My ginger bug went from totally dead to bubbling like crazy in 48 hours

I started a ginger bug last Tuesday and the first two days it did absolutely nothing, like zero bubbles, just sad ginger water. I was about to dump it out and start over with store-bought yeast. Then I remembered my neighbor saying ginger from the farmers market is way more alive than the grocery store stuff. Switched to a chunk of organic ginger from the Saturday market and within 48 hours it was fizzing like a soda bottle. Has anyone else noticed a huge difference between grocery store ginger and farmers market ginger for starting a bug?

3 comments

3 Comments

leo_fisher6d agoMost Upvoted

Oh man, that's wild! Here's something nobody's talking about - maybe it's not just the ginger's "rawness" but the specific bacteria living on the skin. Farmers market ginger comes straight from the dirt with all that wild soil bacteria still clinging to it, while grocery store ginger gets washed and sprayed with something to keep it shelf-stable. That spray probably kills off the natural yeast and bacteria on the peel. I tested this once by scrubbing a farmers market ginger chunk really hard versus just rinsing it, and the scrubbed one took twice as long to get going. Have you noticed if the farmers market ginger has more dirt in the crevices?

emma_dixon706d ago

Wait, you actually scrubbed ginger like that for a science experiment?! That's dedication!

elizabeths516d ago

Leo, do you think that dirt on farmers market ginger actually contains the specific microbes kickstarting fermentation?