Gathering Lactobacillus for food culture
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JonathanCline
Jan 14, 2011, 1:05:18 AM1/14/11
to DIYbio
More kitchen-DIYbio.
The typical, easy way to get a starter culture i.e. for yoghurt is to
buy a commercial brand and reserve some of the food for a starter
culture, or buy a known, pure, commercial starter. The traditional
way should be to collect the bacteria from the environment. What's
the best (safest) way to do this today? By safe, I mean naturally
selective and edible. The natural selection methods used in some
regions surprises me - for example, wrapping cooked soybeans in palm
leaves from the backyard & placing under a rock, which then makes
tempeh in a day or so (from a fungus). I'm not willing to trust the
palm leaves in the backyard so I've made tempeh with a commercial
(pure) culture.
What I'd like to try is making vegan soy yoghurt from environmental
sources, which would mean possibility of culturing lots of other
buggers. How is a soy-living Lactobacillus different from a cows'
milk-living Lactobacillus, is there any way to know (without
sequencing), and what should be fed to the little buggers and at what
temperature to best get them going & kill the competitors? I ran
across this interesting blog which suggested using the stems from
chili peppers as a natural source for starting culture. Why chili
peppers, compared to other sources (such as? raisins?) - is there
anything naturally selective about chili peppers which would result in
stronger Lactobacillus and weaker other-bad-bacteria? The wild
culture naturally depends on the original source of the chili peppers
as well (here, likely imported from Mexico; unless I use Thai chilis).
From the blog: "The secret ingredient [ to starting a culture for soy
yogurt ] is the stem of chili peppers. If the starter went bad or if
we ran out of starter, families in my home town would use the stems of
chili peppers to create a new one. I have no clue which enzyme or
chemical or miracle that these stems hide in them, but they seem to
help. I collected some of these from the Indian green chilies that we
used to buy every two weeks. I used a casserole dish called “Hot
Pack”, which is an insulated product similar to water coolers/warmers.
We can also use ordinary mixing bowl for making the yogurt. But in our
new home, the yogurt that I made in a normal bowl gave too runny
yogurt. Finally after some experiments, I found this insulated
casserole dish solved the problem. The ingredients I used to make soy
yogurt are: 2 cups homemade soy milk, 20 -25 stems of green chili
peppers (Wash well in warm water). *** In India, We don’t add sugar
or salt to our milk while making yogurt. [ ... cook soybeans and add
the stems... ] The yogurt should be ready in 5 hours. The yogurt was
not sour by then, so I left it for 2 more hours, until it reached my
desired sourness. Discard the pouch of stems after the yogurt has been
made."
http://live2cook.wordpress.com/2008/08/22/the-secret-of-making-soy-yogurt-without-store-bought-culture/
Who wants to try?
## Jonathan Cline
## jcl...@ieee.org
## Mobile: +1-805-617-0223
########################
The typical, easy way to get a starter culture i.e. for yoghurt is to
buy a commercial brand and reserve some of the food for a starter
culture, or buy a known, pure, commercial starter. The traditional
way should be to collect the bacteria from the environment. What's
the best (safest) way to do this today? By safe, I mean naturally
selective and edible. The natural selection methods used in some
regions surprises me - for example, wrapping cooked soybeans in palm
leaves from the backyard & placing under a rock, which then makes
tempeh in a day or so (from a fungus). I'm not willing to trust the
palm leaves in the backyard so I've made tempeh with a commercial
(pure) culture.
What I'd like to try is making vegan soy yoghurt from environmental
sources, which would mean possibility of culturing lots of other
buggers. How is a soy-living Lactobacillus different from a cows'
milk-living Lactobacillus, is there any way to know (without
sequencing), and what should be fed to the little buggers and at what
temperature to best get them going & kill the competitors? I ran
across this interesting blog which suggested using the stems from
chili peppers as a natural source for starting culture. Why chili
peppers, compared to other sources (such as? raisins?) - is there
anything naturally selective about chili peppers which would result in
stronger Lactobacillus and weaker other-bad-bacteria? The wild
culture naturally depends on the original source of the chili peppers
as well (here, likely imported from Mexico; unless I use Thai chilis).
From the blog: "The secret ingredient [ to starting a culture for soy
yogurt ] is the stem of chili peppers. If the starter went bad or if
we ran out of starter, families in my home town would use the stems of
chili peppers to create a new one. I have no clue which enzyme or
chemical or miracle that these stems hide in them, but they seem to
help. I collected some of these from the Indian green chilies that we
used to buy every two weeks. I used a casserole dish called “Hot
Pack”, which is an insulated product similar to water coolers/warmers.
We can also use ordinary mixing bowl for making the yogurt. But in our
new home, the yogurt that I made in a normal bowl gave too runny
yogurt. Finally after some experiments, I found this insulated
casserole dish solved the problem. The ingredients I used to make soy
yogurt are: 2 cups homemade soy milk, 20 -25 stems of green chili
peppers (Wash well in warm water). *** In India, We don’t add sugar
or salt to our milk while making yogurt. [ ... cook soybeans and add
the stems... ] The yogurt should be ready in 5 hours. The yogurt was
not sour by then, so I left it for 2 more hours, until it reached my
desired sourness. Discard the pouch of stems after the yogurt has been
made."
http://live2cook.wordpress.com/2008/08/22/the-secret-of-making-soy-yogurt-without-store-bought-culture/
Who wants to try?
## Jonathan Cline
## jcl...@ieee.org
## Mobile: +1-805-617-0223
########################
Cathal Garvey
Jan 14, 2011, 3:54:14 AM1/14/11
to diy...@googlegroups.com
This sounds interesting! I might add one or two comments:
Use organic peppers, because whatever microflora peppers normally enjoy are probably affected by sprays.
To make traditional natto, another fermented soybean product, it was normal to leave soybeans in wrapped hay, buried under the hearth or firepit for warmth for some time. Somewhat similar to tempeh.
I suspect the use of chilli flora could be substituted with other microflora of tomatoes etc, but why deviate from a good thing if it's for the food? It might simply be a natural and convenient balance of chillis, like the prevalence of yeasts on grapes or blueberries.
Please share your results, I have a growing love of wild fermentation!
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Simon Quellen Field
Jan 14, 2011, 1:09:09 PM1/14/11
to diybio
You might start by adjusting the pH of the culture medium to the level that
supports the bacteria you want, and suppresses those you don't want.
The chili stem may do that naturally, but it might be a fun experiment to
culture bacteria from chili stems and compare it to that from raisins,
palm leaves, rice straw, or other starter media.
Nathan McCorkle
May 11, 2013, 8:09:43 PM5/11/13
to diybio
ever think it's simply the heating and increased titer of lactobacilli
(which then change the pH via excretion of lactic acid) that is really
the root of the whole 'magic'. You're already pushing the odds in
favor of them by providing lactose, then you're killing a ton of the
normally 37 C cells (from the milk producers body, if it was infected
or from skin during milking) as well as the room temp bacteria on the
milking equipment and the cold-tolerant species that survived during
milk transportation.
I just realized I was talking about vertebrate lactation milk, not
plant baby mash milk... so I'm not sure if that would really push the
odds in favor of lactobacilli... is it confirmed this is what actually
does the trick in soy yogurt?
-Nathan
(which then change the pH via excretion of lactic acid) that is really
the root of the whole 'magic'. You're already pushing the odds in
favor of them by providing lactose, then you're killing a ton of the
normally 37 C cells (from the milk producers body, if it was infected
or from skin during milking) as well as the room temp bacteria on the
milking equipment and the cold-tolerant species that survived during
milk transportation.
I just realized I was talking about vertebrate lactation milk, not
plant baby mash milk... so I'm not sure if that would really push the
odds in favor of lactobacilli... is it confirmed this is what actually
does the trick in soy yogurt?
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-Nathan
leaking pen
May 11, 2013, 8:15:22 PM5/11/13
to diy...@googlegroups.com
Why would you use bacteria that specialize in breaking down lactose into lactic acid on a medium that doesn't contain lactose? Yes, the B and S brothers will still work eating the other sugars, but you aren't going to get the same acid production, flavors, or coagulation.
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