Summer solstice wild-fermented soda
This summer solstice I started my first batch of wild soda of the year! Many of my ancestors lived in a tropical climate in the Philippines, where acidity and salt plays a large role in transforming and preserving foods, so I have a deep respect and fascination with fermentation, and making wild sodas is one way I stay in relationship with the cultures around and inside me.
There are a few ways to ferment a wild soda. In this process, wild yeasts and sugar from local plants and raw honey make magic together, and you end up with a gut supporting beverage that's sweet, tart, sparkling, and gently infused with medicinal properties of plants! Wildcrafter and teacher Pascal Baudar even encourages making soda with mushrooms, which I’m excited to try in the fall. It’s an interesting and low-resource preparation that you can start any time of year to highlight local and seasonal flavors, though it is quickest to make during the warmer months.
Image above: silvery mugwort and yarrow ready to become soda!
Solstice wild soda - cold water method:
Directions:
To a clean glass jar, I added:
a heaping cup of freshly dried mugwort, yarrow, and rosemary
1/2 C raw honey
1/2 gallon filtered and dechlorinated water. Dechlorinate tap water by leaving it out overnight - the chlorine will evaporate.
Cover the opening of the jar with clean cloth or coffee filter and a rubber band. This way, the mixture is exposed to air but bugs are kept out.
Stir the mixture a couple times each day. Once it starts bubbling, ferment another 24-48 hours, stirring and tasting daily. When it tastes carbonated, strain out the herbs. Then cap the jar, or transfer to a glass flip-top bottle.
In the flip top bottle, let carbonation build up 24-48 hours (sometimes longer, but pop the top daily to release some pressure so your bottle doesn’t explode). When it’s to your satisfaction, serve cold and garnished with fresh herbs and flowers! You can store your wild soda in the fridge for 3 months, that is if you don’t drink it all in the first week. I do find that the carbonation fades after storing in the fridge a while.
You can easily adapt this recipe to fresh flowers, herbs and fruit, which is my preferred method of making sodas. To do this, just add more herbs.
Another method for brewing soda is to start with a hot infusion using all the same measurements. This method will create a stronger flavor (where the cold infusion brings out more delicate notes) and broadly draw out the medicinal properties of the plants just like an herbal tea. Prepare a hot infusion by pouring just-boiled water over the herbs. Let the infusion cool to room temperature before adding honey. Continue with the fermentation process as listed above.
To play with flavor notes, try combinations of fresh and dried herbs, or a combination of cold and hot infusions. You can also use different kinds of sugars and add culture starters to help your fermentation along.
Image above: past batch of fizzy herbal soda in a fancy glass - photographed with percy’s kitchen experiments
Resources:
Pascal Baudar has a few great books about wild ferments, and the Noma Guide to Fermentation has regular use in my kitchen.