Some day off in the future I imagine I will be in an interview. The interviewer will ask this question: So during quarantine what did you do? Besides mentioning my medically compromised child and myself, how I managed all that I would probably mention I started a new hobby.
Yes, I said it a new hobby. Start the eye rolling now. My face will go bright red and I will look away from you. My name is Janette and I have a problem. I love to learn new things. It gives me this high and sense of accomplishment that nothing else can touch.
So over a year now I had have discussions with a friend who is a stay at home parent and they had started making sourdough bread. It was one of those skills in my secret bucket list of stuff I wanted to learn to do. At the time they brought it up, it was during Passover 2018 so I waited and slowly looked into it and started my starter 6 months later. I started keeping a starter alive and making bread, but the thing is, when I started that internet search for sourdough I ended up falling on a page about starting a starter for Ginger Beer.
I also wanted to learn all kinds of other preservation processes and the friend had also told me the name of the book they had bought on the subject. The Art of Fermentation by Sandor Elix Katz. It is an amazing book that documents all the processes Katz has learned traveling the world and learning the home recipes wherever he traveled. The book has loose recipe ideas with a focus on the how and why and science behind the processes. His take on reclaiming food preservation and remembering the ways before commercial manufacturing spoke to me of all the areas I feel uneducated about food. While I was paging through the book it fell open to the page about ginger beer.
At this point lockdown was happening
and the seasonal ginger beer from Trader Joes was going out of season. I was in a cycle of buying all kinds of ginger ales to give Gabe a treat. He loves the taste of ginger, in drinks and food. So I decided to give it a go.
This mindset started me on a new hobby. I now brew. It started with small batches kept in original pot on the stove and putting in mason jars that I had to keep releasing the pressure of so they wouldn’t explode.
I now own a crock for fermenting and have 12 clear bottles and 24 blue bottles designed for pressure and reusable. I keep notes and it has been a process rife with learning. I figured out the flavor is stronger in the blue bottles where less light comes through. I use different sugars and slowly change out the subtle flavors. It is interesting since ginger is a component of my drink but it it more like a lime aid with this ginger undercurrent. Something different but unique in its own right. It is refreshing and bright on the tongue on it’s own but strong enough when I put only a bit in a glass and fill the rest with carbonated water. ( I am diabetic, sugar consumption and taste satisfaction is struggle)
I have given it out to a few people. They bring me back the bottles tell me they loved it and they won’t take more unless I let them pay me for it.
Meanwhile another friend mentions I should come up with a name for it that relates to my fiction. Originally
when I was using the mason jars before I had tasted any of it I joked with Gabe we should call it Ginger Bomb. Now I am musing about fiction based names. Heska Sweat, Collective Concoction, Muriel’s Mead, Aether Juice, Mordecai’s Reserve and I am still thinking.
So future interviewer. I learned a new skill, finished the rough draft of my second novel, and started all those projects about the house I have been meaning to do for years.
And Fermenting is fun :)
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