recipes that grow on trees: Tempeh Tempeh Tempeh

Before making tempeh, you'll need to have obtained the starter, spores of the Rhyzopus oligosporus mold. One source is G.E.M. cultures. I've heard that the starter will last 6 months, but I think you can stretch that if you keep it in the fridge and increase the amount you use as it ages.

Here's the KVG recipe:

2.5 C whole dry soybeans, washed and drained
1-1.5 T rice vinegar
water
1 t tempeh starter or 2 oz fresh minced tempeh

that makes one big ziploc bag. We make five times the recipe in a go, so all measurements below will be for 12.5 cups of soybeans. The process, from soaking to finish, takes about 36-48 hours.

1) So, start with soybeans. Cover them with water (7.5 C?) in a big pot and bring

them to a boil before letting them soak overnight, covered (8-16 hours for pre-fermentation). Drain them and let the fun begin. Once drained, you'll need to dehull/split your soybeans in an amusing and efficient manner. If you're making a small batch, using a rolling pin or small cutting board to press down on them work, but for larger amounts, might I suggest strapping wooden boards to your feet and stepping on them? These experts use a grain mill. It's important to split the beans because the culture can't penetrate the hull, and you'll be stuck with unfermented soybeans in your tempeh.

2) You now have a mix of cracked soybeans and hulls. To separate out the hulls, fill your bowl or pot of bean/hull mix with water and sloosh it around a bit,. The hulls will float to the top--the trick is to pour them off before they settle. If you can establish a good rhythm, it should take about 5 fill and pour cycles to get most of the hulls away (no need to be too too anal).

I like to think of the hulls as soybean ghosts

3) After the last hull pour-off, cover the beans (about 10 cups of water) and add 1.5 T vinegar (i have a note that says if it's a smaller pot, add 7.5 cups water and only 1 T vinegar). Bring to an active boil and cook, uncovered, for 30-45 minutes (do not pressure cook). The vinegar lowers the pH, which inhibits less desirable molds from jumping in

.

4) Drain the beans then pour onto baking sheets lined with towels to dry. Let stand 20-30 minutes, stir around a bit every once in a while, until they are about body temperature and fairly dry. Transfer them to a large bowl, add the tempeh starter, and stir/mix for 2 minutes (well-mixed is the goal).

5) Now we need some ziploc bags with holes in them. Take your gallon ziploc bags and poke holes in them using, i dunno, a far sewing needle, pushpin, corn cob holders?, in a grid pattern, about 1/2 to 3/4 inches apart. My notes say that you can get about 6 cups in each gallon bag.

6) Incubate. This the the tricky bit. The goal is to keep the fridge at 86-88 degress for 22-28 hours. The instructions we were using, from The Book of Tempeh, recommend putting a lightbulb with a dimmer in a foam cooler, with a rack at the bottom for air circulation. We just put a light bulb in the oven, put a bandana above it so it didn't overheat the bag nearest to it, and left the oven door slightly ajar (rolled up dishcloth to keep it from shutting all the way). It'll be a bit tricky the first time, but then you'll know what it takes to get your oven hot enough. The key is to keep checking it, because once the fermentation takes off, the tempeh will start producing it's own heat.

You'll know it's done when it's got the white mold all around it--the soybeans should look held together, not loose. If it starts turning gray or has black spots it's gone a bit far (you can always cut that chunk off). If it smells ammonia-y, it's iffy. It if smells bad, something went wrong. But hopefully not! You're rewarded with beautiful tempeh that will keep 4-5 days in the fridge, indefinitely in the freezer (don't stack the tempeh bags in the freezer, though, or at least not until they are already frozen, because the live mold will keep fermenting and cause them to overheat)