Mixing just vegetable juice with salt and water takes but a minute and transforms into a delicious, cultured juice in just a few days. It’s never been easier to make cultured food with widening benefits to the healthy kitchen.
Take almost any vegetable—or just its trimmings—and combine with our simple salt-water brine to create a refreshing, cultured tonic. Fermented non-dairy beverages are the latest evolution in probiotics. Create your own tonics that offer a new way to enjoy cultured foods merely by sipping. And they are easy to supplement to your family members (even your pet dogs and cats!).
Transform just a cup of veggies into a quart of fermented tonic with this new way to create a living, superfood beverage.
No time for pickles? There’s always time for a shot o’ tonics. From seniors to youngsters and even for your pet: all benefit from a little cultured vegetable tonic. Got cultured carrot juice?
Benefits of Fermented Tonics
- It’s great for the juicers, smoothie makers, people in a rush, athletes, kids
- Pets can benefit from a daily shot o’ tonic
- Morning juice booster
- Inexpensive and simple to make
- Sport drink replacement, rich with electrolytes to ease muscle cramping
- Cocktail mixer or refreshing beverage on ice
- Colds, flu, and sore throat gargle
- Digestive relief for heartburn
- Sip while taking antibiotics and while convalescing
- Use as starter for new batch of pickles/juices. Requires no special feeding. Just keep refrigerated
Two Ways to Make Veggie Tonics
Directions:
Tonics from Chopped Veggie
One Quart Recipe
Chop or grate one cup of vegetable—like celery, beets, or cabbage—and add to jar. Mix one quart of filtered water with 2 TBS. sea salt. Add this brine to jar and seal with an airlock kit if you are using, or follow your own sealing method. This is the lacto-ferment method and the veggies need to be under the brine during fermentation.
Your tonic is done in four days.
You can also eat the vegetables or strain to create pure tonic.
*Note: This will be a salty tonic. Like lacto-fermented veggies it is meant for just an ounce or two per day. If you want a less salty tonic you can dilute by up to 100% after fermenting with filtered water, or try sparkling water for a mocktail beverage.
Favorite Chopped Veggie Tonics : Celery, Beet, Fennel, Cabbage, and Spinach with Lemon Zest
Directions:
Tonics from Vegetable Juice
My Faves: Very Veggie, Pure Carrot, and Coconut Water
One Quart Recipe
Add one pint of pure juice: carrot, vegetable medley [aka V-8], or coconut water are my favorites. Then make up a pint of salt-water brine [1 TBS. sea salt combined with 2 cups of filtered water.] In addition, you will need to add 2 TBS. of existing juice tonic or finished brine from previous facto-ferment vegetables; this is the culture starter necessary for only juice tonics. {Chopped veggie tonics have culture already on their skin.)
At a tasting fair I sampled the Very Veggie Tonic with a dash of hot sauce. It was like a Virgin Mary and the crowd lit up. This could be a Bloody Mary or Virgin Mary power drink at a future party.
OPTIONS: After fermentation, consider adding a squeeze of ginger juice, turmeric, to boost flavor and add superfoods to your tonic. The options are yours to invent!
CAVEAT: Avoid lacto-fermenting traditional fruit juices or sweet fruit, it has too much sugar and will not successfully lacto-ferment.
Stay tuned! I will soon share a fermented tart juice tonic. Using only sour cherry, grapefruit, lemon, lime or passion fruit juices, you will be able to enjoy fruit tonics with probiotics and flavors to make cocktails, cocktails, spritzers, and sodas.
Sour Cherry Tartonic >>
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