Page 17 - The Valley Table - Winter 2022

MAKE KOMBUCHA AT HOME
Yields 1⁄2 gallon
1
Make sweetened tea. Boil water and add 1⁄2 cup cane sugar. Stir until sugar is dissolved and remove from heat. Steep your tea of choice (3 tablespoons or 2 tea bags) for 20 minutes, covered. Strain and let cool.
2
Add kombucha culture.
Fill a 64 oz. glass jar with your room temperature tea. Add SCOBY liquids (available to purchase at seeknorth.com/merch). Lightly stir, and then add rest of SCOBY—it will either float, sink, or move sideways, which are all OK signs. Liquid must be 1” or more below the neck of the jar. Cover jar with muslin, fabric, or coffee filter, and secure with rubber band.
3
Ferment.
Place your kombucha brew away from any elements (sunlight, trash, fresh fruit). Secure it in an undisturbed environment with a temperature of 68–85°F. After 5–7 days, give it a taste. If it’s slightly sweet, a bit tart, and acidic—it’s ready. It can ferment for up to 14 days. When done, reserve two cups for a future brew and refrigerate the rest.
something that has stuck with me.
I love fermenting so much that I enrolled in The Master Food Preserver program at Cornell Cooperative Extension in 2014 with the goal of improving my pickling, canning, and fermenting game while also learning about proper food safety. It wasn’t until 2016—after Julian contracted Lyme disease—that kombucha became part of our story. I was doing extensive research to try to find healing solutions for him, and I learned that over 70 percent of our immune tissue is in our gut. I knew we had to start there to get Julian on the right path to recovery.
He was taking so many antibiotics that I knew his gut was being stripped of all bacteria, both bad and good. We needed to replenish his gut biome with natural probiotics, and I knew kombucha was a great option to accomplish this. After all, you can only eat so much kimchi or sauerkraut. Essentially, that’s how Seek North Kombucha was born—by trying to create a different, healthier, and smoother kombucha.
How does a novice fermenter get started?
Start off with something easy
like kombucha or sauerkraut. For kraut, you only need cabbage and salt. Kombucha also has only two ingredients: sweetened tea and a SCOBY (symbiotic culture of bacteria and yeast). From there, you can learn about more complicated ferments
like lacto-fermented kimchi, lacto- fermented cucumbers, and yogurt. When you’re not cooking for yourself, where do you like to eat?
I live in Uptown Kingston, so you’ll often find me having dinner and drinks at Boitson’s and Hotel Kinsley. I also love Pakt for brunch and grabbing
a sandwich at Lunch Nightly or the Lunchbox. When I get cravings for Asian cuisine, I’ll order Japanese from Yasuda or Kyoto.
What’s a staple Vietnamese dish that’s perfect for winter?
Beef pho. To prepare it properly,
you simmer a rich broth with oxtail and beef bones and add flavor with charred aromatics like shallots, ginger, anise, peppercorns, and coriander. The broth is velvety smooth with a thin layer of fat skimming the surface. It’s served piping hot with fresh herbs like Thai basil, bean sprouts, cilantro, and scallions. On a wintry day, it warms your entire body and soul, because there’s a lot of love needed to make authentic pho.
What are your top three ingredients to cook with?
No Asian kitchen is complete without fish sauce, soy sauce, and Maggi Seasoning (a food flavor enhancer similar to soy or tamari, that comes in liquid, powder,
or cube form). With those three seasonings, you can cook almost any Vietnamese dish.
What’s the one utensil you can’t
live without?
Chopsticks. You can use them to stir-fry meats or veggies, as tongs, or even instead of a whisk to stir sauces and marinades. You’ll always see my parents cooking in the kitchen with a pair in their hands.
— Francesca Furey
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