Foodthink’s first issue of The Alchemy of Food breaks down kombucha through 20 questions — from cultivating the mother culture and tea-to-sugar ratios to identifying mould, secondary fermentation and storage, covering the full hands-on process.
Sun Shan, farming in Canada, turned kale earning rave reviews but selling poorly at the Farmers’ market into Korean-style kimchi, building a fermentation kitchen at Chi Garden Eco Farm. Fermentation touches gut microbiota and memories of home; she shares beginner insights from chilli sauce to fermented pickled vegetables.
Inspired by Finnish immigrants carrying Viili culture in a handkerchief to America, designer Xu Xijing screen-prints the negative patterns of three natural yoghurts onto cloth, paints the positive shapes in yoghurt, and makes tiny culture containers that revive in milk—sending them to friends to keep roaming.
In early summer 2020, Zhang Xiaoshu first tasted kombucha fermented with Chinese tea at a friend’s by the Drum Tower. Three years on, she, tea friends Shuyu and Kiwon, and a growing circle passed cultures, blind-tasted, and guarded connection through a jar of fermentation amid lockdowns and scattering.