This is a hand made item so designs and colours vary - photographs are for illustration purposes only. Not all mishaps will be inedible, but they can greatly change the flavour and make your results unpredictable.

It's so easy to make your own at home and a ridiculously safe way to add more probiotic foods to your diet. We sell some beautiful handmade fermenting weights made right here in Oakland but for those of you who are more budget sensitive, I have a great alternative. I’ve had the glass fermentation weights slide under and fall to the bottom before…One jar actually had THREE of them.You will receive four of these fermenting weights so you can ferment and preserve different vegetables all at once, so when one vegetable has completed the fermentation process, the others should have too! This is a favorite, particularly if you’re making sauerkraut, since you’ll already have a cabbage core on hand. Making your own DIY fermentation weights is more hassle and they don’t always work great as if they are not heavy enough or the right size ferments can slip around them. This means there are higher nutrient levels in the final product than other preservation methods like canning or dehydrating.

With loose vegetables – as in pickles, the bubbles easily work there way around the vegetables and rise to the surface. During the first week of fermentation, large amounts of water are pulled out of the cabbage cells to create the brine. I purchased cabbage, all from the same grower, and made eight jars of plain sauerkraut, topping each off with a different weight. I like bought these as a present for my husband and he loves these, he said that they definitely make his fermenting process much easier, like OMG my husband is really picky with receiving his gifts so I was so surprised when he went absolutely wild for these glass weights. Water or brine can be used, brine is good if you think the bag may leak as it won’t dilute the brine in the ferment.By keeping your produce under the brine, these weights prevent unwanted mold growth and help achieve a successful, tasty fermentation. Fermentation weights are being made from glass, silicone, plastic and stainless steel each with their own set of pros and cons as I discuss in What materials are safe in the acidic fermentation environment? Food safety also matters so we laboratory test these pickle stones to ensure they are free from lead and heavy metals and safe to use in your sauerkraut and kimchi. The ratings/reviews displayed here may not be representative of every listing on this page, or of every review for these listings.

Weighing your produce down under your salt brine will lessen the chance of mold growth or spoilage to your ferments.Once you�re ready to sample your fermented veg, you can easily grab the weights and lift them out of the jar. Ceramic pie weights – another item that can be used like marbles and placed inside a cloth, or even a mesh bag. My pie-in-the-sky dream is for each and every one of your to “graduate” to fermenting in a 5-liter – or larger – water-sealed fermentation crock. As crocks are a certain size and are not a standard size like jars they often come with weights and airlock lids. These 4 or 5-star reviews represent the opinions of the individuals who posted them and do not reflect the views of Etsy.

A plate – when I ferment in a large crock, I place a plate on top of the vegetables, and then a jar filled with water on top of that to hold it down. To calculate the overall star rating and percentage breakdown by star, we don’t use a simple average. Would you rather put that money towards a fancy-schmancy water-sealed crock that takes fermentation to a whole new level? Is that possible as fermentation slows and the brine is pulled back into the cell walls through osmosis?If you’re fermenting in a large crock, you will have to overlap a few large cabbage leaves to cover your ferment.