Living on the Edge... with a Goat

A few months ago, I was reading Wild Fermentation: The Flavor, Nutrition, and Craft of Live-Culture Foods. This is the bible of fermented cuisine by Sandor Ellix Katz. Mixed into the recipes for mouthwatering ciders, tempehs, yogurts and vinegars are stories about life in the Short Mountain Sanctuary—"a queer intentional community in the wooded hills of Tennessee".

The first thing I wondered while reading this book is, why don't I live in a queer intentional community in the wooded hills of Tennessee? The second thing I wondered was whether I had the power to create something immortal. My brief quest for a life beyond death was inspired by the chapter on bread. I read there that, "with a little attention, your sourdough starter can live forever."

Of course, I tried. But my own sourdough starter did not live forever. Most distressingly, it kind of…exploded.

Sandor Ellix Katz had never mentioned that combustion was a potential property of the sourdough. I was stunned. My kitchen table was ruined. I thought briefly of a career in international dough terrorism.

Then I remembered the warnings. About how to ferment "live-culture" foods is to cultivate the volatile hyperactivity of certain microorganisms. To whip them into a frenzy. To drive them bananas. And at this point—who knows? You might get a sauerkraut. You might get a cheese. You might—if you're me—get a bomb.

Based on the stories that Sandor Ellix Katz tells, Short Mountain Sanctuary seems like a very friendly place. I imagine it must be. Because where else would permit these crazy experiments? The bread bomb was probably due to my own incompetence at work, but Sandor Ellix Katz takes it way further than a jar of bread dough.

He tells one story in Wild Fermentation about how he once pickled a goat in the community kitchen.

For two weeks, "it bubbled and smelled good."

Then he roasted it. "As it cooked, an overwhelming odor enveloped the kitchen… There was some swooning and near fainting… Perhaps a half dozen of us tried the meat… My fellow communard Mish absolutely loved it. He hovered over the pan for a long time picking at the meat, praising its strong cheesy aroma, and gloating over the rarefied "acquired taste" that only he and a few others could fully appreciate."

I am appalled and yet fascinated. I certainly will not attempt a goat until I have mastered the immortal sourdough. In the meantime, my friend Johanna suggested that someone (else) ought to brew their way through the whole of Wild Fermentation. If anyone is up for this, let me know! I will sniff and taste your concoctions, however moldy and otherwise unstable. I will find a happy home for all of the sauerkraut, kombucha, and beers that you produce. If you are feeling frisky, I will even find you a goat.

By Maya Joseph

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