The hotter the environment, the more salt you need in your initial brine.
In warm environments, the food can spoil before the beneficial bacteria have a chance to establish a good ferment.
This is why it is easier to ferment foods in cool weather, and one of the reasons why ferments are often made with cool-weather crops such as cabbage and root vegetables.
Salt-free ferments can be especially tricky in hot weather.
If you’re hoping to make crisp fermented pickles in the warmest weeks of summer, it’s wise to add a little extra salt to the brine.
Use vegetables and fruits that are in excellent condition.
You can’t expect crunch from your fermented cucumbers if they were limp to begin with.
Remember to always use filtered or non-chlorinated
Once you start eating out of one of your jars or crocks of Lacto-fermented food, be prepared to do a little maintenance work.
Anytime a container gets down to two-thirds or less of its Lacto-fermented contents, it is a good idea to transfer the remaining goods to a smaller jar or container.
Fermented food sitting in a container with a lot of air space above it tends to lift out of the liquid that is preserving it and discolor it unattractively.
Use glass, ceramic, or stainless-steel containers for your ferments.
Not only can plastic give the food an off flavor, but certain types of plastic can leach harmful compounds into the food as well.
Eat your ferments young if you prefer a lighter flavor; let them age for a few months if you want a more mouth-puckeringly sour taste.
The food will be safe for a year or longer, but even the crunchiest fermented vegetables and fruits start to soften after about 6 months.
Store ferments you expect to eat within a few weeks on the comparatively warm shelves of the door of your refrigerator.
If you want the ferment to last for months, keep a good texture, and not develop an overly strong sour taste, store it on the top shelf of the main body of the refrigerator, which is the coldest area.
Save the leftover brine after you finish eating the food it was preserving.
Use it in salad dressings, or sprinkle it on lentil or bean soups.
You can also use a splash of brine from a previous ferment as a starter culture to kick-start your next one.
Canning Lacto-fermented food in a boiling water bath or pressure canner is a lousy
It’s not that you couldn’t:
It would be perfectly safe, and you would end up with a product closer to the canned sauerkraut at the store (although that was probably made as a vinegar-based recipe, not by traditional fermentation).
What’s wrong with that?
The heat of the canning process will destroy all of the good-for-you probiotic bacteria in your fermented product.
It will still be edible.
It may even still be somewhat tasty.
But you will have wiped out one of the major advantages of eating fermented foods, which is their health benefits.
