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The Art of Fermentation: An In-Depth Exploration of Essential Concepts and Processes from Around the World
Goodreads Choice Award
Nominee for Readers' Favorite Food & Cookbooks (2012)With practical information on fermenting vegetables, fruits, grains, milk, beans, meats, and more…
Fermentation revivalist Sandor Katz has inspired countless thousands to rediscover the ancient art of fermentation, and with The Art of Fermentation he offers the most comprehensive and definitive guide to do-it-yourself home fermentation ever published.
Katz presents the history, concepts, and processes behind fermentation in ways simple enough to guide a reader through their first experience making sauerkraut or yogurt, yet in-depth enough to provide greater understanding and insight for experienced fermentos.
Readers will find detailed information on fermenting vegetables; sugars into alcohol (meads, wines, and ciders); sour tonic beverages; milk; grains and starchy tubers; beers (and other grain-based alcoholic beverages); beans; seeds; fish; meat; and eggs, as well as growing mold cultures, and using fermentation in agriculture, art, and energy production, and commerce.
The first-ever guide of its kind, Katz has written what will undoubtedly become a foundational book in food literature.
Fermentation revivalist Sandor Katz has inspired countless thousands to rediscover the ancient art of fermentation, and with The Art of Fermentation he offers the most comprehensive and definitive guide to do-it-yourself home fermentation ever published.
Katz presents the history, concepts, and processes behind fermentation in ways simple enough to guide a reader through their first experience making sauerkraut or yogurt, yet in-depth enough to provide greater understanding and insight for experienced fermentos.
Readers will find detailed information on fermenting vegetables; sugars into alcohol (meads, wines, and ciders); sour tonic beverages; milk; grains and starchy tubers; beers (and other grain-based alcoholic beverages); beans; seeds; fish; meat; and eggs, as well as growing mold cultures, and using fermentation in agriculture, art, and energy production, and commerce.
The first-ever guide of its kind, Katz has written what will undoubtedly become a foundational book in food literature.
531 pages, Kindle Edition
First published May 15, 2012
1356 people are currently reading
10648 people want to read
About the author
Sandor Ellix Katz
37 books250 followersMy name is Sandor Ellix Katz, and I am a fermentation revivalist.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 351 reviews
February 29, 2016
This book completely thrills me in so many ways!
It is essentially an encyclopedia of what is known about fermentation, with stories based in the personal experimentation of the author and people he's encountered in his travels, as well as a ton of other research. But it is so much more than that.
Equally as precious to me as the vast amount of geeky information about fermentation processes and lore is the perspective. My heart leaps for joy that a queer, community-minded, politically radical, radical faerie-identified creature started sharing their explorations in a zine/pamphlet, expanded it into a beginner's book that became wildly popular, and now has matured the work into this TOME that is arguably the best resource on the subject in the world, AND that the author's radical perspective and personality clearly remain the heart and foundation of this work. What an incredible inspiration for just simply being who you are and doing what you love. Thank you Sandor Katz for teaching me and my community how to pickle, and for making this world a much better place to be.
p.s. It is probably not the best beginner's manual -- "Wild Fermentation" is a better place to start if you're new and want basic instruction.
It is essentially an encyclopedia of what is known about fermentation, with stories based in the personal experimentation of the author and people he's encountered in his travels, as well as a ton of other research. But it is so much more than that.
Equally as precious to me as the vast amount of geeky information about fermentation processes and lore is the perspective. My heart leaps for joy that a queer, community-minded, politically radical, radical faerie-identified creature started sharing their explorations in a zine/pamphlet, expanded it into a beginner's book that became wildly popular, and now has matured the work into this TOME that is arguably the best resource on the subject in the world, AND that the author's radical perspective and personality clearly remain the heart and foundation of this work. What an incredible inspiration for just simply being who you are and doing what you love. Thank you Sandor Katz for teaching me and my community how to pickle, and for making this world a much better place to be.
p.s. It is probably not the best beginner's manual -- "Wild Fermentation" is a better place to start if you're new and want basic instruction.
April 2, 2016
A lovely friend of mine presented me with this book. Realistically, I believed there wasn't much I'd learn about fermentation. Years ago, I was strictly macrobiotic and those familiar with the concept will know that a percentage of each meal consists of fermented food. My roommate has been fermenting sauerkraut for 22 years and I like to ferment fresh pickles using home-grown dill and cucumbers. We are lucky to have a nearby Asian market in our small town, so miso is plentiful and has never been on our list to home ferment. All this is to say that Sandor Ellix Katz is so thorough that I have been learning facets of this almost-forgotten dietary practice, completely in awe of his knowledge. Originally, I just picked out chapters to read: Cultivating a Biophilic Consciousness, Fermentation as a Strategy for Energy Efficiency, Substrates and Microbial Communities, Salting versus Brining, Jar Method, Crock Method, and then the various types of foods used for fermentation including alcoholic beverages, vegetables and condiments. I do not mean to turn this review into a list. You can certainly peruse the contents using the “look inside” feature. I have the Kindle edition and all illustrations are quite clear on the Kindle Fire HD7. So I skipped around and then suddenly realized how engrossing each chapter is, so I went back to the beginning and have been reading it like a novel, cover-to-cover. It is so much easier to buy a jar of pickles from the supermarket shelf, but fermenting one's foods and beverages brings about a spiritual connection, a binding of the earth with ourselves, that plunking down a few dollars for a jar of fermented food cannot begin to compare. Even if you do not grow your own vegetables, the elemental connection is there: earth producing the foodstuff, water as an almost amniotic fluid, and the temporary banishment of air and fire until the birth of the new, healthy offering to our body and soul.
December 7, 2012
Is it possible for a book to be both too detailed and not detailed enough? Maybe I would be better reading Wild Fermentation, but I felt that this book was lacking in details about how to actually execute these different fermentation items. The recipes and suggestions were buried deep within layers of excessive details about each item, most of which boiled down to "there's lots of different varieties of this, mess around and see what you like." I appreciate that approach, but giving more clear details of a starting point for these recipes, then building from there, would dramatically help someone just starting out in these processes.
December 12, 2012
The Art of Fermentation is, as the title says, an in-depth exploration of the processes and concepts of fermentation. Sandor Katz covers various types of fermentation that cover a wide range of fermentables (vegetables, grains, etc) and a diverse geographic region. In many ways this is the encyclopedia of fermentation. It is an excellent resource for those who want to know more about the process and how fermentated foods are used around the world and for those who would like to take their own fermentation to the next level.
With that being said, this is not a beginner book. There are few traditional recipes of the "add X amount of salt to Y amount of water and use to very Z amount of vegetables, leave for N days". The methods are explained and from that someone who has made a couple of fermented foods such as pickles or sauerkraut could easily devise their own recipes. However, the lack of detailed example recipes could be daunting to a newcomer. Katz's previous book, Wild Fermentation is an excellent introduction for those new to this method of food preservation. Once you feel you're moving past the dishes presented in Wild Fermentation you're ready to jump to The Art of Fermentation!
EDIT 12/12/12: I'm not sure why I originally gave this book 2 stars. At first I wasn't thrilled, I expected more recipes, however as time as passed I find myself coming to the book more and more for ideas and inspiration when I want to try new things. My review above still stands - this is not a replacement for Wild Fermentation but it is an excellent next step once you're comfortable with the recipes/methods in that book.
With that being said, this is not a beginner book. There are few traditional recipes of the "add X amount of salt to Y amount of water and use to very Z amount of vegetables, leave for N days". The methods are explained and from that someone who has made a couple of fermented foods such as pickles or sauerkraut could easily devise their own recipes. However, the lack of detailed example recipes could be daunting to a newcomer. Katz's previous book, Wild Fermentation is an excellent introduction for those new to this method of food preservation. Once you feel you're moving past the dishes presented in Wild Fermentation you're ready to jump to The Art of Fermentation!
EDIT 12/12/12: I'm not sure why I originally gave this book 2 stars. At first I wasn't thrilled, I expected more recipes, however as time as passed I find myself coming to the book more and more for ideas and inspiration when I want to try new things. My review above still stands - this is not a replacement for Wild Fermentation but it is an excellent next step once you're comfortable with the recipes/methods in that book.
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November 28, 2020I guess I haven't really read this cover to cover, but I do consult it now and then, which is probably how it was intended to be read. Awkwardly, it's not a book of recipes, so it's useless if you just want to make sauerkraut *right now*. It's perfect if you just want to wrap your head around what sauerkraut is, how it becomes sauerkraut, who makes it, what varieties there are, how it differs from kimchi, whether it will kill you if something weird grows on top of it, etc., which are all useful inputs to kind of figuring out a process on your own.
October 3, 2025
Since l bought this book I have started a mead, multiple vinegars, and a kvass. I would not have had a fantastic sense of how to make any of these before reading this book, so it gets two stars.
The other three stars, however, are being removed with extreme prejudice, one for each of its most egregious sins.
We’ll start, as is totally normal when discussing a cookbook, with Herodotus. I’m not a classicist, but I distinctly remember a passage in which he is describing the fashions and culture of the Persian Empire. He describes a rich, powerful society in which the cultures and practices of the vanquished were not erased, but were rather adopted and integrated into the imperial system. Herodotus probably meant this as disparaging for cultural purity and ethnic opposition reasons, and for this reason I mostly dismissed the description and the implied scorn as diluted propaganda. After reading this book, however, I totally get why that cultural amoebism should get some flack. The author desperately attempts to tie the “art” of fermentation (it’s in the title, I get to interrogate the word choice) to the practices of immigrants, the indigenous, and vaguely defined groups of “experimentalists”. The slipperiness of the definition of all of these groups gives the intellectual structure necessary to tie Mayan corn preservation techniques to Jewish pickling practices on the Lower East Side, but any aspiration to “art” is entirely lost in the amalgamation. What arises out of the extended Encyclopedia Britannica article that follows is a very real sense that the author has taken a nice little literary journey and brought back some nicely parceled culture(s) for the imperial citizen to enjoy (if you read the book you’ll get how genuinely stupid this joke is, and that it’s still better than the “meaning through etymology” he too often practices). If you are a burgeoning back-to-the-earth hippy, or alternatively some sort of traditionalist that has managed to do enough mental gymnastics to believe you come from an unchanging, ancient culture, you may enjoy this book. I came to learn how to ferment stuff, and instead sort of got shown grainy photos of other peoples’ living rooms and was told that this is where spirit comes from. Not only did this deprive me of the techne I came for, it completely, as kids have said since at least the sixties, ruined the vibe.
The above error by itself would not even rise to the level of comment if it were not joined with the others. I began to suspect that the first sin would be committed, however, when the book had barely gotten started and the author dropped in a sidebar addressing the question of whether or not fermented food can cure AIDS. Conscious always that this is a complex and sensitive subject, it is vital to note that, when this book was published in 2012, we knew more than enough about AIDS to know that this was a stupid, and frankly irresponsible, question to even raise. On the principle that since the government should have no power to shut down people with terrible ideas and opinions it falls to us to do so, the mealy-mouthed pathos of the non-denial that formed Katz’ response to the question ranks high in the worst things I’ve ever read on the subject of health. Not only do vague appeals to animism and spiritualism, regardless of the diet that accompanies them, not cure a person of HIV, they threaten to crowd out treatments that are proven to work. If the author had found any credible evidence that fermented foods cured AIDS, I’m sure he would have included it in the mind-numbing number of cited sources that bog down the whole affair. If AIDS could have been cured in the home kitchen, as the pathos of his discussion implies, it would have certainly been by any number of the members of the hardest-hit groups - the passion and work that were poured into advocacy and treatment were immense. The fact that it was, as far as it has been, brought into “livable” status by the beaker-and-lab-coat set implies that they were the people for the job.
Now we come to the worst sin, but also the most ironic and therefore the most funny. In the midst of the absolute mountain of rancid refuse that is currently proceeding forth out of the halls of HHS as divine punishment for Americans choosing to once again put their trust in a Kennedy, it has been accurately observed that until the MAHA movement got ahold of and magnified them, many of the views that are most objectionable were nonpartisan with a large dose of ideas normally associated with the left. In other words, any policy being covered with rapt attention by the New York Times as the end of health in America today was a dearly held policy goal of someone they did a sympathetic profile on 15 years ago. After reading this book, however, I’m prepared to strengthen that statement. Anything being covered as the end of health in America today by the NYT is probably something explicitly advocated for by someone they GAVE AN AWARD FOR IDEAS TO about 15 years ago. More concretely, raw milk is not inherently safe or magical, even if your cows have enough leisure time to get ennui. I’m not advocating for its ban or for the moral turpitude of those who consume it (it is delicious, after all), but you are big fat dumb if you look at a century and a half of pasteurization (which predates factory farming) and figure it happened for no reason. I am not exactly sure who we go to for health guidance at this point, with the reputation of most institutions in tatters after COVID, but it certainly ain’t this guy.
After all this, I won’t be tossing the book. There is not enough of instruction in it to justify its title as comprising of the “art” of fermentation, but it is an adequate introduction. Shame about the other 95% of the book though.
The other three stars, however, are being removed with extreme prejudice, one for each of its most egregious sins.
We’ll start, as is totally normal when discussing a cookbook, with Herodotus. I’m not a classicist, but I distinctly remember a passage in which he is describing the fashions and culture of the Persian Empire. He describes a rich, powerful society in which the cultures and practices of the vanquished were not erased, but were rather adopted and integrated into the imperial system. Herodotus probably meant this as disparaging for cultural purity and ethnic opposition reasons, and for this reason I mostly dismissed the description and the implied scorn as diluted propaganda. After reading this book, however, I totally get why that cultural amoebism should get some flack. The author desperately attempts to tie the “art” of fermentation (it’s in the title, I get to interrogate the word choice) to the practices of immigrants, the indigenous, and vaguely defined groups of “experimentalists”. The slipperiness of the definition of all of these groups gives the intellectual structure necessary to tie Mayan corn preservation techniques to Jewish pickling practices on the Lower East Side, but any aspiration to “art” is entirely lost in the amalgamation. What arises out of the extended Encyclopedia Britannica article that follows is a very real sense that the author has taken a nice little literary journey and brought back some nicely parceled culture(s) for the imperial citizen to enjoy (if you read the book you’ll get how genuinely stupid this joke is, and that it’s still better than the “meaning through etymology” he too often practices). If you are a burgeoning back-to-the-earth hippy, or alternatively some sort of traditionalist that has managed to do enough mental gymnastics to believe you come from an unchanging, ancient culture, you may enjoy this book. I came to learn how to ferment stuff, and instead sort of got shown grainy photos of other peoples’ living rooms and was told that this is where spirit comes from. Not only did this deprive me of the techne I came for, it completely, as kids have said since at least the sixties, ruined the vibe.
The above error by itself would not even rise to the level of comment if it were not joined with the others. I began to suspect that the first sin would be committed, however, when the book had barely gotten started and the author dropped in a sidebar addressing the question of whether or not fermented food can cure AIDS. Conscious always that this is a complex and sensitive subject, it is vital to note that, when this book was published in 2012, we knew more than enough about AIDS to know that this was a stupid, and frankly irresponsible, question to even raise. On the principle that since the government should have no power to shut down people with terrible ideas and opinions it falls to us to do so, the mealy-mouthed pathos of the non-denial that formed Katz’ response to the question ranks high in the worst things I’ve ever read on the subject of health. Not only do vague appeals to animism and spiritualism, regardless of the diet that accompanies them, not cure a person of HIV, they threaten to crowd out treatments that are proven to work. If the author had found any credible evidence that fermented foods cured AIDS, I’m sure he would have included it in the mind-numbing number of cited sources that bog down the whole affair. If AIDS could have been cured in the home kitchen, as the pathos of his discussion implies, it would have certainly been by any number of the members of the hardest-hit groups - the passion and work that were poured into advocacy and treatment were immense. The fact that it was, as far as it has been, brought into “livable” status by the beaker-and-lab-coat set implies that they were the people for the job.
Now we come to the worst sin, but also the most ironic and therefore the most funny. In the midst of the absolute mountain of rancid refuse that is currently proceeding forth out of the halls of HHS as divine punishment for Americans choosing to once again put their trust in a Kennedy, it has been accurately observed that until the MAHA movement got ahold of and magnified them, many of the views that are most objectionable were nonpartisan with a large dose of ideas normally associated with the left. In other words, any policy being covered with rapt attention by the New York Times as the end of health in America today was a dearly held policy goal of someone they did a sympathetic profile on 15 years ago. After reading this book, however, I’m prepared to strengthen that statement. Anything being covered as the end of health in America today by the NYT is probably something explicitly advocated for by someone they GAVE AN AWARD FOR IDEAS TO about 15 years ago. More concretely, raw milk is not inherently safe or magical, even if your cows have enough leisure time to get ennui. I’m not advocating for its ban or for the moral turpitude of those who consume it (it is delicious, after all), but you are big fat dumb if you look at a century and a half of pasteurization (which predates factory farming) and figure it happened for no reason. I am not exactly sure who we go to for health guidance at this point, with the reputation of most institutions in tatters after COVID, but it certainly ain’t this guy.
After all this, I won’t be tossing the book. There is not enough of instruction in it to justify its title as comprising of the “art” of fermentation, but it is an adequate introduction. Shame about the other 95% of the book though.
July 7, 2016
This is an astounding work, a magnum opus reference guide to All Things Fermented. It's not a cookbook, per se, although an experienced cook could use it to develop recipes. (For recipes to start my adventure in fermenting I will look to Katz's equally impressive cookbook Wild Fermentation: The Flavor, Nutrition, and Craft of Live-Culture Foods. If I begin fermenting foods with some regularity I will purchase Art of Fermentation, for now the library copy will suffice.)
From edibles to drinkables Katz covers the entire spectrum of fermentation as well as any one person can and he quotes liberally & often from experts in various cuisines which allows him to include good (and hard-to-find) information on many, many non-Western fermenting traditions. For me his brief discussion of Chinese 'pickle' was gratefully received: typically this is an area overlooked by Western authors in favor of focusing on Korean kimchi, which is similar to some Chinese pickles but is in no way the totality of Asian fermented foods. I've been munching stinky Chinese pickle from childhood and really appreciate that Katz included at least an entry into this world, in addition to a fine explanation of soybean fermentation from both the Japanese (hamanatto) and the Chinese (douchi) traditions.
There are many charming line drawings supporting the text, and there's a nicely curated series of color photos in the middle of the book showing all sorts of 'fermentalia': close-ups of bacteria, pictures of crocks, pickle markets, various finished ferments and even a demo of stuffing a jar with veggies.
For anyone interested in fermented foods, Art of Fermentation is worth at least a look-though and it likely should be on the shelf for any serious fermentation enthusiast.
From edibles to drinkables Katz covers the entire spectrum of fermentation as well as any one person can and he quotes liberally & often from experts in various cuisines which allows him to include good (and hard-to-find) information on many, many non-Western fermenting traditions. For me his brief discussion of Chinese 'pickle' was gratefully received: typically this is an area overlooked by Western authors in favor of focusing on Korean kimchi, which is similar to some Chinese pickles but is in no way the totality of Asian fermented foods. I've been munching stinky Chinese pickle from childhood and really appreciate that Katz included at least an entry into this world, in addition to a fine explanation of soybean fermentation from both the Japanese (hamanatto) and the Chinese (douchi) traditions.
There are many charming line drawings supporting the text, and there's a nicely curated series of color photos in the middle of the book showing all sorts of 'fermentalia': close-ups of bacteria, pictures of crocks, pickle markets, various finished ferments and even a demo of stuffing a jar with veggies.
For anyone interested in fermented foods, Art of Fermentation is worth at least a look-though and it likely should be on the shelf for any serious fermentation enthusiast.
November 30, 2012
Wow, what a huge book! Before reading this (okay, okay, skimming), I knew little to nothing about fermentation. I knew it had something to do with alcohol, cheese, and yogurt, but I also thought it was the same thing as pickling.
Did you know that you can submerge vegetables in their own juices and leave them on the counter for months and eat it and LIKE it? And it's more stable than refrigeration? I obtained this book because I kept reading in many different places that fermented food is incredibly good for us, that the nutrients are multiplied more than that of the fresh/raw version, even. As a prepper, I'm very interested in learning how to get all available nutrients into an off-the-grid diet. Whether I'm going to love the taste of fermented food still remains to be seen. Well, I know I love fermented dairy, so it gives me hope for the rest.
Maybe there's a shorter book, though?
Did you know that you can submerge vegetables in their own juices and leave them on the counter for months and eat it and LIKE it? And it's more stable than refrigeration? I obtained this book because I kept reading in many different places that fermented food is incredibly good for us, that the nutrients are multiplied more than that of the fresh/raw version, even. As a prepper, I'm very interested in learning how to get all available nutrients into an off-the-grid diet. Whether I'm going to love the taste of fermented food still remains to be seen. Well, I know I love fermented dairy, so it gives me hope for the rest.
Maybe there's a shorter book, though?
December 11, 2017
I got through the introduction and first chapter before I had to give up on this one. My life is too short for this kind of buzzword-laden pseudoscientific classist snobbery. I'm interested in fermentation, though, so hopefully I can pick up a book on that in the future.
October 10, 2025
Un libro práctico e inspirador. Para aprender a hacer delicias. Es también un manifiesto contracultural, hazlo tu mismo...
May 21, 2013
To do this well written and very interesting book justice, I should first spend a year (at least) in the kitchen making sauerkraut,kimchi,mead,yoghurt etc.,etc., before writing a review, but since I am already convinced that "The Art of Fermentation"will be much read and used over the years, I'll just give it 5 stars and be done with it!
January 10, 2021
I went from “knows almost nothing about fermentation” to “fermenting everything I can get my hands on” in a week. And the finished results are delicious. Couldn’t recommend this more.
January 30, 2019
‘Biologists use the term fermentation to describe anaerobic metabolism, the production of energy from nutrients without oxygen. ....Bacterial fermentation processes have been part of the context for all life....Bacteria break down nutrients we would not otherwise be able to digest...intestinal bacteria produce certain necessary nutrients for us , including B and K vitamins...Bacteria inhabit all our surfaces, particularly the warmer sweaty places that stay moist, as well as our eyes, upper respiratory tract, and orifices; more than 700 species have been detected in the healthy oral cavity....Bacteria are such effective coevolutionary partners because they are highly adaptable and mutable.
“Bacteria continually monitor their external and internal environments and compute functional outputs based on information provided by their sensory apparatus” explains bacterial geneticist James Shapiro...far from being simplistic “lower forms” of life, they are becoming recognized as highly evolved, with elaborate systems for adaptability and resilience.’
‘We know more about the stars in the sky than about the soil under our feet,’ points out soil microbiologist Elaine Ingram....Like us, plants rely on Bacteria for their survival and have elaborate mechanisms for attracting and interacting with them’
“Bacteria continually monitor their external and internal environments and compute functional outputs based on information provided by their sensory apparatus” explains bacterial geneticist James Shapiro...far from being simplistic “lower forms” of life, they are becoming recognized as highly evolved, with elaborate systems for adaptability and resilience.’
‘We know more about the stars in the sky than about the soil under our feet,’ points out soil microbiologist Elaine Ingram....Like us, plants rely on Bacteria for their survival and have elaborate mechanisms for attracting and interacting with them’
February 19, 2020
I think this deserves five stars for the breadth and depth of information. But did I love listening to an encyclopedia? Not so much. I was rapt when he covered kombucha and kefir, but distracted when he explored edible molds, sorghum beer, and saki. Towards the end of the 20 hours I wanted to be done. The length of it helped me get more walking done.
I firmly believe that our modern trend of eliminating fermented foods from our diets has been detrimental. I've brewed kombucha, but after listening to Katz, I switched to kefir to decrease my sugar intake. Next step: learn to make kimchi and sourdough bread.
The title includes from Around the World. Wow. This would be a great resource for supplementing studies of various cultures.
For a book published in 2012, this book has held its $25 value. If I found it at a thrift store, I would snag it. Katz himself reminded me that Nourishing Traditions is another great resource, and it is already on my shelf.
I firmly believe that our modern trend of eliminating fermented foods from our diets has been detrimental. I've brewed kombucha, but after listening to Katz, I switched to kefir to decrease my sugar intake. Next step: learn to make kimchi and sourdough bread.
The title includes from Around the World. Wow. This would be a great resource for supplementing studies of various cultures.
For a book published in 2012, this book has held its $25 value. If I found it at a thrift store, I would snag it. Katz himself reminded me that Nourishing Traditions is another great resource, and it is already on my shelf.
Read
August 12, 2023I DID IT!!! I started reading this book as a joke… but then I kept reading 2-3 pages everyday at breakfast. Fast forward a month and a half and it’s done.
Sandor Katz (aka the fermentation king) has a passion that bleeds through the page. It’s so infectious that you can’t help but join in.
I loved so much about this book: the illustrations, colour inserts, chapter structures, and stories from other fermentation enthusiastically. I appreciated how global Katz took his research too.
The encyclopedia for all things fermentation. Obsessed!
Sandor Katz (aka the fermentation king) has a passion that bleeds through the page. It’s so infectious that you can’t help but join in.
I loved so much about this book: the illustrations, colour inserts, chapter structures, and stories from other fermentation enthusiastically. I appreciated how global Katz took his research too.
The encyclopedia for all things fermentation. Obsessed!
October 18, 2017
Brief summary: A useful work with a lot of information, both theoretical and practical, but very annoying in other ways.
Detailed review:
Sandor Katz's "The Art of Fermentation" is a detailed survey of food-fermentation techniques from around the world. It begins with a non-technical discussion of the biochemical basis of fermentation, and then systematically looks at applications ranging from fermented veggies (sauerkraut, kimchi, pickles), tonic beverages (ginger ale), fruits and other sugars (wine, cider, mead), milk products (yogurt, cheese, kefir), grains (bread and beer), beans (miso and other soy products) and even potatoes, meats, and fish. Along the way, the book provides recipes, descriptions of techniques used, and cultural background.
I personally found "The Art of Fermentation" to be a useful introduction to the process of food fermentation and a springboard into my own pickling and fermenting activities. In fact, this encouraged me to explore a number of things I probably never would have.
To be candid, however, I have to say that there were many things about the book that I found frustrating/annoying,. These included:
1) The various "banners" (outlined with microbial drawings) throughout the book containing quotations from individuals whose source of expertise is rarely identified—and some of whom appear to be crackpots. For example, a web-search suggests that an individual whose quote is spotlighted on p. 75 is "a gardener, artist, alchemist and mead-maker" who also teaches classes in "Divine Number and Sacred Geometry" at "the Mathemagical School of Art, Design and Natural Phenomena" (of which he is also the founder).
2) The cultural revivalist mantras that are repeated throughout the book, which are, at times mixed with elements of polemic and mysticism. I have a lot of sympathy with traditionalist approaches to food, culture, etc. but some of the stuff here is just plain silly. Fermentation as a form of ancestor worship? As a means to revel in mysteries of the scientifically unknowable? As a means of cultivating "biophilic consciousness"? Puh-leeze...
3) Katz's apaprent love of details that seem intended to gross out the reader. On the hand, sure, it's useful to remind folks that sometimes the outside of a fermented product can develop mold or go bad, while the inside of it remains fine-- but to describe how he once eat perfectly delicious kraut from the bottom of a barrel beneath several slimy and "maggot infested" layers? Or talking about how wine can be made out of the urine of diabetics, because of the high levels of residual sugar in it? Such details seem more like they are intended to shock than inform.
4) A relative lack of research on important subjects on which the author does not have first-hand knowledge. Example: In the chapter on vegetable fermentation, Katz devotes a brief sub-section to "Chinese Pickling". In this, he writes: "China has an incredible array of specific regional styles, of which I know very little." He also asserts that Chinese pickling is of foundational importance in that it influenced so many other pickling styles. But all we really get in terms of info are two quotations from a the one secondary source that Katz has found in English on the subject, followed by , "I wish I knew more and could provide more than a cursory glimpse of the broad, dynamic, and living tradition of Chinese vegetable fermentation." So do I! I mean, fine, so he's not got a lot of first-hand knowledge of Chinese pickling—and he can’t read Chinese-language sources on the subject. Fair enough-- you can't be a hands-on expert on everything. But, from a book whose subtitle proclaims it to be "An In-Depth Exploration of Essential Concepts and Processes from Around the World," I still expect more, especially given the importance he ascribes to Chinese pickling traditions. It seems to me that there options that could have been have been used to research this-- like making a trip to China and explore this first hand, with the aid of an interpreter; or meeting with with Chinese immigrants who may have first hand knowledge of this; or hiring an assistant fluent in the language to survey Chinese-language literature on the subject.
5) Comments by the author that seem to combine errors, odd assumptions, and a lack of knowledge into one. For instance, in a chapter on dairy ferments, he mentions a type of yogurt made in Africa, but then makes the rather curious statement that it’s not technically yogurt because its made with zebu milk, rather than cow’s milk. (He also mentions that he had never previously heard of zebu.) Leaving aside the curious suggestion that something is only yogurt if it’s made with cow’s milk(?!), the fact is that zebu are a type of domestic cattle—something that could have easily been fact-checked with a quick online search.
Now, to be fair, none of these issues, on their own-- or even on the whole-- invalidates the Art of Fermentation's merit as a resource. Nonetheless, their cumulative was to bug the hell out of me.
All that said, the fact remains that, to my knowledge, “The Art of Fermentation,” is still the most comprehensive book on the subject yet published, and may well be for some time to come. I just wish it didn't also come with so many annoying elements.
Detailed review:
Sandor Katz's "The Art of Fermentation" is a detailed survey of food-fermentation techniques from around the world. It begins with a non-technical discussion of the biochemical basis of fermentation, and then systematically looks at applications ranging from fermented veggies (sauerkraut, kimchi, pickles), tonic beverages (ginger ale), fruits and other sugars (wine, cider, mead), milk products (yogurt, cheese, kefir), grains (bread and beer), beans (miso and other soy products) and even potatoes, meats, and fish. Along the way, the book provides recipes, descriptions of techniques used, and cultural background.
I personally found "The Art of Fermentation" to be a useful introduction to the process of food fermentation and a springboard into my own pickling and fermenting activities. In fact, this encouraged me to explore a number of things I probably never would have.
To be candid, however, I have to say that there were many things about the book that I found frustrating/annoying,. These included:
1) The various "banners" (outlined with microbial drawings) throughout the book containing quotations from individuals whose source of expertise is rarely identified—and some of whom appear to be crackpots. For example, a web-search suggests that an individual whose quote is spotlighted on p. 75 is "a gardener, artist, alchemist and mead-maker" who also teaches classes in "Divine Number and Sacred Geometry" at "the Mathemagical School of Art, Design and Natural Phenomena" (of which he is also the founder).
2) The cultural revivalist mantras that are repeated throughout the book, which are, at times mixed with elements of polemic and mysticism. I have a lot of sympathy with traditionalist approaches to food, culture, etc. but some of the stuff here is just plain silly. Fermentation as a form of ancestor worship? As a means to revel in mysteries of the scientifically unknowable? As a means of cultivating "biophilic consciousness"? Puh-leeze...
3) Katz's apaprent love of details that seem intended to gross out the reader. On the hand, sure, it's useful to remind folks that sometimes the outside of a fermented product can develop mold or go bad, while the inside of it remains fine-- but to describe how he once eat perfectly delicious kraut from the bottom of a barrel beneath several slimy and "maggot infested" layers? Or talking about how wine can be made out of the urine of diabetics, because of the high levels of residual sugar in it? Such details seem more like they are intended to shock than inform.
4) A relative lack of research on important subjects on which the author does not have first-hand knowledge. Example: In the chapter on vegetable fermentation, Katz devotes a brief sub-section to "Chinese Pickling". In this, he writes: "China has an incredible array of specific regional styles, of which I know very little." He also asserts that Chinese pickling is of foundational importance in that it influenced so many other pickling styles. But all we really get in terms of info are two quotations from a the one secondary source that Katz has found in English on the subject, followed by , "I wish I knew more and could provide more than a cursory glimpse of the broad, dynamic, and living tradition of Chinese vegetable fermentation." So do I! I mean, fine, so he's not got a lot of first-hand knowledge of Chinese pickling—and he can’t read Chinese-language sources on the subject. Fair enough-- you can't be a hands-on expert on everything. But, from a book whose subtitle proclaims it to be "An In-Depth Exploration of Essential Concepts and Processes from Around the World," I still expect more, especially given the importance he ascribes to Chinese pickling traditions. It seems to me that there options that could have been have been used to research this-- like making a trip to China and explore this first hand, with the aid of an interpreter; or meeting with with Chinese immigrants who may have first hand knowledge of this; or hiring an assistant fluent in the language to survey Chinese-language literature on the subject.
5) Comments by the author that seem to combine errors, odd assumptions, and a lack of knowledge into one. For instance, in a chapter on dairy ferments, he mentions a type of yogurt made in Africa, but then makes the rather curious statement that it’s not technically yogurt because its made with zebu milk, rather than cow’s milk. (He also mentions that he had never previously heard of zebu.) Leaving aside the curious suggestion that something is only yogurt if it’s made with cow’s milk(?!), the fact is that zebu are a type of domestic cattle—something that could have easily been fact-checked with a quick online search.
Now, to be fair, none of these issues, on their own-- or even on the whole-- invalidates the Art of Fermentation's merit as a resource. Nonetheless, their cumulative was to bug the hell out of me.
All that said, the fact remains that, to my knowledge, “The Art of Fermentation,” is still the most comprehensive book on the subject yet published, and may well be for some time to come. I just wish it didn't also come with so many annoying elements.
September 5, 2018
10/10 will read again.
October 17, 2017
What Arora is to the fungi world, Katz is to the fermentation world. This is the ultimate go-to resource to figure everything fermentation out. Highly recommended.
November 19, 2013
Love this book! The subject of fermentation brings out my inner nerd, and this book feeds that impulse! When I got it, I literally sat down and started reading it cover-to-cover, as if it were a novel rather than a cookbook. This is not a book of recipes. Rather, it's a book about the methodologies and practices and principles of fermentation. I definitely appreciate the references to how fermentation is practiced around the world in obscure cultures. As a librarian and nerd, I also appreciate how he cites his sources constantly, so that I am able to do further reading if so desired. By far, my favorite thing is that this book enables me to go and experiment with the plethora of suggestions he provides. Again, this is NOT a book for people who like to follow recipes step-by-step. Rather, it's for the experimental cook/diy-er, who invariably modifies every recipe she uses.
By far, the best section in this book is the section on "kraut-chi" (love the use of this word). There are many suggestions and variations, and I felt very inspired and motivated after reading this section. I wish the section on kefir was larger, but Katz wisely alludes several times to Dom's kefir site, which is THE online authority on kefir. Something I've been struggling with is finding use for whey (the result of making kefir-cheese), and this book brings up many suggestions. I haven't yet had the impulse to make my own beer or wine, but after reading this, I am tempted to make fruit sodas using whey and venturing into fruit fermentation and maybe even making a cider or vinegar.
By far, the best section in this book is the section on "kraut-chi" (love the use of this word). There are many suggestions and variations, and I felt very inspired and motivated after reading this section. I wish the section on kefir was larger, but Katz wisely alludes several times to Dom's kefir site, which is THE online authority on kefir. Something I've been struggling with is finding use for whey (the result of making kefir-cheese), and this book brings up many suggestions. I haven't yet had the impulse to make my own beer or wine, but after reading this, I am tempted to make fruit sodas using whey and venturing into fruit fermentation and maybe even making a cider or vinegar.
December 14, 2012
Everything you ever wanted to learn about Fermentation and more.
This is a great book, too in-depth for my needs but I enjoyed reading sections of specific interest. NO! Not fermenting sugars into Alcohol, which is Chapter 4 by the way. I was interested in Sauerkraut. Which seems simple enough and I think I'll give it a try.
I learned about a fermented sweet tea, kombucha, and soon after got a few bottles of it from Whole Foods. I love this drink! And it's introducing pro-biotics into my body along with that Sauerkraut I got.
One day, I may make my own kombucha tea and sauerkraut.
For kombucha tea, I will have to find a 'mother' called SCOBY to harvest the drink. Some people think of their SCOBYS as pets as they need to be fed regularly tea and a sugar.
When and if I master kombucha tea and sauerkraut, I would definitely come back to this book as it's an reference covering different fermentation processes from around the world, equipment, tools needs and the health benefits derived from fermented foods.
Bon Appetit
March 27, 2013
It is clear that the author, Sandor Katz, has decades of experience fermenting just about anything. As such, this book is filled with Katz passing along that knowledge, spelling out the types of things that can be fermented, how they can be fermented, the fermentation agents, and the vessels you'll need to do such fermentation.
So, what could possibly be missing?
Specifics. Recipes. Clear step-by-step instructions on how you can do this at home.
Without these basic things, Katz's book turns into little more than a mental exercise on the fermentation process. He's passing along a layman's guide to textbook fermentation, but never passes down the how-to that can keep the knowledge alive and thriving.
In the end, this book has given me a starting point for consulting The Google to find more detailed resources on fermenting my own brews. However, given the title and Katz's experience, I don't think I was wrong to expect more.
So, what could possibly be missing?
Specifics. Recipes. Clear step-by-step instructions on how you can do this at home.
Without these basic things, Katz's book turns into little more than a mental exercise on the fermentation process. He's passing along a layman's guide to textbook fermentation, but never passes down the how-to that can keep the knowledge alive and thriving.
In the end, this book has given me a starting point for consulting The Google to find more detailed resources on fermenting my own brews. However, given the title and Katz's experience, I don't think I was wrong to expect more.
November 1, 2015
According to my rating rules there is no way a cook book should be getting more than three stars, but this is the one. Katz makes you feel you will be Closer To God by fermenting your own foods.
As others have said, complaints about lack of recipes are from readers who Do Not Get It. Katz is not the high priest of food here to tell you what God has given you, he points at it. You touch it with your own hands and eat it with your own mouth.
Since reading the book I have started a mead, fermented onions (yay!) and apples (less yay) and started making kombucha at home.
As others have said, complaints about lack of recipes are from readers who Do Not Get It. Katz is not the high priest of food here to tell you what God has given you, he points at it. You touch it with your own hands and eat it with your own mouth.
Since reading the book I have started a mead, fermented onions (yay!) and apples (less yay) and started making kombucha at home.
April 13, 2015
Lots of information about fermenting of various kinds, but the useful info is buried amongst trivia. Some clearer how-to would be more useful than a discussion of the history of different ferments.
August 31, 2016
Marvellous read, I enjoyed this far more than most fiction I've read recently.
April 8, 2020
Katz is a Saint, the Bob Ross of pickling. A feel-good read for anyone, no matter your level of enthusiasm for microbes.
June 15, 2022
Very comprehensive. Fermentation is a boggling, fascinating world that I've been trying to get into, and after reading this I'm sold. Now excuse me while I go make miso and brew my own rice wine.
July 12, 2020
My experience of this book seems to be a common one. I got it expecting it to be a guide to making fermented foods, with recipes and step by step instructions to help me get going. I flipped through it, found that it had no ingredient lists or numbered directions, and it languished on my shelf for years. I was expecting a book of fermentation recipes, and this is very much not that book. But when I did finally give it time, what I found in it is even better.
I came back to The Art of Fermentation in the spring and summer of COVID-19. Like many people, I wanted projects, and (cut off from eating out), I wanted interesting food and drink. So, I started reading through, from cover to cover. Which, it turns out, is how this book needs to be read. It’s many things: an overview of the many different kinds of fermentation, with practices sampled from cultures around the world; an introduction to the science and history of fermentation; an ecological manifesto that wants to revolutionize our relationship to food and to the natural world.
Most importantly, the title is apt: it really does treat fermentation as an art. It makes sense that there are no real recipes, because the creation of art can not be reduced to a series of steps to be followed mechanically. Art proceeds by experimentation and intuition, creating something singular and personal. And this is exactly the approach to fermentation the book encourages. Rather than systematizing a ferment into a clear series of steps, Katz tells us what he does, and what other people do. Often there are no quantities; “taste it” is a frequent instruction. Instead of giving you steps to follow, he teaches you how it’s done, so even from the start you’re fermenting on your own, without following a list.
In order to achieve this end, the book has to take the fear out of fermentation, and it does an admirable job of that. I grew up in the age of “food safety,” with a suspicion of anything raw and at room temperature. Katz shows the differences between fermentation and canning, explains the protective properties of the bacteria and yeasts that the fermentation environment encourages, and all around makes fermentation feel much less threatening. His reassurances about mold that might form during fermentation are especially eye-opening. Reading this book left me with enough understanding to feel empowered to try all the things I was reading about.
So far, I’ve made my own kombucha, sauerkraut, mixed vegetable ferments, and yogurt; I expect to try fruit wines soon, and eventually to work my way up to working with koji. Now, I could have done most of this without having to refer to The Art of Fermentation, and in some cases (especially the kombucha), I’ve gone to other sources for more precise directions. But would I have made them? I don’t know. And even if I had, it would have been with less confidence and less understanding.
I would have been glad to read this book even if I’d never fermented anything. It taught me so much about where various foods come from, about the complex roles of microorganisms in our lives, about an array of food cultures I knew nothing about. It gave me a whole new appreciation of locality, of how the microbiota of a particular place produce truly unique local food products and those differences are something we should seek out and celebrate. It gave me a fresh awareness of how dependent our food systems are on energy-intensive technologies like refrigeration, and what alternatives might be possible. I’ve read books that changed the way I cooked, and I’ve read books that changed the way I thought about food, but I think this is the first book I ever read that did both at once. I recommend it unreservedly to anyone who wants to learn to ferment, to anyone who cares about food and where it comes from, and anyone interested in better understanding how we’re all connected to our world.
I came back to The Art of Fermentation in the spring and summer of COVID-19. Like many people, I wanted projects, and (cut off from eating out), I wanted interesting food and drink. So, I started reading through, from cover to cover. Which, it turns out, is how this book needs to be read. It’s many things: an overview of the many different kinds of fermentation, with practices sampled from cultures around the world; an introduction to the science and history of fermentation; an ecological manifesto that wants to revolutionize our relationship to food and to the natural world.
Most importantly, the title is apt: it really does treat fermentation as an art. It makes sense that there are no real recipes, because the creation of art can not be reduced to a series of steps to be followed mechanically. Art proceeds by experimentation and intuition, creating something singular and personal. And this is exactly the approach to fermentation the book encourages. Rather than systematizing a ferment into a clear series of steps, Katz tells us what he does, and what other people do. Often there are no quantities; “taste it” is a frequent instruction. Instead of giving you steps to follow, he teaches you how it’s done, so even from the start you’re fermenting on your own, without following a list.
In order to achieve this end, the book has to take the fear out of fermentation, and it does an admirable job of that. I grew up in the age of “food safety,” with a suspicion of anything raw and at room temperature. Katz shows the differences between fermentation and canning, explains the protective properties of the bacteria and yeasts that the fermentation environment encourages, and all around makes fermentation feel much less threatening. His reassurances about mold that might form during fermentation are especially eye-opening. Reading this book left me with enough understanding to feel empowered to try all the things I was reading about.
So far, I’ve made my own kombucha, sauerkraut, mixed vegetable ferments, and yogurt; I expect to try fruit wines soon, and eventually to work my way up to working with koji. Now, I could have done most of this without having to refer to The Art of Fermentation, and in some cases (especially the kombucha), I’ve gone to other sources for more precise directions. But would I have made them? I don’t know. And even if I had, it would have been with less confidence and less understanding.
I would have been glad to read this book even if I’d never fermented anything. It taught me so much about where various foods come from, about the complex roles of microorganisms in our lives, about an array of food cultures I knew nothing about. It gave me a whole new appreciation of locality, of how the microbiota of a particular place produce truly unique local food products and those differences are something we should seek out and celebrate. It gave me a fresh awareness of how dependent our food systems are on energy-intensive technologies like refrigeration, and what alternatives might be possible. I’ve read books that changed the way I cooked, and I’ve read books that changed the way I thought about food, but I think this is the first book I ever read that did both at once. I recommend it unreservedly to anyone who wants to learn to ferment, to anyone who cares about food and where it comes from, and anyone interested in better understanding how we’re all connected to our world.
January 7, 2020
Admittedly not everything in this book is TECHNICALLY fermented, but the spirit and traditions of many of these practices are adjacent to the point of overlapping so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
There were bits I skimmed (bioremediation, anyone? human decomposition, anyone?!) BUT this book definitely tickles my fancy in areas I know and love (i.e., fermented alcoholic beverages) and piqued my interest in dabbling in some others (e.g., keffir, sauerkraut, and maybe some of those cured meats).
Katz is an outstanding narrator and storyteller, and if this sort of thing interests you at all then this book is 100% worth your time. Even if you skip over the bits about making silage and compost.
There were bits I skimmed (bioremediation, anyone? human decomposition, anyone?!) BUT this book definitely tickles my fancy in areas I know and love (i.e., fermented alcoholic beverages) and piqued my interest in dabbling in some others (e.g., keffir, sauerkraut, and maybe some of those cured meats).
Katz is an outstanding narrator and storyteller, and if this sort of thing interests you at all then this book is 100% worth your time. Even if you skip over the bits about making silage and compost.
January 27, 2019
Thorough
...and it can be read re read by bits and pieces, most of the time not in the given order. Some pages or chapters would be more interesting some not that much, ie, love the kombucha or rejuvelac part, all grain and fermented milk portion. Meat or roots doesn't make me a buff. The book is awesome.
...and it can be read re read by bits and pieces, most of the time not in the given order. Some pages or chapters would be more interesting some not that much, ie, love the kombucha or rejuvelac part, all grain and fermented milk portion. Meat or roots doesn't make me a buff. The book is awesome.
June 5, 2019
Very informative. Has everything you would want to know about fermenting: the biological process behind it, history, troubleshooting, and more. Makes me want to bust out my pickling crock on start on a batch of sauerkraut.
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