Hein Family Enterprises

Recipe for Making Lacto Fermented Beets

Sally Fallon, in Nourishing Traditions, advises to cut the beets into 1/4 inch cubes and to bake before fermenting. Her rationale is that this helps prevent alcohol production

Using my recipe, you should be able to produce lacto fermented beets using grated, raw beets and still control yeast growth, thus preventing production of alcohol.

Lacto Fermented Beets. Enjoy!

• Wash, peel and grate enough beets to make 6 to 7 cups packed, grated beets.
• Add one tablespoon Celtic Sea Salt.
• Add one capsule of Spectrabiotic.
• Mix together well and let stand for about an hour or until the juices are drawn out of the beets.
• Spoon a one inch layer into the bottom of a wide mouth pint canning jar.
• Use the vegetable pounder to pack the beets into the jar.
• Spoon in another layer and pack again until the jar is filled to within an inch of the top. (I use two sizes of pounders; one 2 1/2 inches diameter and another about 1/1/4 inches diameter. As the juices begin to rise above the vegetables in the jar, I switch to the smaller diameter pounder. I can thus pack the vegetables without making the liquid run over.)
• Clean off the jar rim and cap tightly with a good lid.
• Fill a second pint jar. (You can use 1/2 pint jars to make the measure come out right if necessary.)
• Allow the jars to sit at room temperature for three days. Then refrigerate.
• The beets can be eaten immediately or allowed to age a little in the refrigerator before being eaten.

A Word About Spectrabiotic

I have not used inoculants other than the Spectrabiotic called for in this recipe. This blend of eight beneficial bacteria are microblended with AFA algae to provide the bacteria with the nutrients for vigorous growth and establishment. This product is excellent as a probiotics supplement and makes very good tasting lacto fermented vegetables. Using Spectrabiotic as an inoculant for lacto fermented vegetables and lacto fermented grains has been my innovation.

Musings

Growing up I couldn’t stand the taste of beets. I don’t know what it is about the beets I grow here in Wyoming, but they don’t taste like the vegetable I was made to eat as a child in Oklahoma. Maybe climate has something to do with it. I am sure PlanetFood has something to do with the much improved flavor. I know it makes my cucumbers and squash far better than the ordinary.

So I have had to laugh at myself. When I first discovered I liked my beets, the reflex of disliking them was so strong I nearly couldn’t force myself to swallow. But the good flavor of these beets (whether raw, cooked into soup, or lacto fermented) has won me over.

Ellis Hein

Tags: lacto fermented beets

This entry was posted on Wednesday, January 18th, 2012 at 5:35 pm and is filed under Recipe. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.