edible Marin and Wine Country Winter 2010 : Page 30
days. We watch it closely because it changes constantly— every ferment is different,” said Levinger. Juniper berries, like cabbage and many other fruits and vegetables, are also coated in a “blush” of fine white powder. The blush acts as a natural barrier for the fruit, protecting it from birds and insects. When the berries are submerged in water, wild yeasts start the ferment, and the sugar in the berries feeds the ferment. Using airborne yeasts, not strains that have been perfected in a lab, means that a ferment has its own terroir , a term more commonly used to describe the flavor of wine resulting from the natural environment in which the grapes for the wine were grown. Wild-fermented curtido, kimchi or pickles made by Wild West Ferments in Point Reyes Station will simply taste different than kimchi made anywhere else. It is this inherent variation in character that makes these locally-made products unique and worth seeking out. Kombucha, a fermented beverage derived from green or black tea, goes through a similar fermentation to that of vegetable and fruit ferments but varies in a few significant ways. First, a “mother culture” must be made or purchased. According to Michaela Biaggi, a former brewer at LonjeviTea, the “mother” is the original blob of bacteria and yeast—called a SCOBY: Symbiotic Community of Bacteria and Yeast—that is added to the brew. Second, granulated or raw cane sugar is always used in brewing kombucha. It is the mother’s job to convert the sugar in the tea brew into the vitamins, minerals and enzymes that are present in the final product. Third, like wine, kom-bucha will turn to vinegar if fermented too long. Acetic acid is one of the major organic acids found in kombucha, thanks to the Acetobacter bacteria. This bacteria is responsible for that sour taste which we love in kraut and vinegar, but not so much in wine or kombucha. Fourth, as the SCOBY converts the sugar it also lets off CO 2 and makes alcohol. The fizzier the kombucha, the more CO 2 present, but this is also an indicator that, similar to beer, more alcohol is likely to be in the brew. In June 2010, Whole Foods stores asked kom-bucha producers to voluntarily pull their product off store shelves if they could not guarantee that the alcohol levels would stay below .5%—the FDA requirement to be considered a nonalcoholic beverage and therefore not subject to regula-tions. Since kombucha is not pasteurized and is literally alive with bacteria, it continues to ferment after bottling. Kathy Taylor of Vibranz (www.vibranzbev.com), a kombucha maker located in Healdsburg, said their brewers have now added a step to their kombucha ferment to guarantee that the alcohol level does not rise over the .5% level when stored according to their instructions, for the 60-day shelf life requested by Whole Foods.” What happens if you leave kombucha in your car on a hot summer day is another matter altogether. Photos: top, Robin Carpenter; bottom, courtesy of Golden Star Tea Pu-erh (pronounced “poo-air”) tea can be considered kombu-cha’s great aunt—forget all that jazzy stuff about SCOBY and alcohol; pu-erh’s heritage is low tech. David Lee Hoffman of the Phoenix Collection (www.thephoenixcollection.com), widely acknowledged as the first American to work directly with ancient tea farms in China, has 40 years of experience importing and selling tea. Among other things, Hoffman imports organic raw jungle green tea and ferments pu-erh teas himself in Lagunitas. Pu-erh teas are derived from the varietal of green tea, Camellia assamica —a variant of Camellia sinensis —native to Yunnan Province in China—and come in two basic styles: “raw” and “cooked.” After the tea leaves have been picked, the leaves are “heaped” to begin fermentation. “It’s kind of All the ingredients, ex-cept for Epernay yeast, in Golden Star’s White Jasmine Sparkling Tea 30 | EDIBLE MARIN & WINE COUNTRY WINTER 2010
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