the bag is plenty large, it isn't going to burst any time soon and I'd assume you are checking it daily. Seen this done at the Momofuku labs.

Brendan_Lee_56950

seems like you would have to be making a pretty small batch then? I guess if you were using a foodsaver where you could make your own bag length you could make it as big as you want. I just don't think I could fit a whole head of cabbage in my biggest chamber bag and leave enough room for expansion.

SteveM_20803

Having just moved 4 quarts of countertop sauerkraut into the fridge, I am wondering why you would want to put it in bags? I use canning jars as it is easy to take the lid off and check the flavor. I wouldn't want to load bags each week and reseal them.

Craig_93207

Sous Vide obviously removes oxygen so it might inhibit fermentation. also Botulism becomes a concern in an anaerobic environment.

DiggingDogFarm_65362

Lactic acid fermentation is anaerobic but I don't see any advantage of fermenting in bags...canning jars do work great.

I do plan to experiment with salting and compressing cabbage in a chamber vacuum sealer before fermenting in jars.

I want to see if it affects the texture and speeds fermentation.

seijoed

You get a little snappier texture initially, long term I'm not sure how much it matters.

I do the "swedish pizza salad" that way pretty often, cabbage, oil, vinegar, little sugar, salt, pepper, oregano, bag it up

and give it a vacuum, you get a nice "ready" salad with good crunch.

Brandon_34695

The advantage for me is, I don't have to store a bunch of crocks. I'm way beyond the limits of my kitchen storage.

SteveM_20803

@Brandon_ since you can ferment directly in a jar, without the use of the crock, I would believe the storage requirements would be about the same. The added benefit is you don't have to then repack from the crock but just move the jar to the fridge when you have reached your limit.

Yngve_Hilmo_12861

Nomas food lab(nordicfoodlab.org) suggests using 2% salt to the weight of the vegetables, before vacuum sealing and leaving to ferment for 1-4 weeks... pretty awesome for testing smaller quantities when developing recipes.

Jason_37238

how is there no danger for botulism if you sous vide veggies with salt and leave it in the pantry or fridge?

DiggingDogFarm_65362

It has to ferment (acidify) to be safe.

chriswrightcycles

I'd like to resurrect this old thread.

Jason, have you experimented with this since you posted this? Is a brine necessary for this technique or should dry salting do the trick before pulling a vacuum?