Zen, Being the scientist I am, I went on google scholar to find out what I could about the use of Glomus Intradices in tomatoes. I found a publication that you might be interested in. All I could obtain was the abstract. The peer reviewed scientific study was published in the journal Biological Control, vol 5, issue 3. The title of the publication is "Biological Control of Fusarium Crown and Root Rot of Tomato in Florida Using Trichoderma harzianum and Glomus intraradices." I could not get the full text version, but I can post the abstract: "Field experiments were conducted to evaluate commercial formulations of two beneficial fungi, Trichoderma harzianum and Glomus intraradices, for the control of Fusarium crown and root rot of tomato, caused by Fusarium oxysporum f. sp. radicis-lycopersici. Tomato seeds cv. "Sunny" were planted into soil nonamended or amended with the biocontrol agents, the former treatment serving as the control. After 6-7 weeks, plants were transplanted into beds fumigated with methyl bromide-chloropicrin in commercial tomato fields with a previous history of Fusarium crown and root rot. Disease incidence and severity were recorded at harvest maturity. Large and extra-large fruits (greater than or equal to 6.27 cm) also were harvested, counted, and weighed at maturity. Total marketable fruit yield was also determined. Compared to the controls, significant decreases in disease incidence were obtained with treatments of T. harzianum (1993), G. intraradices (1991), and T. harzianum + G. intraradices (both years). Significant decreases in disease severity were obtained with the treatments of T. harzianum (1993), G. intraradices (1991), and T. harzianum + G. intraradices (1993). Yields of large and extra-large fruit or total marketable yield were not significantly different over the controls. These data suggest that commercial biological control agents may be effective in reducing Fusarium crown and root rot and that further evaluation of these agents is justified." From that I take it that if fusarium wilt is a concern for you in tomatoes, that you could find significant resistance by using this Glomus Intradices laced product. Makes me go mmmm.

the 2 recipes are almost identical. 2 qts chopped peeled cored tomatoes 1 1/2 cups chopped seeded hot red peppers 1 qt vinegar divided is the same as 8 cups (64 ounces) canned, diced tomatoes, undrained 1½ cups seeded, chopped Serrano peppers 4 cups distilled white vinegar (5 percent) the rest is minor. But I like the recipe or both recipes. but I still have a question for Zakker. How do you grind up the peppers. blender or food processor or something else. *****using 1:2 vinegar. That a lot vinegar purchase!! I take it you mean 1 part mash to 2 parts vinegar. I suspect this is a common ratio that commercial people use. I suspect some of the cayenne people use more vinegar to dilute the salt. but lousiana hot sauce is cayenne mash with vinegar and it is kind of salty. Might be able to figure the dilution from the final salt and a good guess on the starting salt. Of course all mfg will rave about their process of making hot sauce. Tabasco sure does. But it seems to me that if you add 2 units of vinegar to the 1 unit of mash then why bother fermenting. You have so much vinegar that you may as well just use the pure vinegar method. Just putting the question to you to see what you might say. I really wonder if you can taste a difference. I would say that any fermentation taste is gone from tabasco. It tastes like flavored vinegar to me. And aging the tabasco sure is a waste of time and energy. I can not imagine that doing it with say a couple of weeks aging would be just as good as the 3 years of aging they claim. and the oak barrel might be ok for wine but I doubt it does anything for hot sauce. and what do you think of lamalu's 2 quick easy recipes. no fermentation. nice tomato taste. John do you know if you can ferment the tomato juice. Can we mix tomato juice and hot peppers and ferment them. The problem I see is that the tomato juice is already pretty low acid so it might not ferment properly. by the way pretty cool that you could purchase 100 pounds of hot peppers. I assume at a good price. Bye the way I have never been a cayenne fan. To me they always seemed hot without much flavor. just blind heat. well at 50,000 SHU they are hot and I dont find much flavor. For example I like habanero at say 350,000 SHU with good flavor. for some reason they do not have that same heat that cayenne has. However, It is interesting they have a new hybrid cayenne type with low heat. that has possibilities because the cayenne has nice high yield. so in a small garden maybe I can get more pepper for my hot sauce. then heat it up with other stuff. but zakker you seem to talk about the flavor of cayenne. so i find that interesting. what do you think of other pepper flavors. or maybe you like to get the flavor from the food and add the heat using cayenne. Bye the way ship 100 bottles to me pronto.

This looks to be #150, so I'll start another sourdough thread with pie segue. :) Cathy, I know the liberated feeling you're talking about! I had it when I started these experiments with the discard. I do as I please with most baking recipes, usually to success. I don't have Grainlady's technical knowledge nor Ann's experience and expertise, but I know that if you control the basics, it'll come out. My mother's challah is so tetchy, however, that controlling it is enough without messing with it. A cousin did that when I was young, and tried using it as a base recipe for other breads, and they were breads, but I didn't really like them. You have to know how to not handle the challah (no typos there) to make it work out right. Add to that the old miseries of using cake yeast and I never messed with yeast dough before. I really liked the figgy loaf! Worrying about keeping the yeast alive rather than if I was going to ruin the bread was great. But that was one of those very soupy things, and if I try that again, I'll use less water/more flour. :) It's interesting that so many people think more hydration means lighter bread and more holes! That's the opposite to what I've experienced so far. Leader, like the ciabatta recipe, works the dough and develops the gluten. Controlled hydration seems to work better for me, and I definitely think the miche was too wet given how much better it got as it dried out. I had similar issues with the pizza recipe. One of the ones I tried, which was the result of much study in a pizza working group, was something like 90% hydration of whole wheat (though not soupy!). It was a very sticky dough and had to be made in a pan. It was not at all comfortable with toppings, though it was okay par-baked. Totally wrong for me, and it didn't have a good enough baked texture to stick with. It's not like my pizza recipe is low hydration. Just comparatively low. It's around 70% hydration. Cathy, I agree that inhaling pizza of any kind is frightening! Thank goodness for the widespread publicity for the Heimlich Maneuver! The miche is peasanty, as in plain old bread. I'd be happy to make the pain de levain for you! That has much more complexity even though it's mostly white. It's very yummy! The miche isn't as flavorless now, but it's not stand in line worthy, unfortunately. Next time. It was supposed to be record setting heat this weekend, but we're having monsoon influence, instead. Not the actual monsoons, which are farther South, but damp and cooler. Spaghetti and meatballs and ciabatta sounds delicious and decadent right now! (Decadent because two starches--my mother never served bread with pasta.) My favorite way to eat ciabatta, however, is with a goodly layer of good butter and an even thicker layer of powder grated good parmesan. This is the breakfast the Italian stewards on the ocean liner tempted my mother with when she was underfed and ill and returning home. I am not underfed, so I don't indulge, but the slightly salty, slightly sour bread with the sweet butter and salty, umami parm is just amazing. (Okay, I'm not underfed, but I haven't had breakfast...) Standing in line for the ciabatta... The gyros-ish meatloaf came out fine. It would have been better with more fat (who says that?), but the meat that needed using was very lean. I suppose I could have added some butter, but who does that? Not I. It's tasty, though. I didn't go full out on the seasoning (i.e., used the recipe) because I'd never made this recipe before. It could be kicked up a bit, but the flavor is about right. The leanness means I can be generous with the oil and grill some up later. :) No yoghurt sauce since since there are no pita either and my cucumbers and dill both bit it in the fridge. Tomatoes, onions and peppers will be fine. :) Ann, one lesson I learned best from you is to just put things in the fridge. Fermenting yeast things, that is. Just put it in the fridge. It's the most freeing thing I've learned recently. I've read all about it, of course, and the pizza recipe is one that's meant to develop in the fridge, but the way you just whip up a levain and throw it in the fridge until you're ready, or make up some do and go off to work, with instructions to Moe for when to take it out. Of course it's a given that cold retards yeast, but so much of my bread life until now has been about keeping yeast warm and cozy and encouraging it to rise, retarding the rise in the fridge to manage the slow process of sourdough is a revelation. Thank-you! Edited to add link and fix weird typo. This post was edited by plllog on Tue, Aug 5, 14 at 20:51

I second that "Yep". When I was making yogurt all the time I could only find Stonyfield Farm Yogurt (which has more varieties of good bacteria in it than Dannon or other brands), two hours away, so I would place it in an ice cube tray in 1-tablespoon amounts. When I needed a new starter I would thaw enough cubes-of-yogurt in the refrigerator and bring it to room temperature before using it to innoculate the batch. I rarely make yogurt - I'm a kefir gal now. The kefir grains last forever and grow to make more so you never need a new starter. You plop the kefir grains in a quart canning jar with 2-3-cups of cold milk of choice in it - right from the refrigerator - and set it on the kitchen counter (out of direct sun), and in 12-24-hours you have kefir. The curd is similar to plain yogurt. -Grainlady Here is a link that might be useful: Dom's Kefir In-Site