Wildcrafted Fermentation: Exploring, Transforming, and Preserving the Wild Flavors of Your Local Terroir

Baudar (The Wildcrafting Brewer) offers another deep dive into plant-based lacto-fermentation. Newbies can get their fermenting feet wet with basic sauerkraut and pickles before stepping outside their homes in search of such ingredients as dandelions (dandikraut) or cattail shoots (fermented with cabbage, fennel or chervil, and salt). Copious photos and detailed instructions (such as tips on checking pH levels) ensure both success and safety. Recommendations for specific fermentation kits run the gamut and utilize jars, leaves (such as folded mustard leaves), seawater, and, for the more adventurous, a hollowed-out oak stump. Basic recipes include those using roots (fermented spicy mustard, wild radish, burdock, turnip) and for creating foraged beers and raw sodas, soups (gazpacho, wild oyster mushroom, miso with mustard root), and a fermented pesto (made with chickweed, chervil, and fennel). While some of the ingredients can be sourced as easily as taking a stroll through the woods, many dishes will need preprepared ingredients, such as a culture starter. Readers interested in taking the next step in producing their own fermented, locally sourced food will find Baudar a useful and instructive tutor. (Mar.)