GRAND OPENING: Cultured Butternut Squash

POST #858
Back to the fermented butternut squash I told you about several days ago.

This was “opening night”!  WOO-HOO!
I want you to know that I have squirmed every day and night since I put that stuff up.  Because of the smell the fermenting gave off, I was afraid I had put in too much garlic, and then I worried I had put in too much jalapeno.  I had already started planning what I could do with it if I couldn’t eat it straight out of the jar.  (I’ve never gone through so much agony over a ferment before)

Well, tonight was the night I decided to open it up.  Tentatively, I took a heaping forkful out and put it in a bowl. Even more tentatively, I took a small forkful in my mouth!

Oh my!  Heavens!  Goodness! Woo-hoo! Oh boy! Wow!  This stuff beats tomato salsa in sweet flavor.  The squash is soft (the way I had hoped it would be — easy chewing), and the flavor is …. pickled!  Amazing!  I did not put any vinegar in the mix, but you’d think I had, from the bright, sweet flavor.  The garlic is not overwhelming, and the jalapeno just gives a mild zing.  I love that vinegary taste, for sure.

I combined it half and half with a “TuNo” mix, and ate a big bowl of it.

I can see grinding this up fine and making a spread to put on other food, or sandwiches, or use as a dip.  I could use it as a soup base.  I could use it as a salad base and add some sprouts (that reminds me, I need to make some new lentil sprouts).

Suffice it to say – this stuff is yummy!

This is stuff I could get hungry for all over the place  (and I don’t get hungry for much).

I will have to start a couple of new jars at least by tomorrow, because I want to show off this stuff and give it to my next-door-neighbors, people who have helped me or given me stuff, and some people I really don’t like (must do something to resolve the karma).  They will get the next jars!  This stuff is all for me!

Meanwhile, except that I am full, I would go right back to the kitchen and eat some more of this stuff. It is really good.

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FERMENTED BUTTERNUT SQUASH UPDATE

POST #854
The apartment smells of garlic (It’s good I like garlic – don’t know how the room-mate feels about it – she once asked me to never dehydrate garlic again, so I only do it when she is out of town).  I’m a little curious, as I have never made a ferment that smelled unless you put your nose right down by the jar.  

I’m guessing that this means that the ferment is going to be very garlicky, probably not good for eating straight.  In that eventuality, I’m imagining that I could use it as a base for soup.   I’m wondering if I could even use it as a fermenting agent for another jar of something fermented. Hmn. The adventure continues……

BUTTERNUT SQUASH FERMENT

POST #853
I read a recipe for butternut squash kimchi, but I did not have any ginger on hand, and I couldn’t be sure that I would enjoy eating the pieces (I’m a very lazy chewer), so I decided to put the butternut squash through the food processor, but only grate it up coarsely (i.e., this is not my usual applesauce-textured concoction).

I can never leave well enough alone, and, for the most part, I am convinced that garlic and jalapeno improve just about anything in sight.  I took a handful of garlic (maybe ten cloves) and a medium-sized jalapeno, and whizzed them in my Magic Bullet to mince them quickly, then, as I packed the squash bits into the quart jar, I layered in gobs of garlic-jalapeno mince.  

I mashed down the squash as much as I could, then mixed a cup of water with 1 cap of probiotics and 1 t sea salt.  Poured as much of it as I could into the jar, stuck a chopstick down through the packed squash and poured some more brine into the jar, then capped it with one of my new plastic re-usable jar lids.

Today, when I looked, about half the bowl the jar is sitting in is filled with juice.   Good. That tells me that the ferment is busy.   

This being an experimental batch of squash, I sure hope that it will turn out and that I will like it.