Eating Cultures

The first thing I learned at the Berkshire Fermentation Festival was the definition of culture. No. This is no reference to art, to social customs, to tribal ideas about justice. Culture is a bundle of microbes that transforms milk into yogurt, flour and water into bread,  coffee beans into a cup of espresso, cabbage into kimchi,  chocolate into a candy bar, dairy into camembert and cheddar, grain into beer, olives into something good to eat (ever try a raw olive?) and soy beans combined with Bacillus subtilis var. natto, into  a viscous (some say slimy) breakfast food credited by some for strengthening the bones of Japanese post-menopausal women.

The fourth year of the Berkshire Fermentation Festival, a “day-long celebration of all things cultured” to achieve “gut health,” opened at the Great Barrington Fairgrounds early Sunday with musicians,  T-shirts urging “Lettuce, Turnup, The Beet;”  guys with lots of hair, pretty women in long skirts and brief tops, children in farm caps, New Yorkers there for the fun of it, and dogs. Lots of dogs, like Mookie, a 125-pound Bernese Mountain Dog who lives in New York City and weekends with his people in Becket, Mass.

Among the 53 vendors were book sellers promoting titles like “A Gut Feeling,” (my favorite), and companies like New Chapter, there to “deliver the wisdom of nature with whole foods and herbs that just incidentally  improve nails, hair and skin,” Lindy Webbe  from Brattleboro, Vt. told me. 

Denise Milano was offering samples of artisanal cheese from grass-fed cows, among them was one cheese she called Nimbus, which was soft, tart, rich and marvelous. During the week Milano drives a school bus but she loves her weekends promoting products from Chaseholm Farm in Pine Plains, N.Y.

Fermenting has probably been practiced for 6,000 or more years, some say. It preserves food and and transforms it into something more interesting, according to Michelle Kaplan, the festival organizer.  “It also promotes good health, good mood and good brain function.”

Among the displays of rosemary- and garlic-flavored ghee  and signs for “Gut health is gut wealth,” and “The amazing real live food company,” there was a table strewn with plucked mushrooms which caught the eye of Locke Larkin, Great Barrington’s health inspector. He wondered why no one was there to supervise the display of amanita mushrooms, one of which with its white cap and gills an observer suspected of being the deadly Destroying Angel, a strange and beautiful sight.                                      

More intriguing yet was a booth devoted to culture swapping. People were invited to contribute their own  mix of microorganisms and try someone else’s. But the most popular site as the day heated up was the beer-making demonstration. A fellow with a sample at hand declared the result, “awesome.”

And lest you get the idea that cultured food is a little bit out there, you know, crunchy and lean, Skyview Farm’s fat grilled sausages on sourdough ciabatta drew very long lines.

Berkshire Ferments, which sponsors the annual Great Barrington Fermentation Festival, describes itself as a collection of fermentation enthusiasts. 

For information, go to berkshireferments.com.