I swore by open jars until my kimchi volcano

I always thought airlocks were extra stuff I did not need. My big batch of kimchi sat in a sealed jar for a week. One day I opened it and it shot out like a geyser. Now I see why people use those bubbler lids. My kitchen smelled like spicy cabbage for days.

3 comments

3 Comments

the_elizabeth1mo ago

Kimchi needs to let gas out, doesn't it?

taylor_rodriguez1mo ago

Actually saw a whole chapter in a fermentation book about this. It said the bacteria make a ton of carbon dioxide, and if it has no way to escape, the pressure just builds and builds. They called it "burping" your jars, which sounds cute until you're cleaning kimchi off the ceiling. That cleanup must have been a huge mess.

hannahm191mo ago

Forgot to burp my first kimchi jar last summer! Came home to a red splatter pattern all over my kitchen walls. It looked like a crime scene from a spicy movie. Took me hours to scrub the cabbage out of the light fixtures. Now I set phone alarms for burping, but my friends still call me the Kimchi Killer.