GENEROUSLY MODIFIED ORGANISMS

 

Masha's kitchen in Moscow

Generously Modified Organisms is a project by Sofia Corte Real and Maria Tarantino. It is rich food for poor people, incredibly energizing fermented vegetables, very rich in vitamic C and enzymes, produced by salting simple inexpensive roots and cabbages together with herbs and spices.

The initial recipes come from the wonderful book “Wild Fermentation” by Sandor Ellix Katz. The idea is that every type of roots, cabbage, leaves can be mixed with fresh herbs, garlic, ginger and chili peppers to create aromatic and fresh-tasting vegetables that are best eaten raw.

Anybody can prepare fermented vegetables at home. It is simple, safe and wild!

What follows is really handy info for GMOs enthusiasts, tips, recipes and a basic blog of preparations and their adventures through time.

BRIEF EXPLANATION OF THE BASIC METHOD IN FRENCH (if you have any questions, please ask!)

 

CURRENT GMOs IN THE PIPELINE:

27 Nov 08

- Mixed cabbage (white and Savoy), carrot and Jerusalem artichoke. Lots of garlic, ginger and onion. Bay leaves and chilies. This was made with the brine method. Removed from the crock after 10 days. Taste was not fantastic. I added some brine I saved from a super batch (Daikon+lavender leaves) and kept in the fridge. After 3 days, already better. Now I placed one jar in the cellar to see how long it can keep. Current batch is 2 weeks old.

- red cabbage, white cabbage, Jerusalem artichoke, carrot, beetroot, garlic and onion. Current batch is 2 weeks old but taste is not wonderful and I guess it is because I did not put enough ginger, which add a very perfumed and fresh note. Also, the quantity of cabbage was too much and kept a rather bitter monotone flavor. The sage leaves did not help much either.

- kimchi with Jerusalem artichoke, white cabbage, carrot, parsnips. This is one week old. The vegetables have been cut small and I also added fresh leaves picked in the Kobe’s garden, a sort of wild celery with a slightly bitter and lemony scent.In this way, Jereusalem artichoke tasted best, nutty and sweet.

- garlic in tamari sauce. Has been there since June. Now the tamari is tasting of garlic quite a bit.

- garlic in miso and mirin. Three months old. It is starting to produce a bit of liquid and taste is getting quite interesting.

- salsify in a super spicy sauce (Thai sauce with beetles, or whatever insect is portrayed on the label), garlic, ginger, soy sauce and some wild celery plant we got from Kobe’s garden. This is a Japanese tsukemono recipe that normally takes 24h but since I did not cook the salsify I am waiting still. Time: 1 week.

- aubergines in tamari sauce and water. They have been kept in salt water for one night, squeezed and filled with a mix of garlic, onion, ginger, salt and chili. Time: one week.

5 December 2008

- Mixed cabbage: 3 weeks old. The addition of fermented juice helped a lot to make the flavor more complex.

- Red cabbage mix: 3 weeks old. I decided to add lots of ginger and I wait to see what happens.

- Aubergines: 2 weeks, taste is good, tamari seems to keep everything in good shape. The aubergine still keeps a firm texture. Taste is very good.

- Kimchi: 2 weeks. This is wonderful, perfect. What makes it special are the wild leaves and odd lemon peel bits. Parsnips are a very good idea.

New batches

- kimchi: 

- celeriac (1), carrots (1), red cabbage (2), bay leaves and poivre long.

- celeriac (1), white cabbage (1), navet (1), daikon (3), ginger, garlic, lavender leaves.

- kimchi: carrot (1), cauliflower (3), garlic, ginger, onion

10 december 08

- red cabbage went bad (maybe room temperature was too high) – END 4 weeks

- kimchi went bad (bubbles), maybe not enough salt and too much opening of jars – END 3 weeks

20 december 08

- Kimchi  in Brussels is two weeks old: no news yet

- NERVIANO: new kimchi 3kg, two parts of cauliflower, one part of carrot. Spices: garlic, ginger, spring onion, leek, red onion, stems of parsley, peel of lemon and orange, bay leaves. Used large glass jar as recipient (same container used to make anchovies).

 

6 January 2009

Brussels: blue mushroom appeared on the kimchi, sauerkraut looks dry. Nobody had the courage to taste.

Nerviano: managed to keep off contamination in the glass jars (covered in plastic film) I used to store the kimchi. Opened one jar and kimchi tastes ok. Maybe I used too much orange peel (after one week it was strong but gets subdued over time). It has a dry flavor due to the fact that I only used a few carrots and that cauliflower is not exactly very juicy.

THE GMOs PROJECT SO FAR:

It’s the end of March, we have been running our GMOs workshops for four weeks, took a two-week pause