My old boss insisted on using a single 5-gallon crock for all our kimchi batches, but after a whole batch went slimy in 2021, I switched to using separate 1-gallon jars for each vegetable.

Has anyone else had a major fail that made you completely change your setup like that?

3 comments

3 Comments

My grandma's 10-liter ceramic pot was the family kimchi workhorse for years. We lost a whole winter's supply in 2018 when the bottom seal gave out and let in air... everything turned fizzy and weird. That was the push we needed to stop treating fermentation like a one-pot show. Now we use a bunch of smaller glass jars with the plastic lids that burp. It's not as pretty on the counter, but we haven't had a single batch go bad since we split everything up.

blakem821mo ago

Yeah, that fizzy weirdness @valgibson described is the worst. Splitting into smaller jars just gives you way more control, so if one goes off it's not a total disaster. What size batches do you usually run now?

christophermorgan6d ago

My buddy had the same thing happen with his hot sauce last year, lost about 20 bottles because one big carboy went south. Now he just ferments in old pickle jars and calls it a "fermentation fleet.