A question about tej - Ethiopian honey wine

[buzzerj]

I have my T'ej in the secondary right now. I picked up a 13oz. bag of gesho inchet at a store around the corner. So how could I refuse? I don't boil the gesho. But for this batch I did use a D47 yeast instead. It turned out dry so I sweetened it up with more honey. Maybe on the next batch I'll just use the gesho to supply the yeast.

 

[Rule]

This is my first attempt. I will just start off with a gallon. The video makes it look so easy. I did pick up some D47 yeast. I would rather it not be dry but not too thrilled with the idea of mold either.

 

[BernardSmith]

The D47 will ferment this dry but IMO ( I don't have a particularly demanding sweet tooth) even dry, this mead tastes sufficiently "sweet" because of the gesho. The alcohol is not hot and the mead does not taste "bitter" . It is simply nicely balanced - a little woody? smoky? Not sure how to describe the flavor. It is very drinkable.

 

[Rule]

Started my 1st two gallon batch of Tej lastnight. Sprinkled alittle D47 yeast in. Now all I can do it wait.

 

[Rule]

Tej turned out great. Thanks for all the help

 

[Grant Izmirlian]

I'm thinking that boiling some of the mixture is to break down the sugars in the honey to assist the ferment.

 

[BernardSmith]

Hi Grant - and welcome, but it looks like you are trying to breath life into a thread that last saw life four years ago. Always better to let dead threads rest in peace and begin your own thread. But given the fact that you are trying to resuscitate the dead let me ask you what sugars are you trying to "break down" ? Honey ain't grain and the sugars that comprise honey are all very simple enough for yeast to easily ferment once you dilute the honey so that it is not so concentrated. I guess you could break down simple sugars to carbon, hydrogen and oxygen but yeast don't ferment those elements. But in tej making I suspect that boiling some of the honey has the effect more of increasing the bitterness of the gesho while also killing some of the bacteria that may be involved in the souring.

 

[Grant Izmirlian]

If it was me I would use some sort of packaged yeast.. And mold scares me... But to each his own.

I'm assuming that you mean the white whiskers growing on the sticks. That's not mold. Google dimorphic yeasts. These grow fur when exposed to air and that's how you start the culture. Then you stir them in and ...bingo, fermentation! The only caveat is that unless you add commercial yeast then it's a total crapshoot. You could grow a vinegar cap and end up with a lovely nonalcoholic beverage. That's why we add commercial yeast, lalvin d47 is good. Add the yeast just before the gesho and you shouldn't have any fur.

 

[Raptor99]

@Grant Izmirlian You are responding to a comment made in 2013. But you are not the first to resurrect an old thread.

I read this with interest, because I am always looking for new things to try. Apparently the traditional method for making T'ej includes lacto fermentation: Tej - Wikipedia. I imagine that the flavor would be quite different if you boil the gesho as some do and use a wine yeast. But using natural lacto fermentation and adding wine yeast sounds interesting!

I just checked: gesho will grow as a perennial in my USDA planting zone. Hm...

 

[BernardSmith]

I think that you are almost certainly correct that indigenous gesho contains lacto-bacteria but when the enchet or the kitel is imported I wonder if the wood or leaves are heat treated to kill any possible bugs and the like and so the bacteria are perhaps destroyed... All that aside, I often wondered why the traditional recipes call the the gesho to be added to the honey and allowed to sit for a week or so, before the gesho is boiled... and if the idea was to allow the lactic bacteria to grow in the must (the raw honey would be the most likely source of yeast) then that action makes good sense. If you plan on using processed honey and are therefore more or less dependent on the gesho being your source of yeast that too may suggest the good sense in pitching wine yeast. But even as we resurrect this long time dead thread, I think my next batch of t'ej will be made with raw enchet or kitel.

 

[Raptor99]

Lacto bacteria are present on many garden vegetable. Last year we made fermented pickles vs pickles made in a vinegar brine. We put cucumbers in a salt brine with spices, and within a few weeks the natural lacto bacteria had converted some of the carbs to lactic acid. The pH was around 3.5. Much more delicious than grocery store pickles, with a significantly different flavor. If you like dill pickles, you should try this! Here is a good article on the science of lacto fermentation: The Science of Lactic Acid Fermentation: Pickles, Kraut, Kimchi, and More

It is likely that the lacto bateria are destroyed by the process of drying the gesho, so you would need to use fresh gesho or introduce lacto bacteria from another source. I don't know whether raw honey would include lacto bacteria, but it might.

In traditional Tej, the honey probably provides the sugar while the fresh gesho provides the lacto bacteria. My guess is that they boil it after one week to stop the process, so that it doesn't get too acidic and leaves some residual sugars. This two-stage process is interesting to me, so I might need to give it a try. A short stage of lacto fermentation to provide complex flavors, followed by fermentation by wine yeast. I note from the article above that lacto bacteria will tolerate the presence of oxygen, but will only ferment aerobically. So maybe after a few days you could stir vigorously and add wine yeast. It would be an interesting experiment!

@BigDaveK you can add this to your list!

 

[BernardSmith]

Lacto bacteria are present on many garden vegetable. Last year we made fermented pickles vs pickles made in a vinegar brine. We put cucumbers in a salt brine with spices, and within a few weeks the natural lacto bacteria had converted some of the carbs to lactic acid. The pH was around 3.5. Much more delicious than grocery store pickles, with a significantly different flavor. If you like dill pickles, you should try this! Here is a good article on the science of lacto fermentation: The Science of Lactic Acid Fermentation: Pickles, Kraut, Kimchi, and More

It is likely that the lacto bateria are destroyed by the process of drying the gesho, so you would need to use fresh gesho or introduce lacto bacteria from another source. I don't know whether raw honey would include lacto bacteria, but it might.

In traditional Tej, the honey probably provides the sugar while the fresh gesho provides the lacto bacteria. My guess is that they boil it after one week to stop the process, so that it doesn't get too acidic and leaves some residual sugars. This two-stage process is interesting to me, so I might need to give it a try. A short stage of lacto fermentation to provide complex flavors, followed by fermentation by wine yeast. I note from the article above that lacto bacteria will tolerate the presence of oxygen, but will only ferment aerobically. So maybe after a few days you could stir vigorously and add wine yeast. It would be an interesting experiment!

@BigDaveK you can add this to your list!

Don't forget when (if) you make sourdough bread, the yeast and the lacto bacteria from the flour play together. The problem with sourdough is that the lactic acid from the bacteria will damage the gluten if you allow the starter to age unused. Each time you replace some of the older starter you remove a significant amount of the acidity and so you control the "damage" to the gluten that an overly acidified dough creates. This is why you CAN over-proof sourdough in a way that cannot be repaired; but over-proofing lab yeasted bread does not damage the gluten in such a formidable manner.
That said, I am not certain that boiling say a pint of the tej with all of the gesho will halt the lactic fermentation. The bacteria may come from the wood or the leaves but they are now swimming in the mead.. and you boil only a small amount of the tej. What halts the continued souring is that t'ej was never meant to be aged but was made to be drunk about three weeks after mixing the water and the honey. What stopped the acidifying was that there was none left except the lees that were used to begin the next batch.

 

[BigDaveK]

@BigDaveK you can add this to your list!

Already on my list, buckaroo!
It's mentioned in my Wild Fermentation by Sandor Katz. He's pretty much the fermentation guru. I think every book on fermentation cites him. He mentions coffee-banana T'ej which sounds interesting. But thanks for thinking of me!!

 

[BigDaveK]

Lacto bacteria are present on many garden vegetable. Last year we made fermented pickles vs pickles made in a vinegar brine. We put cucumbers in a salt brine with spices, and within a few weeks the natural lacto bacteria had converted some of the carbs to lactic acid. The pH was around 3.5. Much more delicious than grocery store pickles, with a significantly different flavor. If you like dill pickles, you should try this! Here is a good article on the science of lacto fermentation: The Science of Lactic Acid Fermentation: Pickles, Kraut, Kimchi, and More

I overlooked commenting on this portion of your post. For me it started with sauerkraut about 15 years ago. That led to variations of sauerkraut then other vegetables and finally kimchi. Sandor Katz philosophy is any food can be fermented - hmm, sounds similar to what we say about wine making making ingredients!

As far as fermented dill pickles having a "significantly different flavor" - that's almost an understatement. It's definitely an Oh-My-God experience to bite into one. I usually add a couple grape leaves to the bottom of my crock for the tannin.

Sandor Katz refers to gesho as "woody hops" so I think it's mostly used as a bitter flavoring agent.

 

[Grant Izmirlian]

If it was me I would use some sort of packaged yeast.. And mold scares me... But to each his own.

its not mold-- its a dimorphic wild yeast which grows white fuzz when exposed to oxygen and eats sugar making alcohol when stirred in. You want a bloom on top in about 7 days or so to start the colony. Then you stir it in. Check out Harry Kloman's video "Make Tej at Home"

 

[BernardSmith]

its not mold-- its a dimorphic wild yeast which grows white fuzz when exposed to oxygen and eats sugar making alcohol when stirred in. You want a bloom on top in about 7 days or so to start the colony. Then you stir it in. Check out Harry Kloman's video "Make Tej at Home"

But Harry Kloman, these days suggests that we use lab cultured yeasts - the indigenous yeasts in the honey and on the gesho (assuming the latter have not been killed when imported) can make for a very unpredictable mead. Note that in Ethiopia standard practice is to hold back the lees from the last batch as the starter for the next one and that at least will result in a far more predictable outcome: if you liked the last batch, the yeast in your next batch will likely be very similar.