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Post by templeton on Jun 16, 2015 2:55:25 GMT -5
I've been fermenting my olives by soaking in 10% brine for 18 months or so. Unfortunately, some containers have a distinct nail polish remover tang, most unpleasant. Since I'm about to do another batch, can anyone diagnose what the problem is, and how i might fix it?
Would acidification by the addition of some vinegar prevent this?
T
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Post by billw on Jun 16, 2015 3:05:32 GMT -5
I have never fermented olives, but I have made plenty of cider. The nail polish remover odor typically comes from the presence of ethyl acetate in cider. Ethyl acetate forms from reactions involving acetic acid, which means that adding more is probably not the solution. To reduce ethyl acetate formation, you reduce exposure to oxygen (by topping off with an inert gas or using a valve that restricts airflow) and/or make it difficult for acetic acid forming bacteria to survive by adding sulfur dioxide. I imagine the situation is pretty similar with olives, but I don't know that for certain.
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Post by templeton on Jun 16, 2015 4:18:20 GMT -5
Thanks Bill. I'm a bit reluctant to exclude oxygen, i dont really know enough about the nasty anerobic bacteria. I have topped some containers with olive oil in previous years, but got a bit nervous after reading about botulism.
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Post by PatrickW on Jun 16, 2015 12:01:24 GMT -5
I've never made olives or cider, but I am a real fan a lacto-fermented pickles.
Fermenting vegetables for pickles is definitely an anerobic process, and you need to restrict the oxygen entering the fermentation vessel. This is usually with a (tight or loose fitting) lid or piece of plastic wrap. A tight lid has to be loosened from time to time to let the fermentation gasses out. If you have a purpose made pickle crock these are fitted with a water filled airlock.
The process of fermenting vegetables produces lactic acid, and this together with the salt are highly anti-bacterial. It's very unlikely botulism bacteria could grow there. If you think not enough lactic acid is developing, you could add vinegar to make it more acidic.
While botulism is serious, it's very rare. It's much more of an issue with processed foods, because if contamination occurs it can sicken very large numbers of people. In the US about 145 cases of botulism occur every year, about 25% of which come from food, and 5-10% are fatal. Statistically speaking, you're probably more likely to be killed by being hit by a bus. It's not that you should ignore the risks completely, but I don't think you need to make yourself crazy over it.
I've never heard of limiting the oxygen with a layer of oil with pickles. I don't know if this would work.
Anyway, I would suggest a lid on your vessels, and if necessary add vinegar.
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Post by templeton on Jun 16, 2015 17:08:55 GMT -5
Thanks Patrick. I'm usually relaxed about preserving - i do lots of jams and chutneys, and never post-process the finished jars like most health authorities now recommend, and I've never had a problem. For some reason - perhaps the paranoia of increasing middle age - I'm just a bit nervous. The olives do gently out-gas, presumably CO2, so I would guess there is a protective layer of oxygen excluding gas over the surface anyway. But I'm not sure olives actually get very acidic. I should check it. Wonder how I will use my soil testing kit for liquids? The source of my recipe, Mark Dymiotis, suggests a tight fitting lid - except the outgassing means pressure builds up, and can make the jars leak. hmmm, back to the drawing board. T |
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Post by steev on Jun 16, 2015 19:17:36 GMT -5
Yes, increasing age does make one more conscious that SOMETHING is gonna gitcha sooner or later, and on-going learning increases the number of things we know of that might be that "lucky" something; nevertheless, neither the cosmos nor any of its constituents bears us any malice (excluding some of our con-specifics, of course).
Something ( birds, I think) have always eaten the few olives my small trees produce, so I've not yet tried curing them (the olives); the few vague notions I have of the process either involve dry salt or lye solution; never heard of acid being involved.
People have been eating olives a long time; surely there are many curing processes available on-line; at the very least, a wine-maker's fermentation-lock would seem to suit your purpose (easy to cobble together, if not readily available); failing that, you could perhaps exclude oxygen with a layer of 10-30 motor oil.
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Post by templeton on Jun 16, 2015 19:37:21 GMT -5
Yes, increasing age does make one more conscious that SOMETHING is gonna gitcha sooner or later, and on-going learning increases the number of things we know of that might be that "lucky" something; nevertheless, neither the cosmos nor any of its constituents bears us any malice (excluding some of our con-specifics, of course). Something ( birds, I think) have always eaten the few olives my small trees produce, so I've not yet tried curing them (the olives); the few vague notions I have of the process either involve dry salt or lye solution; never heard of acid being involved. People have been eating olives a long time; surely there are many curing processes available on-line; at the very least, a wine-maker's fermentation-lock would seem to suit your purpose (easy to cobble together, if not readily available); failing that, you could perhaps exclude oxygen with a layer of 10-30 motor oil. So, Steev, if you've never done it, how come you're recommending 10-30?  Ahhh, probably trying to stay away from those 'synthetic' oils, yeah? t |
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Post by steev on Jun 16, 2015 20:21:55 GMT -5
I figure 10-30 is readily available (you might even have some to re-cycle from your car's last oil-change; I think that would render your concerns about the taste of acetone moot) and probably less subject to oxidation/rancidity than olive oil (after all, if olive oil were the preventative, don't olives just have it included?).
It occurs that if your curing vessel is large-mouthed enough, a water-filled plastic bag might serve to "seal" it, as with a crock of sauerkraut, allowing out-gassing; of course, you've got to have enough head-room so as to avoid "boiling-over".
I'd ask my great-grand-uncle Gottlieb how he cured olives (his were excellent), but he went to his reward 20 years ago without passing that valuable information to me; I'm sure he'd have been pleased to do so, had I had the sense to ask.
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Post by templeton on Jun 17, 2015 1:23:35 GMT -5
Great minds, Steev. Yesterday's batch went into a big (2 gallon?) plastic bottle with a big ziplock full of water on top. Since the olives are almost overripe, I'm hoping that the cure will be shorter, and perhaps the bitterness will be reduced more quickly, before the acetone flavours develop. Thinking on this a bit more, the acetone flavours have only become noticeable since i shifted away from narrow necked glass jars to wide mouthed buckets, submerging the olives with a small dish. might be coincidence, tho. Have you checked street trees for forage olives, Steev? The parks and waste ground around here have all sorts of wild seedlings growing - i can collect as many olives as i like, tho the cultivated ones are way bigger. I've now got a few different trees in people's front gardens that i have permission to collect from - swap raw olives for a jar of cured a year later. Tho this last owner got a bag of limes since the olives were a bit 'wild' tasting. PS, rather than wasting good 10-30, i could use some of that stale diesel in the jerrycan from my last outback trip...  T |
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Post by steev on Jun 17, 2015 2:21:40 GMT -5
Oil is oil, n'est pas?
The Bay Area isn't like the Central Valley used to be; not so many olive street trees; tant pis!
I'll prolly eat olive-stuffed birds before getting around to curing olives.
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Post by PatrickW on Jun 17, 2015 3:07:07 GMT -5
Thanks Patrick. I'm usually relaxed about preserving - i do lots of jams and chutneys, and never post-process the finished jars like most health authorities now recommend, and I've never had a problem. For some reason - perhaps the paranoia of increasing middle age - I'm just a bit nervous. The olives do gently out-gas, presumably CO2, so I would guess there is a protective layer of oxygen excluding gas over the surface anyway. But I'm not sure olives actually get very acidic. I should check it. Wonder how I will use my soil testing kit for liquids? The source of my recipe, Mark Dymiotis, suggests a tight fitting lid - except the outgassing means pressure builds up, and can make the jars leak. hmmm, back to the drawing board. T If you see a milky or cloudy color in your brine, you probably have lots of lactic acid. Personally, I doubt you need any vinegar. CO2 is slightly heavier than O2. If you have a lid on your fermenting container, the CO2 will gently outgas from the brine, and form a layer on top. When you open the container to release the pressure, mostly the displaced O2 will come out. If you don't have any lid at all, then the layers of gas will be disturbed and mixed. When you ferment beer or wine for example, contact with any oxygen will create acetic acid, which even in small amounts is not acceptable, so you have to use an airlock on top to prevent this. With pickles a little acetic acid is okay, generally considered undesirable, but not so undesirable that an airlock is necessary. Fermented pickles without added vinegar taste really good! Literally, only vegetables and spices fermented in brine. Nothing else added. They're naturally crisp when you put the in the refrigerator. If you don't store them in the fridge or another cool place, they will keep fermenting and get too sour, but there's nothing dangerous about them. They are way too acidic to develop botulism, and the live culture they contain is also much stronger than botulism and will compete with it. If you want to store them at room temperature, you have to can them to kill the fermenting culture. Sugar, salt, acidity, refrigeration, high temperature processing and competing culture are all independently very anti-bacterial. For almost all commercial pickles in Europe, to make absolutely 100% sure that no one can get botulism, are required by law to have large amounts of added sugar, salt, vinegar and be processed for a long time at high temperature until they are mush. This tastes like garbage, so they then add chemicals to make then crisp and so on. When you make your own pickles, you don't need to do this! Home canned fruits and vegetables are much more likely to show signs of spoilage (mold or off taste) before they become dangerous to eat, as long as you haven't done something wildly stupid with them. The last outbreak of botulism in the US was in Dannon hazelnut yoghurt. It happened after Dannon replaced the sugar with Nutrasweet. Commercial yoghurt doesn't have live culture any more, so there was nothing left to compete with the botulism, and the final product wasn't canned or properly refrigerated. Can you imagine how atrocious this must of tasted?! When people get botulism at home it's usually with garlic, tomatoes, mushrooms or peppers in olive oil, with nothing else added, kept at room temperature in a closed jar. This is the main reason why sugar and salt are 'bad'. They are essential for processing food safely in this way. Small farmers producing products like this will produce better tasting food without any added risk of food poisoning, and compete 'unfairly' with other commercial products. |
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Post by templeton on Jun 17, 2015 3:12:52 GMT -5
Thanks patrick. I agree with the taste test - homemade is usually far superior. My olives, when they are good, are so olivey. hard to eat commercially processed olives after tasting the real thing. thanks for reminding "Sugar, salt, acidity, refrigeration, high temperature processing and competing culture are all independently very anti-bacterial."
T
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Post by blueadzuki on Jun 17, 2015 5:15:50 GMT -5
NO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!if you are going to use motor oil, you have to be very, very careful. Some oils are made from castor beans (such as Castol) in and of itself, that wouldn't be a problem (people do take castor oil) but that castor oil is heat extracted, which means it still has all of the ricin (as in that toxin that's so nasty it's classified as a biological weapon) in it. At least I think it does (given just how much more prominent ricin is in the news these days, it would not surprise me if they filter it out of the oil just to be on the safe side and save themselves a lot of lawsuits.) But it is probably best to not put motor oil on anything you plan to eat later.
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Post by templeton on Jun 17, 2015 17:53:24 GMT -5
One problem with 'net recipes is that most of the ones I've found are either quick fix home recipes - seems most people don't want to wait a year to eat the results - or industrial/commercial.
The quick home processing involves crushing or slicing every olive, the industrial recipes use NaOH, and i would like to avoid both if possible.
Mark Dymiotis who i linked above suggests that lots of the flavour compounds are washed away in the slicing/crushing/rinsing process, and after tasting the results of just plain long brine-soaked olives, i would have to agree.
I might try the airlock.
T
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Post by steev on Jun 17, 2015 19:37:25 GMT -5
NO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!if you are going to use motor oil, you have to be very, very careful. Some oils are made from castor beans (such as Castol) in and of itself, that wouldn't be a problem (people do take castor oil) but that castor oil is heat extracted, which means it still has all of the ricin (as in that toxin that's so nasty it's classified as a biological weapon) in it. At least I think it does (given just how much more prominent ricin is in the news these days, it would not surprise me if they filter it out of the oil just to be on the safe side and save themselves a lot of lawsuits.) But it is probably best to not put motor oil on anything you plan to eat later. Please tell me you didn't take that seriously; I don't even use corn oil, much less Castrol; surely you know my vegetable oil of choice is bacon grease (which would prolly make a good seal if kept cool; hmm.. olive confit?). |
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