FERMENT IT | Guest Interview with Belinda & James from Ferment It

I am excited to be sharing an interview with some fellow fermenters albeit these guys are doing it on a much larger scale than myself. I had the pleasure of trying some of their fermented foods recently and I gotta say they are definitely gourmet! These ferments offer a different and delicious spin on what you may typically be used to. Their fermenting technique makes it possible for people like myself over the other side of the country to enjoy their products.

Can you give us some background as to how and why you guys got into fermenting?

Thanks Jeremy for this opportunity to share our story, love and passion for nutritional organic fermented foods. Over a year and a half ago we decided to commence our own business, Jambel Eco-Productions, with our accumulated skills to better serve the internal and external environments for the people of Australia. After dedicated research and life experiences, we truly felt that to educate and provide consumers with a pre & pro-biotic gourmet range of fermented foods was the way forward. Essentially as James is a chef and Bella a teacher by trade, this made sense for our personal and business future. On a personal note James father passed away from cancer 2 years ago, which really started the fire in our bellies to share our knowledge and love of healthy organic wholefoods! Most importantly we wanted to provide a profound product in the marketplace that would benefit people by taking preventative measures before it is too late, therefore increasing their microbial gut flora to maintain a healthier lifestyle.

Your fermented foods are quite different to what one may typically see on the shelves of the health food stores, the obvious being that your products are in a zip lock bag, can you share with the readers how your fermenting technique enables the products to be bagged and not off-gas and cause the bag to explode?

Currently we are selling our fermented food products in a BPA free zip lock bag, so consumers would note the point of difference between our competitors and us. The main reason for this, as you mentioned above, is that our product range is currently not packaged in glass and does not require refrigeration until after opening. We are able to deliver our product range this way due to our devoted Ferment It method of lacto-fermentation. This production process was really important for us to correctly implement, so consumers receive the full benefits from a complete lacto-fermentation. As you know, certain lactobacillus bacteria take time to develop and mature resulting in a more nutritious and delicious end product without explosive results. We never pack our product range until our fermentation process has completely out gassed from our vats, as a result of most available sugars being consumed by symbiotic yeasts and lactobacillus bacteria. This process can take between 4-9 weeks. We inoculate all of our ferments with a powerful organic, gluten and dairy free pre & pro-biotic formula to create a consistent ferment every time

.Another obvious difference to other products out there are some of the gourmet ingredients (inca berries, lime, mango, star anise) you guys use, can you share with us where the inspiration came from to use such ingredients?

Quite simply with James knowledge, love and experience of food and wines around the world, his understanding of combined flavours and textures was always going to be important in this organic fermented food range. We are true foodie lovers and believe that taste is just as important as health! If you are going to eat these foods as a condiment every day as suggested, you really want to incorporate some delicious gourmet flavour into your meals. Believe us, you can really taste the goodness! Many people are already familiar with Kimchi and Sauerkraut, so we modernised the ingredients to spice things up and create bold flavours! Our unique Lime, Mango & Chili is a hit with fermented food lovers and our Beetroot, Apple & Inca Berry (infused with cloves & star anise) is so original, tasty for all seasonal produce. These organic gourmet ingredients suit most nutritional diets eg: Micro/Macro-biotics, Raw foodies, Vegans, Vegetarians & Paleo. So we feel blessed with the support and encouragement of this vast demographic.

We are seeing a lot more information coming out over mainstream media these days about the importance of gut health, how important do you feel fermented foods are in relation to this and overall health in general?

Gut health is extremely important these days and as you know always was! Finally we are slowly waking up and recovering from our amnesia from our modern, commercial bastardisation in the food and mono-agriculture industry and especially in ways of preserving processed foods eg: canning, GMO and the high usage of GRAS chemicals and sugars. The resurgence of fermented foods and other cottage-based industries are a welcome breath of fresh air to improve overall gut health and vitality. Once regularly consumed, the benefits and outcomes of fermented foods are overwhelming for many people. We have microbiologists purchase our products, so that must be saying something! Humans are a host to all types of bacteria so with biodiversity of good microbial bacteria in our guts, from healthy functional wholefoods and ferments, we stand a better chance at improving our health on all levels, mental, emotional, physical and spiritual.

Rumour has it that fermented foods can also cure/reverse grey hair can you fill us in on the details with this?

Too funny Jeremy! Yes this comment from James is true and slowly happening. James hair colour seems to be reverting to his original colour and also growing more. Who knows? We do feel a lot more energetic and youthful these days and we definitely have more stamina and vitality.

Im sure you have had so much feedback from people and how they have had health revelations since incorporating your products into their diet, could you share with us some stories

Absolutely! The feedback has been so positive and amazing from our customers and regular clients. The main revelation we keep hearing about is how good it tastes and how great people are feeling after consuming. Many people find they become addicted to our fermented foods and begin to crave these products daily instead of sweet processed foods. This is totally great to hear, as a major function of incorporating fermented foods into our lifestyle, is to assist with reducing sugar cravings. It has also helped many of our customers with the following: Headaches, Candida, ulcers, digestive issues, gout, weight regulation, bloating, mental clarity & focus (useful for Autism and ADHD), vitality, motivation, eating sensibly and feeling satiated. You can view customer testimonials on our website.

If you were Captain Cook setting off on exploration expedition what ferment would you have chosen to take on board the ship and why

Difficult one Jeremy we love them all, even when we go camping we take all four of our products. Most likely an expedition would take a long time and we assume there would be a lot of rice to eat as a staple, so we would choose the Kimchi, as there are 8 nutritional ingredients, is full of Vitamin C and a superb condiment for rice dishes. However Sauerkraut did get those sailors over here on ships in the first place too and helped with scurvy, so maybe that would be our next option.

Where can our readers find your amazing fermented foods?

We sell online, at markets and some wholesalers. Visit www.fermentit.com.au for more details on weekly markets and stockists. You can like us on Facebook- Ferment It or follow us on Instagram- fermentitgood. We appreciate our Ferment It followers posts and creativity with pictures. Look out for us in 2015 though because we will be distributing hopefully Australia wide! Remember to Eat It, Live It, Love It from Ferment It.