Fermented Turmeric Is A Superfood That's Packed With Health Benefits
Fermented Turmeric is a tasty and healthy seasoning to have in your refrigerator for cooking and baking, ready to use. It will store for a year or more. Fermenting turmeric increases the many health benefits of fresh turmeric, adds probiotics, and makes it easy to have this powerful ally for wellness available every day, year round. Get more turmeric into your life with this easy recipe!
Equipment
- A pint jar for fermenting - A mason jar or Bormioli Rocco Fido Jar works great.
- Fermentation Lid - Fermentation lids or Airlocks require no maintnance, but a regular lid works fine if you burp it daily.
- Fermentation weight - Best: a glass fermentation weight for wide mouth mason jars or use a baggie filled with 2% salt brine.
- Pickle packer (optional) - I use a pickle packer but you can use a spoon too for packing your ingredients.
- Scale (optional). - Helpful but not neccessary is a scale. You'll find it useful if you ferment a lot but in this recipe you can also use a measuring spoon, see the instructions below.
- Blender, Grater or Food Processor - An electric food processor or Manual chopper will finely chop your turmeric. You can use a grater for small amounts, or for a smooth paste, use a Blender that can handle pastes, or a Vitamix.
- Wide mouth funnel (optional) - very handy is a wide mouth funnel for packing your jar.
Ingredients
- 1 lb Organic turmeric, unpeeled (You might need a little less, I used 14 oz for my pint) - Get fresh organic turmeric at Azure Standard.
- 1 tsp Peppercorn - Use whole black peppercorn,
- 1½ tsp Salt - Redmond's Real Salt or Himalayan pink salt. You can also use unrefined sea salt or Kosher sea salt. Avoid table salt or other salt that has additives!
Instructions
- While peeling improves the flavor of turmeric, you'll not want to do that when you ferment it. We want the beneficial bacteria that grows naturally on the skin, to make fermenting possible. If you absolutely want to peel yours, you'll need to add a couple of tablespoons of starter culture. This can be juice from a previous ferment or whey from strained yogurt or cheesemaking.
- Roughly chop the turmeric. If you're using a scale, weigh your food processor bowl, record the weight and tare it to zero in grams. Add the turmeric, record the weight, and process. I used a food processor.
- Add peppercorn or fresh ground pepper (the piperin will oxidize quickly and lose its benefits, so don't use ground pepper from a box).
- Now calculate your salt. You'll be using 2% of the weight of the turmeric in salt. If your turmeric weighs 400 grams, this is your formula: 400 x .02 = 8. You'll be adding 8 grams of salt. If you don't have a scale, add 1½ tsp per pound of turmeric.
- Give the paste another whirl to incorporate the pepper and salt.
- Using a funnel, transfer your ingredients into the fermentation jar.
- With your pickle packer, or spoon, press the ingredients firmly into the jar to eliminate air bubbles and to submerge the ingredients in the brine.
- Cover the ingredients with a fermentation weight or a ziplock baggie that's filled with 2% salt brine. If your jar is only half full, this is actually the best solution, so you can reduce the air space that occupies the jar.
- Seal with a fermentation lid.
- Place a plate under it and leave it for 10-21 days in a darkish corner at about 70-80℉. 3 weeks is the recommended time for long fermentation. But it will be pretty good after a week.
- Maintenance and Observing: Keep a casual eye on your fermentation. You don't need to do anything if it looks ok. It will start to bubble after a few days and might possibly ooze out of the jar. If you see a whitish layer on top, that should be skimmed off every few days.
- If you're using a regular mason jar lid, don't forget to burp it every day.
- Now you can open it, look at it, smell it. If nothing seems off, taste some. If it's good, take out the weight and top with a regular lid and place it into the refrigerator or cellar. If your turmeric paste is a little dry and your brine isn't covering your ferment anymore, you can add a little brine from another ferment or just add some raw vinegar to cover the ingredients and keep them from getting moldy on top. Most ferments will keep for at least a year. I have kept many of my ferments successfully in a cellar with fluctuating temperatures (35-60 degrees) even for 2 or more years.
Notes
Enjoy Your Fermented Turmeric!
Congratulations! You've got a nice jar of living turmeric paste in your fridge! This was so easy and now you can enjoy mess free fresh turmeric paste whenever you need it. Cooking or baking will destroy the probiotics. However, all the other benefits are still going to be there, and gentle cooking actually releases a few more. So use fermented turmeric paste generously raw or in your cooked meals and reap the benefits of this powerful ally for your health.