Also By This Author

Wild Fermentation

The Flavor, Nutrition, and Craft of Live-Culture Foods

by Sandor Katz

Reviews

Review by Cathe Olson for VegFamily Magazine

I'm wild about Wild Fermentation. This cookbook is so inspiring. Sandor Katz, an HIV/AIDS survivor, believes that eating fermented foods played an important part in his healing. In Wild Fermentation, he shares his fermentation experiences and recipes.

Wild Fermentation covers just about every vegetarian food that can be fermented. The section on Vegetable Ferments includes sauerkraut, kimchi, and pickles. In Bean Ferments, Kandor explains how fermentation helps to improve the digestibility of beans and neutralizes the phytic acid that inhibits mineral absorption. The section contains methods for making miso and tempeh and includes recipes that use those foods.

Grain ferments contains recipes for porridges, amasake, and rejuvelac. There are methods for making sourdough breads, pancakes, and crackers. The book also includes sections on naturally fermented vinegars, wines, and beers. Dairy Ferments offers methods to make kefir, yogurt, and cheese and Katz includes vegan alternatives for most of the recipes.

I love the way the recipes are presented. Katz urges readers to trust their instincts - not to be bogged down by exact measurements or specific ingredients but to experiment and evolve. It's like Katz takes you into his kitchen to show you what he does and then sends you out to do your own thing. In addition to recipes, Katz includes lots of information on the benefits of fermented foods. He also briefly explores the history and politics of human nutrition, advocating organic and non-genetically engineered foods.

I liked everything about Wild Fermentation. The book is interesting and Katz's style welcoming. His candor about his health and lifestyle make this more than just a cookbook. After reading Wild Fermentation, I felt like I wanted to go and hang out with Katz at his peaceful intentional community in Tennessee and ferment some veggies with him. Katz makes fermenting sound like a fun adventure to embark on. Even if you don't make any of the recipes, this is a great book just to read.

Midwest Book Review (Oregon, WI USA)

With Sandor Katz's Wild Fermentation: The Flavor, Nutrition, And Craft Of Live-culture Foods as their guide, meal time dishes involving fermented and live-culture cuisines are not to be thought of as being restricted to gourmet class professional chefs. Most of us would recognize a great number of fermented foods (bread, coffee, chocolate, beer, wine, cheese, miso, yogurt, sauerkraut) that find their place in our kitchens and on our dining room tables. These are foods that depend on complex bacterial activity in order to be nutritional and palate-pleasing ingredients to our dining. What Sandor Katz has done is to compile a book that explores the history and politics of human nutrition, draws attention to world food traditions, and demonstrates the vital connection between natural, "live culture" foods and good human health. Wild Fermentation deserves a rightful place in any personal, professional, or academic Food & Nutrition reference collection -- and should be read by every dedicated kitchen cook in America!

From Booklist

Fermentation is one of the earliest natural processes involving food and its preservation that humans sought to control. The earliest puffed-up breads, wines, and cheeses likely occurred by chance, and results were scarcely uniform or predictable. Disconcerted by off-flavors and spoilage in beer, wine, and baked goods, early peoples learned to control microorganisms whose existence would not be demonstrated for centuries. But in that process of control, people lost some of the benefits of wild fermentation. Sandor Ellix Katz has experimented with Wild Fermentation, and his book explains to others how to take advantage of natural fermentation processes to produce bread, yogurt, cheese, beer, wine, miso, sauerkraut, kimchi, and other fermented foods. A gold mine for science-fair projects, Katz's work presents properly supervised young people ample opportunity to explore both the science and the art of fermented foods (alcoholic beverages excepted).
Mark Knoblauch Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Library Journal

Katz, a gardener, cook, and writer, is also a long-term HIV/AIDS survivor who strongly believes that the live-culture ferments in foods have kept him alive and healthy. In this unusual book, he makes a case for the benefits of fermentation, an ancient preservation technique that he says makes foods much more digestible and nutritious and that is lacking in the Western diet. Among other weighty topics, he explores worldwide traditions of fermented foods, the history of human nutrition, and fermentation as part of the cycle of life; many chapters explain the science and techniques of vegetable, bean, dairy, and bread fermentation, with more than 90 recipes (e.g., sauerkraut, kimchi, miso, yogurt, breads, wines and vinegar, and beers) included. Katz has obviously done comprehensive research on his subject and is passionate about it (although he tells readers much more than they want to know about his digestive process). While foodies who enjoy the sensual pleasures of the table will find Katz's attitude completely contrary to theirs, this specialized guide will appeal to those facing similar health challenges. For large collections.
--Mary Schlueter, Missouri River Regional Lib., Jefferson City Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.