over the last couple of years if you
have seen any of the lists of the big
new food trends you might have seen that
fermented foods have been recognized as
a new food trend which actually is quite
absurd because for longer than any of us
have been alive almost everybody in
almost every part of the world eats and
drinks products of fermentation every
single day the the products of
fermentation have enjoyed enduring
popularity and have never gone out of
fashion yeah we could talk about coffee
we could talk about bread we could talk
about cheese we could talk about deer we
could talk about wine you know many of
the greatest delicacies that people
around the world enjoy or products of
fermentation that have never gone out of
style and have not recently just come
into style what has changed is that
there is a growing awareness of the
phenomenon of fermentation and a growing
interest in it fermentation is practiced
everywhere I certainly do not possess
encyclopedic knowledge but I have been
looking for counter examples for many
years now and I cannot find one single
example of a culinary tradition anywhere
that does not incorporate fermentation
anything can be fermented you know
nothing we could possibly eat cannot be
fermented this is a versatile process
that can be applied to any kind of food
we could possibly digest
and people have been fermenting for
literally thousands of years there’s
really nothing new about this phenomenon
the archaeological record tells us that
we can find evidence of fermentation
going back at least 10,000 years and
these are on ancient pottery shards with
residue of alcoholic beverages but you
know that really only tells us about the
history of pottery and the earlier
vessels people use for fermentation were
wood and gourds and other materials that
are biodegradable so you know they they
just have not persisted through time but
but fermentation is an ancient practice
that people everywhere have a practice
and I think that you know recognizing
how old this practice is we can
recognize that you don’t need to know
about biology or microorganisms in order
to practice fermentation and in fact the
practice of fermentation has been
recognized as you know kind of
mysterious and mystical all around the
world because you know there was no you
know known understanding of the
mechanisms of it during the age of
microbiology because most of the
information that we’ve heard about
bacteria and microorganisms leads us to
be afraid of them you know it’s about
the the danger of disease you know we’ve
developed a widespread cultural fear of
bacteria and along with that a fear of
fermentation and so you know the work
that I’ve been engaged in is public
education about fermentation
demystifying this process for people and
helping them understand you know how
simple this process is and what an
effective strategy for food safety it is
microbiology certainly has illuminated
the process of fir
so beginning with the work of Louis
Pasteur about a hundred and fifty years
ago you know he began to recognize the
existence of bacteria and yeasts and
other microorganisms you know and
observe their their activities and for
the first time from the scientific
analysis we began to understand that
fermentation is the transformative
action of microorganisms and one of the
things that microbiology illuminated
about this ancient practice is that
everything we eat all of the plants and
all of the animal products that make up
our food are populated by elaborate
communities of microorganisms everything
we eat has many different kinds of
microorganisms that are part of them and
microbiology also illuminated the fact
that our bodies are the host to a vast
populations of microorganisms you know
every human adult is the host to
somewhere around one trillion
microorganisms these bacteria and other
organisms outnumber our bodily cells by
something like ten to one so in a way we
are bacterial super structures and we
are not alone in this regard you know
every every vegetable every grain every
animal you know all of the things that
make up our food are populated by
similarly elaborate communities of
microorganisms the perspective of
evolutionary biologists is that all life
is descended from bacteria and the other
side of this reality is that no
multicellular form of life has ever
lived without bacteria and we all are
dependent on bacteria for
aspects of our existence and and and our
functionality and what fermentation is
is the transformative action of these
microorganisms now not every
transformative action of microorganisms
results in something delicious that
people want to put into our mouths and
you know in fact most of us are familiar
with the transformative action of
microorganisms from let’s say cleaning
out our refrigerators and the you know
decomposing food that we inevitably find
stuck in the back of the refrigerators
and we oh we don’t call this kind of
food fermented we have a different
vocabulary to talk about that we call it
rotten food or spoiled food and we
reserve this word fermentation to
describe intentional microbial
transformations or at least desirable
microbial transformations but I think
that the fact that we all inevitably
encounter unappealing decomposing food
in the back of the refrigerator gives us
some insight into the inevitability of
microbial transformation of our food as
I mentioned earlier everything we eat is
populated by many different kinds of
microorganisms so really the you know
the primary objective of fermentation is
to guide that microbial development so
that we encourage the growth of certain
kinds of organisms and at the same time
we discourage the growth of other kinds
of organisms and we do this by
manipulating environmental conditions so
the practice of fermentation really
amounts to manipulations of
environmental conditions in order to
encourage the growth of certain
organisms and simultaneously discourage
the growth of other kinds of organisms
there’s always a practical benefit to
fermentation the food is not decomposing
and we are creating alcohol we’re making
food that is more stable than the raw
product
agriculture that we began with we’re
creating something that is more
delicious we’re creating something
that’s more easily digestible we’re
creating something where some toxic
compound in the food is broken down and
the otherwise dangerous food is made
safe and the other you know great
practical benefit that’s being revealed
to us really for the first time in our
lifetimes is the the benefit of eating
the bacteria themselves you know because
all of us have lived our lives in the
midst of the war on bacteria which
includes antibiotic drugs and
antibacterial cleansing products and
chlorinated water these are all chemical
compounds designed to kill bacteria and
when we when we have contact with these
compounds which we all inevitably do it
has the effect of narrowing the
diversity of bacteria in our intestines
if they were to kill all those
microorganisms we couldn’t possibly
exist because we rely on these
microorganisms for our digestion we rely
on these microorganisms that are part of
our body for what we call our immune
systems our ability to withstand disease
and new research in the last few years
is revealing that our brain chemistry
serotonin and other chemical compounds
that determine how we think and how we
feel are regulated by bacteria and our
intestines and yet this chemical
exposure that we all inevitably have
narrows biodiversity inside of us
typically people think about
biodiversity as you know a phenomenon
that affects the forests and the oceans
and and certainly that is important but
we have to recognize that biodiversity
also exists within us and our health and
our well-being are related to the health
and diversity of bacterial populations
in our intestines and one of the
greatest benefits that we can get
eating fermented foods and drinking
fermented beverages is the bacteria
themselves now of course not all
fermented foods or beverages have live
bacteria if they’re cooked or heat
processed the bacteria perished or due
to heat but but with growing recognition
of this many people are seeking out
living fermented foods fermented foods
that have not been cooked or heat
processed precisely in order to ingest
bacteria generally we we’re ingesting
elaborate communities of bacteria and
this is what is commonly called
probiotics is so it’s really a strategy
for helping to restore biodiversity in
our intestines fermentation is also used
in a metaphorical sense and I just want
to talk for a moment about the word
fermentation fermentation comes from the
Latin ther very which means to boil and
it’s because the visible action of
fermentation is bubbles bubbles of
carbon dioxide that will rise in your
fermenting beer or your fermenting wine
the bubbles remind people of the bubbles
that rise in boiling liquids so
fermentation has always been viewed as a
form of a cold boiling or cold cold
cooking you know transforming food and
producing these bubbles without using
heat but when people talk about
fermentation in a metaphorical sense
when they’re talking about the
fermentation of culture or political
fermentation or intellectual
fermentation or spiritual fermentation
they’re also talking about bubbles
except that instead of literal bubbles
of carbon dioxide rising in liquids
they’re talking about bubbles of
excitement when people are excited about
ideas and they want to share those ideas
people get bubbly they want to talk
about them they want to you know share
the ideas that are making them excited
with their friends and with
families to conclude I just want to
point out that in addition to being this
important mode of transformation of
foods and beverages which enables people
to make effective use of the food
resources that are available to them
fermentation is also an engine of social
change and all of us are the starter
cultures thank you
[Applause]
have seen any of the lists of the big
new food trends you might have seen that
fermented foods have been recognized as
a new food trend which actually is quite
absurd because for longer than any of us
have been alive almost everybody in
almost every part of the world eats and
drinks products of fermentation every
single day the the products of
fermentation have enjoyed enduring
popularity and have never gone out of
fashion yeah we could talk about coffee
we could talk about bread we could talk
about cheese we could talk about deer we
could talk about wine you know many of
the greatest delicacies that people
around the world enjoy or products of
fermentation that have never gone out of
style and have not recently just come
into style what has changed is that
there is a growing awareness of the
phenomenon of fermentation and a growing
interest in it fermentation is practiced
everywhere I certainly do not possess
encyclopedic knowledge but I have been
looking for counter examples for many
years now and I cannot find one single
example of a culinary tradition anywhere
that does not incorporate fermentation
anything can be fermented you know
nothing we could possibly eat cannot be
fermented this is a versatile process
that can be applied to any kind of food
we could possibly digest
and people have been fermenting for
literally thousands of years there’s
really nothing new about this phenomenon
the archaeological record tells us that
we can find evidence of fermentation
going back at least 10,000 years and
these are on ancient pottery shards with
residue of alcoholic beverages but you
know that really only tells us about the
history of pottery and the earlier
vessels people use for fermentation were
wood and gourds and other materials that
are biodegradable so you know they they
just have not persisted through time but
but fermentation is an ancient practice
that people everywhere have a practice
and I think that you know recognizing
how old this practice is we can
recognize that you don’t need to know
about biology or microorganisms in order
to practice fermentation and in fact the
practice of fermentation has been
recognized as you know kind of
mysterious and mystical all around the
world because you know there was no you
know known understanding of the
mechanisms of it during the age of
microbiology because most of the
information that we’ve heard about
bacteria and microorganisms leads us to
be afraid of them you know it’s about
the the danger of disease you know we’ve
developed a widespread cultural fear of
bacteria and along with that a fear of
fermentation and so you know the work
that I’ve been engaged in is public
education about fermentation
demystifying this process for people and
helping them understand you know how
simple this process is and what an
effective strategy for food safety it is
microbiology certainly has illuminated
the process of fir
so beginning with the work of Louis
Pasteur about a hundred and fifty years
ago you know he began to recognize the
existence of bacteria and yeasts and
other microorganisms you know and
observe their their activities and for
the first time from the scientific
analysis we began to understand that
fermentation is the transformative
action of microorganisms and one of the
things that microbiology illuminated
about this ancient practice is that
everything we eat all of the plants and
all of the animal products that make up
our food are populated by elaborate
communities of microorganisms everything
we eat has many different kinds of
microorganisms that are part of them and
microbiology also illuminated the fact
that our bodies are the host to a vast
populations of microorganisms you know
every human adult is the host to
somewhere around one trillion
microorganisms these bacteria and other
organisms outnumber our bodily cells by
something like ten to one so in a way we
are bacterial super structures and we
are not alone in this regard you know
every every vegetable every grain every
animal you know all of the things that
make up our food are populated by
similarly elaborate communities of
microorganisms the perspective of
evolutionary biologists is that all life
is descended from bacteria and the other
side of this reality is that no
multicellular form of life has ever
lived without bacteria and we all are
dependent on bacteria for
aspects of our existence and and and our
functionality and what fermentation is
is the transformative action of these
microorganisms now not every
transformative action of microorganisms
results in something delicious that
people want to put into our mouths and
you know in fact most of us are familiar
with the transformative action of
microorganisms from let’s say cleaning
out our refrigerators and the you know
decomposing food that we inevitably find
stuck in the back of the refrigerators
and we oh we don’t call this kind of
food fermented we have a different
vocabulary to talk about that we call it
rotten food or spoiled food and we
reserve this word fermentation to
describe intentional microbial
transformations or at least desirable
microbial transformations but I think
that the fact that we all inevitably
encounter unappealing decomposing food
in the back of the refrigerator gives us
some insight into the inevitability of
microbial transformation of our food as
I mentioned earlier everything we eat is
populated by many different kinds of
microorganisms so really the you know
the primary objective of fermentation is
to guide that microbial development so
that we encourage the growth of certain
kinds of organisms and at the same time
we discourage the growth of other kinds
of organisms and we do this by
manipulating environmental conditions so
the practice of fermentation really
amounts to manipulations of
environmental conditions in order to
encourage the growth of certain
organisms and simultaneously discourage
the growth of other kinds of organisms
there’s always a practical benefit to
fermentation the food is not decomposing
and we are creating alcohol we’re making
food that is more stable than the raw
product
agriculture that we began with we’re
creating something that is more
delicious we’re creating something
that’s more easily digestible we’re
creating something where some toxic
compound in the food is broken down and
the otherwise dangerous food is made
safe and the other you know great
practical benefit that’s being revealed
to us really for the first time in our
lifetimes is the the benefit of eating
the bacteria themselves you know because
all of us have lived our lives in the
midst of the war on bacteria which
includes antibiotic drugs and
antibacterial cleansing products and
chlorinated water these are all chemical
compounds designed to kill bacteria and
when we when we have contact with these
compounds which we all inevitably do it
has the effect of narrowing the
diversity of bacteria in our intestines
if they were to kill all those
microorganisms we couldn’t possibly
exist because we rely on these
microorganisms for our digestion we rely
on these microorganisms that are part of
our body for what we call our immune
systems our ability to withstand disease
and new research in the last few years
is revealing that our brain chemistry
serotonin and other chemical compounds
that determine how we think and how we
feel are regulated by bacteria and our
intestines and yet this chemical
exposure that we all inevitably have
narrows biodiversity inside of us
typically people think about
biodiversity as you know a phenomenon
that affects the forests and the oceans
and and certainly that is important but
we have to recognize that biodiversity
also exists within us and our health and
our well-being are related to the health
and diversity of bacterial populations
in our intestines and one of the
greatest benefits that we can get
eating fermented foods and drinking
fermented beverages is the bacteria
themselves now of course not all
fermented foods or beverages have live
bacteria if they’re cooked or heat
processed the bacteria perished or due
to heat but but with growing recognition
of this many people are seeking out
living fermented foods fermented foods
that have not been cooked or heat
processed precisely in order to ingest
bacteria generally we we’re ingesting
elaborate communities of bacteria and
this is what is commonly called
probiotics is so it’s really a strategy
for helping to restore biodiversity in
our intestines fermentation is also used
in a metaphorical sense and I just want
to talk for a moment about the word
fermentation fermentation comes from the
Latin ther very which means to boil and
it’s because the visible action of
fermentation is bubbles bubbles of
carbon dioxide that will rise in your
fermenting beer or your fermenting wine
the bubbles remind people of the bubbles
that rise in boiling liquids so
fermentation has always been viewed as a
form of a cold boiling or cold cold
cooking you know transforming food and
producing these bubbles without using
heat but when people talk about
fermentation in a metaphorical sense
when they’re talking about the
fermentation of culture or political
fermentation or intellectual
fermentation or spiritual fermentation
they’re also talking about bubbles
except that instead of literal bubbles
of carbon dioxide rising in liquids
they’re talking about bubbles of
excitement when people are excited about
ideas and they want to share those ideas
people get bubbly they want to talk
about them they want to you know share
the ideas that are making them excited
with their friends and with
families to conclude I just want to
point out that in addition to being this
important mode of transformation of
foods and beverages which enables people
to make effective use of the food
resources that are available to them
fermentation is also an engine of social
change and all of us are the starter
cultures thank you
[Applause]
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