Wildcrafted Vinegars

Pascal Baudar has long served as an inspiration to me as both a forager and a fermenter. With Wildcrafted Vinegars, he once again delivers on the promise of bringing the outdoors inside. On its surface, this book is a fantastic guide to crafting a whole pantrys worth of staple vinegars and condiments to ameliorate your cooking, but at its core, its a practical call to action through recipes that turn you into an agent of ecological remediation, wherever you might live. A must-have for any avid fermenter!

David Zilber, chef and food scientist; coauthor of the New York Times bestseller The Noma Guide to Fermentation

From apple scraps to mugwort to bountiful berries, Baudar brings vinegar-making past the boundaries of our ordinary home pantries and out into the great wide open. Anything is a possible flavoring here, be it roots, herbs, or stems. As with his other books, Baudar once again enlightens us to the fact that flavor is found from the forest floor to the tips of the trees, and even takes inspiration from humdrum supermarket shelves to make vinegars that shine.

Michael Harlan Turkell, award-winning food photographer, author of Acid Trip: Travels in the World of Vinegar

Pascal Baudar continues to lead his readers down a path that connects them to their landscapes, whether urban or wild, through culinary explorationthis time through the power of sour. Wildcrafted Vinegars is a visually striking invitation to explore flavorful condiments, preserves, and quick pickles from unexpected and often overlooked seeds and weeds.

Kirsten K. Shockey, author of Homebrewed Vinegar, Fermented Vegetables, and other fermentation titles

Wildcrafted Vinegars is another outstanding fermentation guide from Pascal Baudar. With wonderful clarity and a variety of flexible approaches, Pascal simultaneously demystifies the vinegar-making process and inspires the imagination with its infinite possibilities.

Sandor Ellix Katz, fermentation revivalist, author of The Art of Fermentation

Baudars approaches to vinegar making are serious and whimsical at the same time. A true pioneer in the world of fermentation, he is pushing the boundaries on our future food production, while illuminating the past and the very origins of one of the most important products in human history. The wealth of ideas and information contained in Wildcrafted Vinegars cannot be overstated, and this book has a place in every kitchen.

Harry Rosenblum, author of Vinegar Revival

Pascal Baudar has once again tapped into the spirit of the forest and open spaces in this paean to all things pungent. A love letter to Acetobacter in the wild, it will have you thinking about vinegar in a whole new lightnot only as essential in the kitchen but really quite easy to make yourself, too.

Ken Albala, professor of history, University of the Pacific

Having closely followed the musings and teachings of Mr. Baudar through his previous works, I have found that his creations emanate from an uncommon combination of scientific experimentation and culinary curiosity, always showing great reverence for traditional foodways.

In this fun book, Baudar, with his playful spirit of adventure, brings us on yet another creative quest that appeals to both the chef and forager in all of us.

While drawing us into the rarified ancient world of fermentations and Acetobacter (the mothers of vinegar), Baudar also keeps one foot firmly planted in the reality of our modern worlds fragile ecology. A few pages of this book could serve as the most practical guide to vinegar production (including the use of fruit flies to initiate a wild fermentation!), but the remaining pages serve as an invaluable compendium of wild food flavors and recipes.

This book will be a fixture on my kitchen bookshelf where rainy-day culinary projects begin.

Evan Mallett, chef/owner, Black Trumpet Bistro; author of Black Trumpet

Pascal Baudar, long-time wild food forager extraordinaire and vinegar savant, has created a book that will revolutionize the vinegar world. Wildcrafted Vinegars is an acetic AZ of fermentation advice and lore, beautifully illustrated with his helpful photographs, to guide you to new levels of culinary experimentation. As a fellow vinegar maker and lover, it left me totally in awe of his expertise and passion...

Andy Harris, CVO (chief vinegar officer), Vinegar Shed

The New Wildcrafted Cuisine: Exploring the Exotic Gastronomy of Local Terroir

The Wildcrafting Brewer: Creating Unique Drinks and Boozy Concoctions from Natures Ingredients

Wildcrafted Fermentation: Exploring, Transforming, and Preserving the Wild Flavors of Your Local Terroir

Copyright 2022 by Pascal Baudar.

All rights reserved.

Unless otherwise noted, all photographs copyright 2022 by Pascal Baudar.

No part of this book may be transmitted or reproduced in any form by any means without permission in writing from the publisher.

Project Manager: Alexander Bullett

Developmental Editor: Natalie Wallace

Copy Editor: Diane Durrett

Proofreader: Angela Boyle

Indexer: Joel Kaemmerlen

Designer: Melissa Jacobson

First printing October 2022.

v1.111622

Our Commitment to Green Publishing

Chelsea Green sees publishing as a tool for cultural change and ecological stewardship. We strive to align our book manufacturing practices with our editorial mission and to reduce the impact of our business enterprise in the environment. We print our books and catalogs on chlorine-free recycled paper, using vegetable-based inks whenever possible.

ISBN 978-1-64502-114-8 (paperback) | ISBN 978-1-64502-115-5 (ebook)

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available.

Chelsea Green Publishing

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White River Junction, Vermont USA

Somerset House

London, UK

www.chelseagreen.com

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION

Why Vinegars?

After I finished writing my last book, Wildcrafted Fermentation, I had another book idea in mind. I had just purchased an RV with the intention of expanding my horizons by traveling across North America and connecting with like-minded people.

The concept for that next book was to look at environmental issues and explore the possibility of a wildcrafted cuisine that would be beneficial, not just sustainable, for the environment. Sounds incredible, but its actually quite possible.

In Los Angeles, where I lived at the time, I was surrounded by a huge quantity of wild edibles that are considered invasive or non-native, so much so that our local hills turn completely yellow around April due to the large amount of flowering Mediterranean mustard (Hirschfeldia incana) and black mustard (Brassica nigra).