“Between fresh and rotten, there is a creative space in which some of the most compelling of flavors arise.”

––– Sandor Katz, The Art of Fermentation

I’ve been getting packages in the mail all week.

Okay, only two. But the anticipation as made the whole experince seep into every facet of my life, just as if I really were receiving packages every day, instead of checking their shipping status every half-hour.

Thursday these arrived:

Garters at Sunset, or some such.

Yes, more socks, to go with my ever growing collection. And yes, garters. I went to the Freer Art Gallery with a friend and her father a month ago and the night, beautiful as it was, experienced more than its fair share of worry over slipping, slouching, sagging stockings. So garters. I’ve tested them out twice now, with my new favorite socks, and can attest to their usefulness and comfort. You think they’re going to be too tight when you first snap them on, but all that fat on our legs is conveniently movable. If you make them as lose as you think they should be they’re liable to fall down to your knees at the first mention of a brisk walk, as they did Friday, when I first wore them. Today I tightened them up (or down?) and wore them with my brown, Good Will heels while walking around Ikea. I didn’t have any slippage at all, and my legs didn’t turn purple and fall off. It’s actually quite easy to forget they’re there if you walk in a lady like fashion, though plodding along in my usual manner they tend to brush against each other every now and then. I’m curious to see how long they’ll last before stretching out completely.

If you’re afraid that this – the packages and stockings and care about appearance – is all rather materialistic, well yes it is. But don’t worry, what I lack in moderation I more than make up for in diversity because my next box, arrived just this afternoon, held a book.

Yes, The Art of Fermentation, by Sandor Katz. And while this tome does include beer and wine, it mostly contains kimchi, yogurt, miso, sauerkraut, and a peculiar Russian drink called kvass that’s traditionally made out of stale bread. It also has ginger beer, which alone is enough of a reason to chose it over the other pickling and canning books out there. I’ve been wanting to make this forever even though, up to now, I had not the foggiest idea of what it was.

Already I’ve flipped through some of the “recipes” (after admiring the cover, of course. Carrot-orange dust jacket over maroon-dusted-plum with gold lettering, finished with pumpkin colored endpapers, and my heart is lost again). Now I’m knuckling down and working my way through the first few chapters, which are full of indigestible psedo-latin phrases  and tantalizing pictures of the microcosmos that envelopes and overlays our whole life. It’s sci-fi: mini edition.

The author of this book, who I know nothing about, has taken the pain to include a “Cultural Revivalist Manifesto,” which I have yet to read. The ignorance is mostly thoughtless (which I feel guilty for), but partly intentional (which I’m fine with). The subject of preservation, and therefore food and nutrition, blends so easily with political view points it makes me a little prickly. I’m afraid the one thing I am consistent about is being contrary, and so when I read anyone who is passionate, dare we say radical, I tend to grind my heels in for no other reason than pure willfulness. Despite this purposeful mental distancing, I agree with a lot of the basic, underlying principles on which the author’s love for fermented foods is founded. The ideas of community, sustainability, and creativity – of culture, as he puts it – are neither new to me nor alien. One of my favorite books as a kid was Stalking the Healthful Herbs. I was already obsessed with the idea of eating whatever came to hand, and then Euell Gibbons has such a wonderful way of writing – so thick and summery. Surely Gibbons, in his own way, urged us to “break out of the confining and infantilizing dependency of the role of the consumer (user), and take back our dignity and power by becoming producers and creators.” I’m positive he shared the sentiment – as must I, in some way, to be interested in this book even a little and to thrill at the idea that one day, maybe after a few years of careful sauerkraut production, I’ll be able to move onto jeryking meat and making aged cheeses. Still, after being reminded that we may all soon be without electricity, I need to read such lines as these to settle my contentious spirit:

“Yet ultimately more compelling (at least for me) than preservation, health, or energy efficiency benefits are the complex edgy flavors of fermentation . . . .”

Yes. It’s primarily about food. But reading the pop-science chapter has made me want to learn more about microorganisms in general. Is there such a book written out there in English for people who still think light is black magic, or should I kill two birds with one stone and watch more Moyashimon? I’m going to put off both possibilities because I’m just about to start Chapter 3: Basic Concepts and Equipment.